StrongerSample

Brokenness—A Strange Kind of Blessing 

To be human is to be broken. Bones break. Hearts break. Wills break. Spirits break. Waves break also . . . sometimes over us and sometimes against us. The day breaks too, but the nights are so very long. And once we taste the bitter salt of the waves, we are awakened to the fact that the world itself, even in its staggering beauty, is so very broken. The world didn’t break because we finally tasted our own weakness; rather, we see our pain illuminated in the world and recognize that it was always broken.

What I believe is this: that the God offered to us in Jesus of Nazareth was broken for us and was torn in all the ways we are tearing. And that somehow, mysteriously, we connect with God from where we are. As hard as it is for us to comprehend right now, entering the pain of our deficits is actually the path to strength and wholeness.

I struggled to find my way as waves of loss continued to crash against me. Words from Second Corinthians carried me through my dark night. I find it one of the most fascinating books in the New Testament because the apostle Paul wrote it from his place of brokenness. Throughout this letter, we’re given the heart of a weathered, lovesick apostle, hanging on because of the people he so desperately cared for.

Paul’s pedigree was like nobody else’s and his accomplishments a mile long. He could have leveraged these credentials to convince the Corinthians that he was the one they should listen to. Instead, Paul did the strangest thing: he kept talking about his weakness. He put his weaknesses on display for all to see.

Scripture shows how Paul arrived at the place of embracing his brokenness as a benefit—a blessing: “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us” (2 Corinthians 4:6-7).

Whatever broken place you are in, God meets you there. The very thing we think might kill us has an odd way of bringing us to life.

When are you most broken? What do you do in that moment? Do you escape or embrace? Please embrace what is hard, so that God’s light shines through you.