Brokenness Equals Usefulness?!?

Last Thursday as I drove home from Bible study I received a call from my friend Tonya. It was quite strange because she never calls me at night, mostly because she has a hundred children to get through homework, bathe, and get to bed! Okay, maybe not a hundred, but A LOT!

Anyway, she was reading a book and although I don't know the name of it, I will probably be reading it here soon. She read me a quote out of the book and while I can't remember it exactly, the principle was this: real brokenness leads to real usefulness. She went on to say that immediately following that quote the author was expounding on how Moses spent 40 years in the desert after committing murder and how God used that time of brokenness and eventually brought him back to Egypt to lead the Israelites to the Promised Land. She later followed up and said the author went through several other Biblical characters.

Over the next couple days I really pondered brokenness leading to usefulness because I am broken. Seriously broken. I asked Steve the other night "How much more stuff is going to come out?" Since the question was completely out of the blue, his response was right on...."Huh?" "Oh, pardon me, I've been conversing with myself so you truly probably have no idea what I'm talking about." I seriously do that a lot....anyway, I went on to explain that over the past few months God has just been squeezing the vice grip and man is "stuff" coming out. Things I had buried that really hurt me, situations I ran away from, and people I can't seem to forgive. It just keeps coming out!

But, there's HOPE! In order for me to really and truly life a Spirit-filled, God-glorifying life, I must deal with these. Make amends where needed, give God hurtful situations where it's not appropriate to confront, and allow healing. Complete, only-as-God-can-do-it healing.

And this morning I was reminded of a single, solitary word that will lead to victory: choose. I must choose to believe God is good when I don't feel it; choose to believe he has a purpose even though I don't see it; choose to believe He's right there even though I can't touch Him; and choose to trust that eternity is at stake and I'm privileged enough to be part of it.