Broken, wounded world...

Since the lesson I'm working on for this Saturday for the high schoolers, is about "Jesus Christ as a Healer", I've been reflecting a lot about the topic of "brokenness". It's a very Christian-ese term that I think sometimes get thrown around too much without people really thinking about what the word really means - that our world is broken, shattered - it doesn't work the way that its Creator intended it to work.

In a perfect world, everybody would marry their first crush, have two loving parents and a loving family, work a job they enjoy, etc... but the world we live in is harsh, cruel, darkly ironic... and very tragic. Part of our God-given sense tells us things aren't how they should be, and we do our best to pick up the pieces, an exercise that often ends in futility because we refuse to recognize the place that God has in helping us do just that - fixing the brokenness.

Broken people, with jury-rigged lives and busted dreams - everyone carries their wounds, their own baggage and problems - we compare ours to other people's, and sometimes they look bigger, sometimes they look smaller - but they're still heavy for us to carry. Our lungs burn for fresh air, our muscles ache, and our eyes leak tears... but when we hit our breaking point, what will we do?

Deny it even hurts, lie to ourselves? Throw ourselves into superficial romantic affairs, busy jobs, or a meaningless hobby? Lose ourselves in the bottle or a haze of smoke? Wrap a rope around our necks or stick the cold barrel of a 9mm in our mouths? Or just give up all together and resign ourselves to lives of sadness, unfulfillment, mediocrity, rage, and bitterness?

Or maybe, just maybe... we find the strength to call out to the one who made us, who desperately wants us to return to Him. Maybe we'll find the strength to seek out He who waits patiently, who with a love so divine and infinite, concieved a gift for humanity that we probably never will fathom - grace, nursed by the hope that even when we are free to choose every other thing in this world, we will still choose Him.

Many times, I've teetered on the line, and have fallen on both sides.

Here's a prayer for everyone else who is too: May you cry out, and may your cry be answered.
posted by G at 2:20 AM   |

in?scrip?tion (n-skrip-shun)n.
1. The act or an instance of inscribing.
2. Something, such as the wording on a coin, medal, monument, or seal, that is inscribed.
3. A short, signed message in a book or on a photograph given as a gift.
4. The usually informal dedication of an artistic work.
5. Jeremiah 31:33