When Brokenness Hides

Last year, I thought I finally had my stuff together. I wasn't quite where I knew I should be, but I thought I was on the right track. I was doing the right things, saying the right things, posting the right things on social media, even praying the right things. I was proud of the progress I was making, and I thought surely my life had turned a corner and things would finally start lining up and God would soon give me the desires of my heart.

Brokenness knows how to hide itself well. 

Sometimes you don't know how broken you are until something forces you to look deep inside yourself, past the veneer of "I'm okay." Down deep in the dark corners of my soul, brokenness was lurking.

Sometimes we're so busy trying to do the right things we forget to take a long look at our heart to see WHY we want to do the right things. Was I doing and saying and posting because I was in love with Jesus and wanted to share His message with the world? Or was it so that maybe if I was good enough and pleased Him enough, He would give me what I most desired? 

I don't really want to answer that question because the answer is not pretty, and it's not spiritual and it's not what you're "supposed" to say. Honesty is hard, especially honesty with yourself.

My heart wasn't right. Far from it. It pains me to say that before this year, I never even asked God what His will for my life was. I just prayed for my will to be done, and then grew frustrated when it wasn't. I thought I was seeking God, but really I was still seeking my own will by trying to earn it. The Bible says "Draw close to God and He will draw close to you"...but somehow I translated this to "Draw close to God and He'll see how hard you're trying and give you what you want."

Brokenness lies to you. It will tell you all's well, that you're doing great, and that all the unhealed wounds you shoved to the back of your heart and tried to ignore don't really have to be dealt with.

Brokenness doesn't want to be found. It would rather hide in the dark than be forced into the light. 

Brokenness wants to stay broken. It's comfortable buried deep inside, where it can silently dictate your life. 

But God refused to let my brokenness win over me.

Through a very painful time at the beginning of this year, God took away a dream I had been holding onto with clenched fists. My heart felt shattered beyond repair. My life suddenly felt meaningless. And here I thought God had been the center of my life, but He showed me through my pain that He hadn't been. He brouht my brokenness into the light and I was faced with the full picture of what I had hidden in my heart. 

I lost myself. Completely. Depression set in, worse than any I've ever experienced. Outwardly I was still doing and saying and posting, but inwardly I was a mess. I wasn't sure my heart could survive this much broken.

I sensed that I wasn't going to come out of this and be the same afterwards. My heart was being remade. And for awhile, I'll honestly admit I wasn't sure if I would emerge better or worse than I had been before. 

But God wouldn't leave me in my mess alone. He's walked through every second of it with me; He's seen the worst and the weakest of me...and He has not turned away. Because of Him, I am still me. A changed and a humbled me, a me that finally wants to find out who God wants me to be...but still me. The brokenness did not destroy me. 

I still have a long road to walk towards wholeness. I'm still fighting depression. I'm still healing. I'm baby-stepping more than actually walking. I'm leaning on God for every breath.

But I think now is actually an improvement over where I was last year. Yes, it's been painful; yes, it's been one of the hardest years of my life; yes, it's still a struggle...but God has shown Himself to be stronger than I've ever known Him to be. And my heart towards Him has changed. I need Him now, more than I need anything He can give me. I never really understood before how God could truly be enough; I'm beginning to now. 

Brokenness is not the end of my story. God won't let it be. He has more for me than the broken self that I had been content to ignore. 

Brokenness cannot hide here anymore. The Light has come to force it out and overcome it.