Broken

Life stories.

They are hard to tell, and most of us hold them inside us until we meet a person that we believe will be receptive to our tale.

Oftentimes when we tell our “life story,” we describe all of the terrible things in our lives. For some reason, we believe that who we are is all of the darkness inside. We think that the only way to show people who we really are is to show them all of the awful things that we have been inflicted with, caused for others to feel, or hate about our condition. 

We let the darkness define our very being.

And it crushes us, day by day, month by month, year by year.

It’s scary to let your life be illuminated by those around us. Not just because of the questions that I have placed above, but because people often leave. They leave, and we start to believe that this brokenness, regardless of its cause, is going to take away all of the light in the world.

So we let the darkness define how we can be loved.

And as the darkness wells up in our hearts, we start to believe that we are unlovable.

I have had the blessing of meeting many beautiful souls whose lives have been scarred by the actions of the world around them. Some of these souls have caused harm to themselves. They trust me with this darkness for but a moment, but then they quickly run away.

No way could I understand.

No way could I possibly love someone for who they truly are.

No innocent little Catholic girl could ever understand and accept the soul before me.

This thought process is why those of faith receive such a bad reputation. Because we are afraid of being sullied by the dark and broken pieces of the world, we hide. We run away towards the things that we know, and we convince ourselves that we are doing the right thing by going away. So many people are broken, and yet it is that exact brokenness that allows for us to love them.

But we don’t.

We run away, towards what we think is a lighter world.

Christianity does not teach us to avoid darkness. The truth of the matter is that true Christianity is based on a man, fully human and fully divine, facing the darkest and most broken parts of the world. He goes to the outcasts, the misunderstood, and the evil. He goes to the people who do not expect to see Him.

Most importantly, Christ allowed Himself to be killed in the most evil way.

Christ let Himself be broken.

Christ saw each person for who they truly were. You see, He was there at the beginning of time when all of us were formed. He knew us, and He loved us. Much like a school project where you work incredibly hard and do not care what a single soul says because you know how perfect your project is, God sees us as perfect and worth every moment.

You are lovable.

But that does not mean that you will not be broken.

Christ got up on the Cross because He knew that we were in need of His love. He knew that we would not believe that we were saved if He did not get up on the Cross, and He knew that this was the only way.

He was scared, and He even asked God to take the suffering away.

But He still got on the Cross.

To be broken is not the same thing as to be unlovable. Rather, being broken means that there is something to be glorified. Each broken piece of your heart is not meant to snuff out the light of love. In fact, the broken pieces of our hearts are the very candlesticks meant to light up our lives.

And as we find light in the darkness, we can bring light to those who have suffered like we have.

You see, our brokenness is not unique. We all share in the same human condition, and we all feel pain, suffering, loss, and fear. However, those moments which brought out the darkness in our hearts do not make us dark. In fact, those pieces allow for those who have seen light to bring joy and love to us.

If we allow others to share in our suffering, then they may be able to understand the broken pieces and bring light in to the darkness.

They may have shaky hands, but they can love you.

I have been in a position where I did not trust the soul in front of me. While my darkness may not be entirely shocking, I found it incredibly difficult to be honest with myself and the people who were trying to love me.

I ghosted people

I did not tell the whole story to my friends

I let my judgmental side of myself rule those days.

And all of the love that I could have received was taken from me. In my fear, I cut off people who truly did care about me. It was not fair, and they were hurt terribly in return. Yet however hard they tried to love me through the pain, they could not get through to me anymore. It made my days far more difficult than they ought to have been.

I’ll never forget the day that I admitted my fault.

I came up to a friend that I had ghosted, and I apologized for what I had done.

He could have rejected me. He could have told me that I was not a friend worth having. He could have said that he never wanted to speak to me again and that we could no longer be friends. That was what I expected him to say to me.

Instead he smiled the biggest smile, and he told me that we would be friends no matter what.

And we’re still friends, even if we’re miles and miles apart.

To let ourselves be vulnerable is scary. To love those who feel unlovable is scary. However, it is by meeting that brokenness that we allow our hearts to be transformed. 

“This is where the healing begins

This is where the healing starts

When you come to where you’re broken within

The light meets the dark”

~Healing Begins, Tenth Avenue North

This is all fine and good. Letting others in to the darkness can make our lives better. We get that. However, many of us believe that we are a burden. We think that we have to be able to give something back, or we have to get better right away. After all, showing God’s love to a broken heart is nothing but hardship for the lover right?

No.

To love another allows us to more fully understand just how much God loves us. When we choose to love someone else, we are reminded of how much God loves each one of us. We bear the cross for those we encounter in small ways, and we feel the power Christ must have had in order to endure such suffering.

By loving those who feared their darkness I have found far more love than I ever expected.

“To love another is to see the face of God” Victor Hugo, Les Misérables

We are all broken.

We are all loved.

Today, and every day, let’s allow the broken pieces become the candlesticks to drive out the darkness.