One of the hardest things for us to accept is that in God’s kingdom, strength often comes through brokenness. None of us like being broken. We want to be whole; we strive for wholeness and completeness. We want to be strong. The world tells us that we can only be strong if we put ourselves first and trample over everyone who stands in our way. It tells us that strength comes through power and often we like the many stories of God’s power that we read in the Bible and feel frustrated if these things are not being replicated in our own lives. But if our Saviour chose the way of strength through brokenness, we cannot expect our path to be any different.
Nicholas Darrow, a character in the Susan Howatch novel ‘A Question of Integrity’, is a Christian priest with a strong healing ministry. In this novel, we see him learning some very, very painful lessons about life and relationships and at the end of the book he says ‘I have this unusual ministry among the sick and the broken, and now that I’ve been sick and I’ve been broken I should have a new solidarity with those I try to help. Wonder-workers are never sick and broken, of course. Wonder-workers never fail. But a Christian priest acquires strength through weakness and power through vulnerability.’ (‘A Question of Integrity’, P 611)
Our lives often look like shattered pieces of glass. We feel broken into pieces and wonder how God can ever use us in this state. But He is the One who, having been broken Himself, understands brokenness and is able to assemble ‘all our broken, shattered pieces’ making of them something beautiful. (‘Long Live The King’, Aaron Shust) He carries the scars of the cross even with Him into eternity. Brokenness is no barrier to receiving God’s strength. As Rend Collective sing ‘Though I’m broken, I am running into Your arms of love.’ (‘Joy’) When we are broken at God’s feet in worship like an alabaster jar with the fragrant perfume running out, we are in the place where His strength can be poured into us and His strong arms can pick us up and we can be carried to new places. Nehemiah reminded the people that ‘the joy of the Lord is your strength.’ (Neh 8:10) As we realise afresh our brokenness but realise afresh also the depth of God’s love and mercy towards us, we gain strength to rise.
Graham Kendrick’s song ‘Meekness and Majesty‘ shows us the paradox of our Saviour’s combination of strength and weakness and helps us to see that we too can only ‘conquer through sacrifice’:
‘Meekness and majesty,
Manhood and Deity,
In perfect harmony,
The Man who is God.
Lord of eternity
Dwells in humanity,
Kneels in humility
And washes our feet.
Father’s pure radiance,
Perfect in innocence,
Yet learns obedience
To death on a cross.
Suffering to give us life,
Conquering through sacrifice,
And as they crucify
Prays: ‘Father forgive.’
Wisdom unsearchable,
God the invisible,
Love indestructible
In frailty appears.
Lord of infinity,
Stooping so tenderly,
Lifts our humanity
To the heights of His throne.’