I HAVE A QUESTION!

Does Gods process of making something beautiful that previously was broken
... always mean that the beautiful thing is no longer broken? 
... ever mean that the beautiful thing is no longer broken?

Or instead does the brokenness of our lives simply provide the backdrop onto which we paint the colours of our walk and journey through life?

Recently, I have been watching an individual deal with the loss of  family...  passions and relationships. BROKEN would be a kind way to describe the difficult pathway that is being walked. BROKEN to the point where no vision for hope or reconciliation is anywhere on the horizon. 

For the past 36 years I have been in the front row as I have watched my sister struggle through mental illness and depression, BROKEN. I was there as my mom and dad loaded us all up into the station wagon and we headed down the sawdust trail, ( an old reference to the camp meetings ) in the hope that a person of faith would impart into my sister the freedom and restoration that she clearly needed. Yet no healing was precept-ably given, no new sister emerged, no "healing or deliverance occurred... complete with restored memories and refreshed intellect... and yet...

For my entire life I have been carrying around the design flaw (?) that has threatened my life BROKEN. On at least four occasions the sword of Damocles has been hanging over my head, ready at a breath of air to fall and strike me down. Or to at least break me again.

It is against this stark dark backdrop that I ask my question...

As people of faith we understand that with God nothing is impossible and all broken people can be made new, all broken relationships and passions can be restored, and that all broken bodies and minds can be reborn. We sing about it, we preach it, we believe it. But does God always intend it? 

Before you start heating the tar and plucking chickens let me have a moment to explain. 

This world is broken and we are just as broken and in need of the life of Christ to breathe into our mortal bodies and hearts. But when God breathes he often leaves the scars from the wounds of our situation in tack. They are often there to remind us of the pain from which we have been rescued and the reality of His Gospel. 

God the father, resurrected Jesus from the dead, and restored to him the mortal body that was his since before the beginning of time. BUT IT WAS BROKEN! This time the supernatural body that Jesus had was complete with scars on his body. Not just the ones on his hands and feet but a hole big enough in his side that Thomas could have placed his hand into it. Christs God given glorified, eternal body was BROKEN and by no means perfect, pristine or flawless.

Do you carry the load that this existence has given you? Does your hand brush against the scar from a previous encounter with the absolute certainty of lifes brutality? May I pray for you.

May I pray that the grace of God rather than the grave of this world define you? May I pray that the intensity of Gods love, rather than the indifference of this worlds friendship restore you? May I pray that the wounds of the your treatment at the hands of a tyrant would through Gods love become the scars of your testimony in the hands of a saviour? Lastly, May I pray that the reality of Jesus pain bring you to understand that above all powers... above all things, Jesus gets you?

May I...? I hope so because I just did.