chipped not shattered...

As is true for many newlyweds, Hunter and I received a coffee pot as a wedding gift. Unfortunately, in a clumsy moment sometime in the first six months of owning it, I dropped it on our kitchen floor. But it didn't shatter. However, right at the spout it was significantly, noticeably chipped. The lid was also broken so you couldn't really make it stay on the pot. 

But we kept that broken coffee pot for 8 1/2 years. And I drank coffee out of it at least 90% of those mornings. (yes mom, even when I was pregnant. I know that's still a sore issue). That's 2,792 days of drinking out of a broken coffee pot.  

No one would have argued that the coffee pot was less than effective anymore. No one would have argued if I had decided to replace it. But I couldn't do it. It wasn't broken enough for that kind of investment. 

That image really encompasses a lot about what I've believed about myself for many years. I've believed that there was some kind of line between chipped and broken and since I have so much to be thankful for, so many things going for me... I don't qualify for really needing people to stop for me. Of course I've got some nicks and bruises but nothing in comparison to others who've had it much harder...so I don't qualify for attention, help, concern. I need to buck up and do my part in helping others. I need to ignore my pesky wounds that keep drawing attention to themselves. Maybe if I just serve others enough, care enough about major issues, then my (self-defined) smaller ones will just disappear. Either way I need to just press on.

But. Through a series of activities that I can only really label "God's kind pursuit of me", manifest through friendships, counseling, reading His word and so on, I threw away my old coffee pot and have tried to trash my skewed worldview along with it. That worldview, I think, is getting replaced with a kinder and more Biblical one.

Here's some of what that journey was like.

Last summer I spent a long time studying a passage in the Bible that tells of a day when Jesus was asked by a man named Jairus to save his dying 12 year old daughter. He agrees and is following Jairus when a woman who had a disease where she bled for 12 years came up and touched his garment. While time was of the essence in rescuing the little girl whose story was (as any Emergency Room doc would agree) much more acutely traumatic, Jesus stopped and he stayed with the woman. The scripture tells us that she told him the "whole truth" as he listened to her whole story. And in his staying with her, not just her sneaking up and touching him, she was deeply healed. 

But in the meantime, the little girl died. The story doesn't end there, of course, after arriving at the scene, Jesus resurrects her. 

But that's not the part of the story that I got beautifully stuck on for almost two months. I wasn't stuck on the truth that Jesus went and spent equal care and attention to the traumatized little girl and raised her from the dead. Yes, that's amazing and that might be the part of the story that God has for you today when you read it. But the part that is slowly changing me is the fact that Jesus stopped for the woman whose problems appeared so much less significant. Surely her problems were real...but in comparison with the little girl there was no question?! But Jesus doesn't assess situations the way we do. The broken woman's story, her health and healing was equally significant to Jesus. 

His stopping for her, his valuing her and his listening to her has felt like the permission I've needed to walk up to him and touch his garment and admit what's true. Actually, maybe my problems aren't as bad as others. But they've been affecting our marriage for 8 years. And I think they've been affecting me for a lot longer than that. Somethings not quite right. Somethings wrong actually. I don't feel like I have a lot to complain of, but I feel like I'm broken and needing help. needing rescued. 

And the attention I've needed hasn't bothered Jesus. It isn't stealing from anyone else that I'm receiving care, attention, mercy, love, help from him. His resources aren't limited the ways that I have arrogantly (and harmfully) defined them to be. 

There are many details that I won't share here as they involve other people and they frankly just aren't that important for most people to know. But. Last fall I participated in a counseling group with other women called Healing Hearts, provided by the Barnabas Center in Richmond, VA. The group is being offered two other times this fall, which is part of why I wanted to share my experience with it: to encourage others of you who might be hurting, broken, but reluctant to seek care.

There's real help and hope and redemption on offer and Healing Hearts is a great place to start. I think going through that group is actually one of the things that (looking back) felt necessary for me to come to Rwanda healthier. It is also why it felt surprising and confusing that after all that undoing of lies about chipped/broken that we were sent away from Richmond, after I finally agreed/believed that the work of showing and receiving God's love there was equally valuable and important as doing that in places like Rwanda. 

But, here, too, I can spend time with folks who look a lot like me, whose stories seem more "chipped" than "broken" from the outside appearance. But I don't need to assess that. Their story and life, their health and wholeness is deeply significant to the King. In fact, I think that kind of listening might be part of what He's made me for. 

So, it feels like a big gift to have participated in Healing Hearts (though the counseling group of course wasn't like going on a vacation. it was hard, emotional work!) But I am deeply thankful that I got to spend my time unpacking some of my story and allowing Him to heal parts of me. If any of this is resonating with you, I sincerely encourage you to consider participating in a Healing Hearts Barnabas group this fall. and feel free to ask me more detailed questions if you have them.