Brokenness.
It’s a word I have carried in my chest for several years now. It’s a word I see when I look in the mirror and at the world around me.
Sometimes it is all I can see. I close my eyes and imagine shattered pottery, the jagged edges slicing the tender chambers of my heart.
I think it is a battle we all must fight in varying degrees throughout our lives. Each sin we commit chips off another piece of masterfully molded vessels, the shards digging into flesh. Worse yet, sins committed against us splinter into our hearts and minds, drawing blood. Scars form that never heal correctly.
We carry the weight of our own deserved consequences. Our sin breaks off more and more of who we were created to be, leaving us fragile and unsure whether we can accomplish the tasks we are destined for. The weight of this reality is humbling and terrifying.
But what do we do when the outcomes of others’ jagged edges tear into us? At least when we see our own sin, we can stare into the mirror with some level of acceptance knowing we made the mess ourselves.
How can we move forward when we are crippled by the stabbing of another? We collect the pieces of our broken hearts and bodies like discarded seashells dug from the sand, unable to imagine what their original shape must have been based on their current state.
The burden of these realities knocks the wind out of me more often than I’d like to admit. The distant memories of myself in a more intact state are so faint they are hard to recall.
I see the brokenness in my life, but when I lift my eyes to survey the scene around me, I notice that everyone else is on the shoreline too, gathering the jagged shells of their own lives as well. None of us are spared the devastation of sin- our own and others’.
Robert Anton Wilson, a man who did not claim Christianity and in fact strongly opposed it, offers an interesting perspective. “Under the present brutal and primitive conditions on this planet, every person you meet should be regarded as one of the walking wounded. We have never seen a man or woman not slightly deranged by either anxiety or grief. We have never seen a totally sane human being.”
Unlike Wilson, if we can somehow shift our focus from the throbbing pain to logical analysis, it doesn’t take long to come to the conclusion that things were not meant to be this way. Surely we were created for something entirely different. The pain inflicted on our innermost hearts all stems from various forms of wrongdoing, something not intended in the creation of our world.
Our bodies and minds were not made with the ability to carry weight this heavy. The breakdown of the created world starts immediately with the introduction of sin. Our bodies age and decay under its burden, something they were not originally meant to do.
Our minds do the same. A human brain can only endure so many painful or traumatic events before it begins to alter under the impact. We become susceptible to all forms of physical and mental illness, a consequence of wickedness existing in our world.
This is not to say that all difficulties and sickness are a direct punishment for our own sin. Just as an ecosystem is forever changed by the introduction of a new species of plant or animal, the universe was altered when sin entered. Now we carry the destruction in our very bones.
It takes bravery to assess the state of the world and not succumb to the devastation of it all.
If we close our eyes and listen in silence, we can hear the whisperings of another world- God’s Spirit beckoning us to turn from the destruction to gaze upon His holiness.
He alone is whole. And thus is the only Being capable of reaching His hand into the pit of our lives.
All throughout Scripture God promises His justice for the wronged (Proverbs 21:15). He calls those poor in spirit blessed (Matthew 5:3). He promises to be close to the brokenhearted (Psalm 34:18). These are the truths offered to us as others wrong us in horrifying ways.
And still we must deal with the consequences of our own sin atop the attacks of others.
“Or which of my creditors is it to whom I have sold you? Behold, for your iniquities you were sold.”
Isaiah 50:1
The people are grumbling under the weight of God’s severity with them. And He questions them.
He challenges them to give evidence that it is He who has turned from them, and not the reverse. He has not sold them off to receive payment for their debts. It is the people who have chased after their own wrongdoings; their punishments for their actions are deserved. There is no one else to point their fingers at but themselves.
God says their consequences are because of their “iniquities, for the pleasure of them and the gratification of [their] own base lusts [they have] sold [themselves]” into slavery and “when God chastens His children, it is neither for His pleasure nor for His profit.” (Matthew Henry)
God tells them in the following verses that He “came and offered them His favor, offered them His helping hand, either to prevent their trouble or to deliver them out of it, but they slighted Him and all the tenders of His grace.” (Matthew Henry)
“Why, when I came, was there no man; why, when I called was there no one to answer?”
Isaiah 50:2
Note the similarities here between God looking for the hiding Adam in the garden after his sin.
God answers His own questions with a verse that has haunted my thoughts for several months now.
“Is My hand shortened, that it cannot redeem? Or have I no power to deliver?”
Isaiah 50:2
“Can any limits be set to omnipotence? Cannot He redeem Who is the great Redeemer?” (Matthew Henry)
God proves Himself both as powerful to save as He is willing to save. He is actively seeking out those in the pit, ready to pull out with the strength of His arm. With only an utterance of words, He parts waters, raises the dead, and calms the waves.
We cannot stare at this scene of the Mighty Rescuer and ignore the intensity of His patience.
His patience rides on the coattails of His lovingkindness, wanting not any to perish but all to find eternal life.
“The Lord is not slow to fulfill His promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”
2 Peter 3:9
Indeed, He delays His return even now out of immeasurable patience, refusing to leave any behind who would turn to call upon His name.
It is my own natural human, but still foolish, visual that cannot see the tapestry He weaves over the generations while I hold a mere thread in my hands. I see the concerns in my life, and the lives of those around me, and they are crushing.
And late in the night, my heart screams out, “But is Your arm too short to ransom this?” This monumental problem that towers over my height shadows me in fear. And yet I question the very One Who uses the earth as His footstool (Isaiah 66:1).
His patience and lovingkindness flow like a river as He beckons me back to the grounding truths of this Savior who ransoms- Who ransoms even me.
While my emotions tell me God has not, and therefore will not redeem the entirety of the brokenness, I cannot allow my feelings to dictate truth. My mind must hold the scepter of my will, certainly bending to listen to the call of my feelings. But my mind cannot cast judgment on emotion alone.
This is why, dear sojourner, it is imperative that we feed our minds a constant diet of truth. Else it will succumb to the rumblings of a starving stomach gurgling with emotion.
Paul cautions us severely to take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ. (2 Corinthians 10:5). If our emotion- swayed thoughts will not bow before the King, we must force their knee to bend.
This is not to say that our emotions, which are a gift graciously given to us by God, serve no purpose. They signal injustice, sound the alarm for danger, and beckon us to grieve instead of stuffing pain into the cells of our body. But they must not rule over us.
So if today you find yourself also wondering if God’s arm is too short to ransom whatever predicament you stare in the eye, preach to your heart. Remind your mind of the truth of God’s goodness, His lovingkindess, and His desire to make all things right. “Salvation belongs to the Lord.” Jonah 2:9
I’ll leave you with one of my absolute favorite quotes from Spurgeon.
This is a season of crawling over jagged shells buried in the sand, and I am honored to sift through this part of the journey with you as we longingly await the righting of all things.
Why is it we feel the need to hang on to the wrongs done to us. Why is it easier to remember the wrong and keep it closer to our chest and hug it or in our pocket to pull it out at another time to look at it again and re-live the hurt and unhappiness. Thank you for your insight and painting with words the joy we can have with the Creator if we just believe and let go of our doubts that He can take care of us. It is an ongoing battle but your putting into words that we are not alone is encouraging.
I think there are 2 major possibilities in those situations.
1 is we are willfully choosing unforgiveness and bitterness.
2 is that when a significant enough situation happens, the brain stores it in the incorrect spot. This is what leads to trauma wounds, PTSD, and such. When something triggers a subconscious memory of the event, the body will respond as if it is happening again in the current moment. It isn’t a controllable response, but can be healed with lots of hard work- usually with a therapist.