Brokenness To Blessedness

Have you ever felt broken? Has something happened in your life that has left you feeling completely hopeless? Perhaps you’ve lost a loved one and the void in your life has left you feeling broken. Or maybe you’ve just lost your job and there doesn’t seem to be a new opportunity within reach.

I have a dear friend who battles every day a rare and complicated form of cancer. I didn’t know her when she was actually diagnosed. We met several months later and that’s when I learned about her disease. This cancer is so complicated that at the time she was diagnosed, MD Anderson actually turned her away. This hospital, as many of you know, is one of the leading cancer facilities in the world. Personally, I have never faced cancer so I cannot begin to comprehend how broken she felt when she learned of this disease. Her brokenness stemmed from a loss of hope and confusion over why this was happening to her. I remember when she shared with me all that she had been through. I could tell by her voice that although she felt defeated at times, she would continue to fight until her last breath.

Despite what the doctors believed, my dear friend is still alive today and what we’ve both learned is as she continues to fight for her life, cancer doesn’t have a claim on her life. As her disease worsens, her faith strengthens. I can’t explain it but I have had the privilege of watching from the sidelines the blessings she pours out to all who come into her life. I asked her if she truly felt God’s blessing throughout this ordeal and was simply amazed by her response. She said to me that not only had she been blessed, but in many ways, she had already been healed. Every day, my friend has to get out of bed, be a mom, and has several doctor appointments in any given week. The medicine alone leaves her tired and feeling nauseated, yet her brokenness has been healed through God’s blessedness.

When we face brokenness, that’s when we can experience God’s love and strength in our lives. When we’ve reached a point of acknowledging there’s no human solution to our problems, this can become the most divine moment to be seized.
Nobody likes to talk about death and as a result, it’s the one event that we are so unprepared to face. Yet death is inevitable and how we choose to face it can be the most significant decision in our life. Death is often what makes us feel so broken. My family has lost loved ones and the grieving is very painful and devastating. But with each loss, we have experienced the transition from brokenness to blessedness because of our faith in Jesus Christ.

Jesus died on the cross but that wasn’t the end of the story. Jesus ascended into heaven and lives today so that we as Christians can know that even death doesn’t hold a claim on our lives. Death is nothing more than the passageway to a new life through Christ our Lord. When we allow God into our brokenness, He mends our hearts with His blessedness and for many this becomes the moment when we experience what it means to be His Beloved.
May today we seek God in our brokenness. When we do this, the healing of our hearts begins and like my dear friend, that’s when we’re able to become a blessing for others.

"I waited patiently for the Lord;he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the Lord."

(Psalm 40:1-3)