Day 4: Dare to dream: Brokenness – when it’s helpful, when it’s harmful

This passage in Isaiah 53 pulls no punches. It’s graphic in its description of the physical and mental anguish Jesus experienced on earth. Then it turns the suffering on its head and evokes the amazing, life-giving, powerful restoration for which Jesus’ affliction paved the way.

The gospel of Jesus is one of pain and sorrow as well as victory and triumph. Even in the case of Lazarus, Jesus experienced great emotional pain before he raised Lazarus from the dead. We see him experiencing the devastation of loss and bereavement before restoring the loved brother to life.

Jesus was broken for our sins, but he did not stay broken. He needed to be injured and to die in order for God’s purposes to be complete, but then he came back to life, conquering death completely. How wonderful!

I experienced painful personal breakdown as I worked with some of the most marginalised women in society. My emotional reaction to their suffering was too much to cope with, and I felt inadequate. I was trying to make everything OK out of my own strength. I had to come to a point of complete brokenness to see that. But God healed me, restored me, and made me whole. Then was I able to minister to others effectively.

You can’t help hurting people if you are immune to their pain – but you also can’t help if you’re so affected by their pain that you become incapacitated.

Even after being held and healed by God, the experience and memory of that brokenness stayed with me. I continued, often, to feel extreme personal heartache and grief associated with the work I did and the pain I saw day after day. But this brokenness no longer crushed me. Indeed, it helped me connect with hurting people because I saw that they were like me – broken but loved by a God who could make them whole.

Reflect: Have you let God break your heart about the pain and need in the world? How can you keep yourself whole and rely on him whilst letting your broken heart identify with those hurting?

Prayer: Dear Lord, help me walk this balance. Continue to make me whole through your restorative love, and keep me broken so that I am open and useful – loving people through your strength and seeing them as equals in this broken world you love so much.