Broken

In my prayer time recently, I saw this picture of my heart, it was shattered into a million pieces, like broken glass.  After 11 months, its still broken.  My heart is broken from watching the man I love self destruct.  My heart is broken from the extreme situations I was in over the past few years.  My heart is broken from  burying my husband.  No one can see it.

It started with the phone call, "Your husband is in the emergency room, there has been an accident."  At that moment, the fragile glass which made up my heart, got a hairline crack.  Walking into the emergency room, and feeling all eyes on me.  A little more pressure on the crack.  And when they told me he had died... the crack started to spread.  And just like a crack in your windshield, it begins to spider.  One small crack, now resembles a web.  Multiple lines in different directions.  Still held together, but more fragile then ever.  As I walked into the room where he was laying, lifeless, touching his cold hand, saying "What did you do Jonathan?" More pressure, more cracks, this time deeper and longer.  But none of that compares to the pressure as I stood over my husband's casket, with my hand on the lid, lowering it down over the last glimpse I'll have of his face on this earth, the cracks drove so deep that my heart shattered in that instant.  No longer held together, but broken to pieces.  You couldn't see it, but that's what happened.

And since that moment my heart shattered, all I have wanted was for God to put the pieces back together.  At first I pretended it wasn't broken.  But you can't function long with a broken heart before you realize it. And once I realized it my prayer quickly became, "God, take my brokenness and make something beautiful." I've been praying this for months now.  And my desire to have my heart restored continues.  I just want to be done with this healing process.  Perhaps because its so uncomfortable, I really just want it to be over.  Maybe its because I want to feel the consistant joy of life again, that I'm trying to rush through the process.

Since that vision I saw of my heart a few days ago, God has continued to speak to me about brokenness.  He showed me that I need to stop focusing on being healed and rushing the process.  Brokenness is beautiful in God's eyes.  He uses the broken.  I need to let God do what He desires to do in me during this time and stop trying to "be done".  As I do I can see Him moving. He's been revealing my calling to ministry and drawing me to deeper levels, because of what I have walked thorough.  Because of my brokenness He can use me more powerfully.  I must truly let Him take my brokenness and make something beautiful.  I believe that beauty I'm praying for will be shown in the women's lives I touch.

There is something powerful about being broken before God.  My pastor, Richard Crisco, taught a powerful message on the power of brokenness this past Sunday. God draws near to the broken hearted.  I am sharing that podcast with you!  Whether you are a widow or not, there will likely be a time in your life when your heart will be shattered to pieces like mine.  When that happens, you are ripe for an encounter with God.  Some of the most life altering experiences with God come when we are broken before Him!

Click here to listen to Broken and Hungry, by Richard Crisco