BROKEN...

On Easter evening, we celebrated the Lord’s Supper with our congregation, and when it was my turn to take the unleavened bread, the server held the silver tray before me and whispered, “This is the Lord’s body…that was broken for you…

Broken for me? Yes…He was broken.

I will admit; over the years, my heart has been broken―more than once. I am human like anyone else. I cry, I bleed, and I feel. How could I have thought that my heart would not be broken, that I would always be strong, that God would not allow me to experience brokenness―helplessness? Could I expect to be different?

When a loved one dies, when your children suffer, when someone you love goes astray, your heart may break. But His heart and body were broken. He understands heartache. He knows.

I understand in a deeper sense the meaning of His brokenness. His body was broken and He was broken in heart. He wept over Jerusalem, over lost humankind. He suffered; He bled; He died…and I am not alone. From my brokenness, I find strength in Him. I become more aware of others, their pain. I seek to offer compassion.

If we are never broken, we cannot be mended by the master Potter who knows just how to mend a broken vessel. A heart never broken will never understand that we can be made whole again. It is an enlightening and encouraging reality. Our Lord understands brokenness. From the chards of our shattered heart, He picks us up the pieces and lays them on the potter’s wheel. The potter knows the clay. He will make us whole again.

Then I went down to the potter's house, and, behold, he wrought a work on the wheels. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it. Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying, cannot I do with you as this potter? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are ye in mine hand…

Jer. 18:3-6

©ruthellinge5/2011