I am never going to wake up one day “fixed.” And here’s what I absolutely believe to be true: For God, the fact that I am broken is just not that big a deal – – it’s simply the condition I come in. Being broken is not a judgment – – it’s just a state of being. There are no unbroken Christians out there, except Christ. So I am broken…..Check. Next. I think that’s how God wants me to deal with my brokenness, looking at it as a foregone conclusion and moving forward eagerly, without shame or condemnation or pride tripping me up on the real adventures He has in store for me. Between me and God, I am the only one veh-clempt about my brokenness. Through my redemption, God doesn’t even see it. And whatever I focus on – – that’s where I’ll end up, so why would I focus on my brokenness?

But I haven’t treated it like that at all. I have been striving so hard, and for so long to “address my brokenness” to fix myself, to clean up based on what I know about God and scripture. I think God just wants me to simply accept and notice the broken places in my life, acknowledge them to Him in prayer and confession, and then get busy with the rest of my life. My tool box is too simple to deal with my own brokenness. And God didn’t design me to fix myself.

Me fixing myself would be like me fixing my own computer. I have no business opening the motherboard. (If computers still have motherboards). I need a professional. In the same way, I am finally coming to the realization that God is better equipped to tinker with my broken places than I am. And He, unlike me, is going to love me through the process.

So if broken is the condition I come in, I have two choices – – to focus on my brokenness or to focus on God. And once I shift focus – – something truly supernatural begins to happen. The fancy word is sanctification – – God’s handiwork made evident in my life. He will deal with my brokenness in His time, and in His way, not mine, if I commit to building relationship with Him. That’s trust in God, lived out.

The Apostle Paul pleaded with God to remove an affliction, the details of which the Bible never fully reveals – – but it was clearly something Paul thought was getting in the way of his usefulness to God and others. But God did not remove the affliction. One of the best things I have going for me in my faith is that I really, truly trust God. And seeing that He didn’t fix Paul, is one of those things in scripture that just helps redefine a new perspective about my areas of weakness or defeat. My Christian walk isn’t about getting better, it’s about trusting God, loving others and getting on with my life.

Brokenness is not failure. It’s a pathway to humility – – something God prizes. Brokenness isn’t a punishment. It’s one of the most potent incentives for relationship with God there may be, because clearly I cannot do this on my own. Brokenness doesn’t have anything to do with shame or blame or guilt. It’s just my packaging. There are no unbroken people, it’s just some of us pull-off looking less broken than others. Brokenness has nothing to do with how much God (or others, for that matter) love us.

In fact some of the people who have done the most for God have been colossally, spectacularly broken, and it didn’t faze God (or them in their relationship with God) in the slightest. Paul? A train-wreck – – a converted killer of Christians. Broken, but transformed, loved and used by God for good. Mother Teresa? Broken. Plagued by doubt throughout her ministry. But a channel of the authentic, unconditional love of God for thousands of have-nots. David? SO Broken. Adulterer. Maniacally-focused on getting the girl, he did all sorts of horrendous and ungodly things to get his way…. But he is remembered by God as “A man after His own heart.” If Paul or Mother Teresa or David had focused on their brokenness, rather than on their relationship with God and others, their ministries would have tanked, their time on earth would have spun in the same concentric circles of self-examination and they wouldn’t have been Paul, David and Mother Teresa as we know them today. But they didn’t focus on themselves, they didn’t focus on their brokenness; they focused on God, His love, His redemption, His faithfulness, His power and eternity…. And out of the overflow of that relationship, they did extraordinary things.

They didn’t let their lives revolve around the problem. You don’t see Paul putting his missional journeys on hold to ponder his affliction. He kept praying, kept traveling, kept planting churches. You don’t see David giving up on God’s calling for Him because he cannot seem to do it without tripping over his own desires. He just keeps showing up, keeps talking to God. Mother Teresa didn’t stop ministering to the poor when doubt descended. She kept praying, kept working, kept loving.

I struggle in the particular places I am broken, but at the end of the day, I have a choice. Am I going to look at my brokenness and wring my hands or am I going pray for God to help me, and then move on with the rest of my life. I vote for plan B. God’s focus isn’t on my brokenness, so nor should mine. In fact, (and I can’t even believe I wrote the last sentence, but that’s so often how I “see” it)…God doesn’t even see me as broken AT ALL. God sees me as redeemed. And He should know, He was the one who redeemed me and knew I would need it – – it was His plan all along.

I don’t know if everyone gets to run into those Christians in life who “wear life like a loose garment”, but I have had the great pleasure to meet a few. They are out there and they are like Divine magnets. Lisa Ware, you are one of those Christians to me. There is something about those folks – – it’s a deep and abiding calm, an outward focus, the ability to listen and a basic make-up that is infused with the kind of love that doesn’t judge or rate, categorize or keep score. They are tapped into something so basic and foundational about God that they remain strangely unruffable in a world whose circumstances sometimes go their way and other times don’t. They laugh at themselves in the midst of their imperfections and they rarely take themselves too seriously. They are always, to a person, kind. They trust God enough to leave the tinkering to Him and their understanding of grace and the Holy Spirit of God is profound and personal.

