Dan and Deb

Brokenness

     The other night I was leading a group at Celebrate Recovery. Typically, when I lead groups, I don’t choose topics, I just open up the group to whatever people want to speak about. Friday night was different.

     We had just been singing a song that says, “Brokenness, brokenness is what I long for, brokenness is what I need. Brokenness, brokenness is what You want from me.”[1] It got me thinking about my state of brokenness that brought me to the Lord. I believe that everybody has a different level of brokenness causing them to come to Him.

     As I look back over my life, there were disappointments in which I felt broken. None of them ever caused me to cry out to Jesus. I had failed jobs, a failed marriage, and even two failed attempts at suicide. None of these caused me to reach out. What it finally took was for me to hate myself, to be completely shattered. To admit that I in all my own glory and righteousness was nothing more than what the prophet Isaiah wrote about when he wrote, “…we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteous nesses are as filthy rags.”[2]

     I was nothing more than a filthy rag lacking guidance and direction in my life. In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus speaks of the stone that the builder rejects.[3] He says, “And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken…”[4] The stone of which He speaks, is Himself. This verse is referring to those who fail to believe on Christ therefore causing their eternal downfall. As I read this verse however, I tend to look at my unbelief and sinful behavior leading me to fall on the stone that is Jesus thus leading me to cry out to Him in utter brokenness.

Praise the Lord for His Mightiness!

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[1]Sonicflood “Sonicflood”, 1999

[2] Isaiah 64:6

[3] Matthew 21:42

[4] Matthew 21:44