A couple days ago I visited with one of my favorite people in the world. She is a wonderful soul and will be ( Lord willing) turning 90 in a few weeks. I met this sweet lady when I began attending church with my husband before we married, about 20 years ago. Almost immediately this woman and I had a friendship. She is a character! Full of stories and laughs. She adores her family and is so proud of her grandchildren. The woman can cook food that makes a heart sing. I could go on. Safe to say, she is just a special blessing to me.

The last few years haven’t been easy for her. Age is taking its toll, as it seems to always do. And while she accepts some limitations, others are hard to swallow. Along with her own limits, she has been watching her husband decline as well. She does her best to encourage him, and admits that she gets frustrated. I have sensed a softening to this firecracker woman that didn’t exist before.

She is in the process of being broken. Beautifully broken.

It happens to us all, this breaking. Whether we want to admit it or not, at one point or another a limit is imposed, a situation descends, a mountain can’t be moved.

When I look back at my 42 ( almost 43 years ) I can see brokenness all along the way. I grew up in a chaotic home. Lots of fighting. Lots of fear. Lots of mistrust. It wasn’t always like that. We had good times, too. But they were always shadowed by the knowledge that just around the corner hid the next explosion between my parents. I would wonder: Would my mom, sister and I leave in the night again? Would dad leave this time? How many days would we be gone this time? The chaos inside my home was normal to me. It was only when in school in later years I realized that not everyone grew up this way. My dad left when I was 17. They divorced when I was 19. I don’t really have a relationship with my father since he left.

I think about the losses I have had along the way: A dear uncle who was like a father to me, died when I was 13. My brother in law committed suicide when I was 21. At 30, my sweet grandmother lost her battle with colon cancer. Those were all rough and had a deep impact on me.

Most recently, our family went through a period of loss that has completely impacted the people we are. In 2012, my mother in law passed away. In 2013, my father in law passed away. Most significant to me, was the death of my mother in 2014 after she battled Leukemia. Essentially, my husband and I are orphans. It is tough to be without our parents. So tough.

We have been broken.

I am in the process of seeing how beautiful being broken can be. Oh, how I fight it though! The stubborn streak runs deep in this heart. I want to be strong. I want to handle it all. I want to appear okay. The truth always comes out, however. Always. The truth is, I am not strong. I can’t handle it all. I am not okay. And when I admit this, then the healing begins.

What I am coming to understand more and more is that the stuff of my past is part of me, but it doesn’t define me. I don’t have to deny the hurt. I don’t have to pretend I’ve gotten over it. It’s part of me. Those are the pieces that have been picked up and put back together in ways in could never have imagined. It was that hurt that put my heart into a position to see my need for Christ. It is that hurt that keeps me going back to God over and over for healing.

Many times now, I recognize that the Lord is continuing to break me of, well, ME. The perfectionism, the pride, the self reliance, the lack of faith, the lack of humility. This is all part of His plan to make me into what He knows I need to be. And, though sometimes painful, it is beautiful to be broken.

From my other post you know that I love to read. There are some wonderful books I have read over the years that have encouraged me to accept this breaking more and more. Nancy Leigh DeMoss Wolgemuth has a wonderful trilogy called Brokenness, Surrender and Holiness. Dear me, it is so good. Also, Phillip Yancy’s Where is God When it Hurts? My current book, Humility, by Andrew Murray can be added to this stack as well.

My desire is to continue to let God work all things for my good ( Romans 8:28). I will rely on His love and grace and be broken, for His glory.