I wonder if the people I love the most in life would do better in God’s hands than my own. I wonder if the same is true for me. I wonder if my vision for fixing my own brokenness and the brokenness of others is more limited than God’s. I LOVE that these are easy questions to answer. And now to really live that way, striving not to be better myself or focus on the brokenness of those around me, but to live in the light of God’s provision, protection, love and perfect timing. To trust Him so much that what is reflected back is a sense of peace and ease. That’s what draws me to those Christians. They know they don’t know it all; they know they are not getting everything right, but they also know and lean into the truth that God does. They are content in all circumstances, because their realities are not hinged on how life is going at any given moment… they are grounded in the goodness and faithfulness of a sovereign, omnipotent and living God.

Philippians 1:6 says, “And I am certain that God, who began this good work in you, will continue it to completion.” God is on the job in my life, in an active and ongoing way. And those people who truly radiate faith, know that God is working on them from the moment they commit their lives to Him – – that He is sanctifying them every moment of every day and that their lives will, in turns, be hard and easy, successful and unsuccessful, graceful and ungraceful. They know it’s not about getting it right but trusting the Source behind all the twists and turns life will take. So they navigate that journey well. With joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness and self-control. The more trusting and yielded those beautiful broken people are, the more His Holy Spirit shines through. I remember someone telling me once, early on when I was a believer – – “We are just God’s vessels… if we weren’t cracked, how could He flow through us?” Love that.

One of the greatest insights I have had this year is that life is meant to be lived leaning toward something not away from something. Understanding that my brokenness is a condition that is just fine by God helps me do that. God wants me to live a “yes,” life, making choices to do things, not living a life afraid to make a misstep, or imprisoned inside my own personal comfort zone by pride. I am going to misstep, I am going to mess up, but it doesn’t matter. If I continue to make choices that move toward God and honor God, then I am moving in the right direction.

I remember shortly after I learned how to swim, my father took us in the the old Plymouth station wagon down to Florida for spring vacation. He spent a lot of that break in the Holiday Inn pool, arms outstretched toward me, moving backwards, ever so slowly to help me practice swimming. “Swim to me!” He would yell.  And as I sputtered and choked my way closer, he would cheer me on.   “You’re swimming!  You’re swimming!” When I finally reached him he would pull me up and out of the water, turn me around and say, “See how far you swam?” He made me feel like Michael Phelps. It was a joy. The sun, the way the suntan lotion made the water bead on our arms and backs, the warmth and sparkle of the water. Magic.

God’s like that. He is asking us to move toward him. But he doesn’t expect us to swim there with a flawless stroke. He knows we are going to sputter and choke, and that sometimes our heads are going to go under and He might have to take a step toward us to help us – – but he WANTS us moving toward him. He doesn’t want us clinging to the pool deck looking in, too afraid to launch ourselves forward into the blue – – too concerned we will mess it all up – – or might look awkward. God wants our yeses. God wants us, in trust, to simply abandon ourselves to Him and His way and enjoy the sun.

If I live a life moving toward God, He allows me to live beyond my circumstances and I can leave all those things that break my heart in the hands of God, and STILL choose peace. Still choose joy. Still choose motion in the direction of God.

Do I trust God that much? Do I trust Him with the tinkering of me and others more than my own tinkering with the same? OF COURSE I DO. But do I let Him do it. Do I actually live that way? It’s a real question, because faith and obedience work spiritual wonders together, but living a faith whose assent doesn’t translate into action,  is actually pretty painful.  It doesn’t help to just agree with God or even believe in God – – the transformed life comes from actually following Him.

When I become involved in fixing the brokenness in me and the brokenness in others, I miss the joy and peace God offers along the way. I can either live my life trying desperately and ultimately unsuccessfully to “not to be broken” or I can live it knowing I am broken, but also knowing I am redeemed, which trumps everything. God isn’t waiting around for me to get fixed. He knows I only come broken. And it doesn’t bother or surprise Him a bit. He just wants to make sure I know how to love. And He loves me in the same way He wants me to love others. That’s His challenge to me. But I have been so busy helping Him “fix me,” that I have failed to see His true mission and focus.

When Jesus was asked in Mark 12, ²⁸ “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” He answered, “³⁰ Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ And then he added, ³¹ “The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”

So there it is. Where in Jesus’ summation of the most important things to do as a Christian, is my mission to fix or for that matter focus on myself? Well, it’s just not there. Where does he say I cannot do the most important things until I am all better? He doesn’t.

So the invitation is this:

²⁸ ‘Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. ²⁹ Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰ For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.’ Matthew 11:28-30 New International Version – UK (NIVUK)

But please don’t miss this – – because I did – – come as you are. For a long time I have been focusing on my own brokenness instead of focusing on God. Part of the good news is I can leave all that striving at the door. Faith is a come as you are proposition. Don’t worry. Don’t fret. Stop trying so hard to fix yourself. Just run to God. Jump in and start to swim. He cannot wait for you to make that choice and He already knows the condition you’re in!