Did you ever feel like your heart was fragmented like this window? Smashed! Shattered! Unfixable! Thousands of shards. You can't find all the pieces and however can you put them all back together? Every time you try to put the pieces together, the pain keeps cutting deeper. You feel so alone. You want to find God and wonder if he even exists. Maybe there is no God....but if there is no God, then there is no help. So you struggle on.
I know what that feels like. My husband & I were part of a small missions team. We met with Christians in the Communist countries to see what they needed. We made many trips bringing money, food, Bibles & medicine. We were a lifeline of support to these dear people. We would have continued in the work, but were forced to leave. Our mission & supporting church didn't want us any more. We were not able to live up to their image and we were accused with lies. What happens when the truth doesn't matter? What happens when you just can't measure up? We left broken. Broken heart, broken life, broken pieces.
I struggled for many years to make sense of it all. I wanted to serve God, yet the religious threw me out. God was able to break through the years of brainwashing from the Christian school & church. God unraveled the lies in my head. I looked at my precious kids, thinking about how much I loved them and it dawned on me. Why do I love my kids more than God loves me? Is it possible that I don't see God rightly? Is is possible that the Preachers that told me that I wasn't valued by God were lying? What if, in spite of all the religious training I had and all the truth I'd been taught, what if God was actually something more? And so began my journey....
Years later, we were able to go back to a church in Hungary. There was a visiting American preacher, preaching to the people. "God doesn't want broken people! God only wants you if you are successful! Look at how God used me!!! I'm successful!" Gag, Choke...Cough...I almost threw up! Talk about triggering anger. My temper flared. I wanted to scream at him, "HOW DARE YOU! YOU ARE NOTHING MORE THAN A SELF-RIGHTEOUS POMPOUS PIG! You understand nothing of the breath & depth of the love of God" A song kept going through my head, "Only, only when we're broken, can be made whole, Only, only when we're empty, can we be made full".
After church we went back to my friend's house. Walking around the corner, I saw this broken, smashed window. I stopped and stared...............OMG!! Whoever broke it thought it was destroyed, but I saw something different. I saw beautiful shapes, different layers, colors around the spectrum, pieces fallen, pieces holding on refusing to let go, shards of beauty, sparkles of light, glimmers of hope, and a special reflection of beauty in it. Had this window been perfect, I would never have noticed it. I would not have taken this picture. This window reminded me of when I left. Physically & emotionally broken. God took what Satan meant to destroy and He twisted it into a victory. I felt abandoned, but I wasn't. He was there all the time, but I was blind and couldn't see Him.
In halting English, my friend asked me what I thought of the visiting preacher. I thought back on my broken life and the pain I went through. I told them that God's love is much deeper and broader than we can imagine, and YES God does love broken people.
