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Broken Lives

One day I dropped a treasured vase and it broke in a hundred pieces. Since a dear friend had given it to me, I felt especially bad. Why hadn’t I been more careful?

As I threw the splinters into the trash can, I heard a still, small voice speaking to me: “that’s not what I do with broken pieces.”

“Yes, Lord?”

“Like this vase, your life has been broken in many pieces: childhood abuse, broken marriage, unfulfilled dreams and ruined plans. Give them to me.”

I gave him all the broken pieces of my life, and he began to work with ease and confidence. Nothing I gave him shocked or discouraged him. I could almost hear him humming as he rearranged, and fitted, and glued piece by piece together. Like putting together a jigsaw puzzle, he seemed to know where each piece belonged. He worked dexterously as though he had a design in mind. And, then I saw it too - ever so faintly - a mosaic of Christ’s likeness was beginning to form such as I had seen in famous cathedrals in Europe.

Then I began to understand: His wonderful plan for my life included even the brokenness I had experienced.

~Father, thank you that the pressure I feel on my life right now is but the touch of your hand on my life as you are forming me.

Questions: How does it affect your attitude about yourself to know that God created you? Have you given your broken pieces to God to put back together?