Brokennes

7 May

“A saint is someone who has allowed God to love them in their brokenness.”
~ Chris Padgett

If there is one thing that the saints all have in common, it would be the fact that they all saw themselves for who they were in the sight of God:  weak, broken, and unable to get through life on their own.  They all acknowledged their need for God and they did all that they could to open themselves to God’s love.

That was not easy to do because, in order to open themselves up to God, they had to get rid of the things that kept them from Him.  They had to set aside their selfishness, their vanity, their pride or whatever it was in their human nature that made them too much a part of the world.  It was a difficult, and often life-long, struggle.

Some went to great lengths that appeared ludicrous to others.  St. Francis embraced a leper on the road.  He also through himself into rose bushes during temptations.  St. Teresa of Calcutta picked up dying people from the street gutters of Calcutta and brought them to a place where they could be cleaned and die in dignity.  St. Maximilian Kolbe offered to die in the place of another prisoner simply claiming, as he did so, that he was a Catholic priest as if that were enough of an answer.

All of these people, and many other saints, could be seen, through the eyes of the world, as extremely foolish.  But they all knew the same thing:  their human nature was weak and broken and only God could fill them with what they needed for eternal life.

What fills you up?  What keeps you going?  What is your goal?  What is your purpose?  If you give answers that reflect that the world and its treasures fill you, keep you going, and give you purpose, you need to take a good, hard look at yourself because none of the flash and glitz of the world will give you what you need for eternal life.  All that is of the world stays in the world and all that is in the world will eventually tarnish, wither, and fade away.

Only God can give us what we truly need.  Only God can sustain us in this life.  And only God can lead us over the threshold of death to eternal life.  The saints knew that and responded to that.

You know what?  We are all saints-in-the-making.  Do not be alarmed at your weakness, at your brokenness.  Acknowledge it, let God fill it, and you, too, can go on to do amazing things in this life and enter into our true goal: eternal life with God.

FAITH ACTION:  In prayer today, acknowledge your weakness, your brokenness, and ask God to fill you with His love.