6 minute read
Broken and Beloved
written by Aimee Taylor
I talk with a lot of women, followers of Christ, who are walking around not knowing at the core of their beings two very important pieces of their identity. We see in Jesus’ life that knowing who we are is vital to following Him and living a Holy Spirit empowered life like He did (John 13:3). Jesus knew that He belonged to the Father and never lost sight of that vision for His time on Earth. But even though we may claim to know Christ, so many of us are lost, floundering around living a half-hearted, lukewarm life before God.
We need to get a handle on two things. The first is that we are deeply broken people who need to be totally, out-and-out dependent on the Lord. Absorbing this is a must: that apart from Jesus, we can do absolutely NOTHING - nothing eternal and lasting (John 15:5).
John 15:5 (NIV)
Yet we are still walking around trying to control everything, and we are still deluding ourselves that we can, through our sin-soaked flesh, contribute something to His story. But it simply is not true. In our brokenness, we end up bogged down feeling struck by our own guilt, shame, and condemnation. And this shame, guilt and condemnation are really running our lives from deep within us. Their roots run everywhere fueling our delusions and the lies that we live our lives from. We think we can fix ourselves on our own, but we can’t. It’s like slogging around with pigs in a pit of muck, falling again and again in our own dark slop. Stuck doesn’t even begin to describe this bondage. We simply CANNOT fix it on our own! So stop trying! Instead, our brokenness must drive us into complete reliance on Jesus. Bring all of your sin and the muck you have been wading in to the foot of the Cross and leave it there with Him! We continually need to get on our faces like beggars seeking the Lord’s mercy and grace to cover our lives. We need to live each moment of our lives like we actually need God to come and run it, so that each moment of our day looks like a non-stop conversation of, “What’s next, Lord?” So start with bringing your junk to Jesus and crying out to Him, “I need you to come and make me right!” That’s what total dependence looks like, and we need to do this work all the time. Leave it with Him and let Him lead you out of your junk into freedom.
The second piece of identity we haven’t grasped is that despite all our natural feelings to the contrary, we are deeply and passionately loved by God. This astounding truth does not rest in our souls as an unending reservoir for us to draw from as it should. His passionate love for us should fill us up so fully that it spills over onto everyone we meet. Instead, we attend to our doubts and wonder how on earth it could possibly be true that God wants me. We see our own ugliness as too much for anyone, especially God, to overlook. So we keep our true selves hidden away and we refuse to see the beauty He has created in us. The truths of scripture haven’t hit us with revelation that’s specific and speaks directly to our soul. We only rotely acknowledge the truth with our mind, but having only that mental assent is not enough for anyone to rest in God’s passionate love, or to know that He sees me and wants me. Do you know that He is captivated by you? That truly He sees you as beautiful (SOS 4)? That He longs for you to gaze into His eyes like Mary sitting at the feet of Jesus (Luke 10:39-42)? Because He does. God’s love is monumentally more profound and beyond than ours, His ways are so much higher, so much more glorious. We must learn to immerse ourselves and swim within His immense love and move even deeper into the heart of God.
The questions we need to ask ourselves, then, is not only how do I capture these truths so that they become one with who I am, but also how do we hold these seemingly opposing thoughts both at the same time? How is it possible that I am so screwed up, so contrary to God, and yet I am so loved by this Holy God all at the same time? So what’s to be done? Is it even possible to know these two truths so profoundly that they actually change who I am - my very being - at a fundamental and foundational level?
Yes, yes, and YES! We CAN and MUST know them, we MUST own them down to our core! Jesus was able to live in and from the truth because it is who He is. So then the truth has to BECOME who we are. And specifically these two truths … that we in our flesh are hopelessly broken and yet somehow it’s equally true that we are wildly loved. How, how do we become these truths?
So get on your face, because this is a work of repentance and surrender to the truth that Jesus has already spoken over your life. Confess that you haven’t allowed these things to become part of who you are, repent and turn toward the Lord again and ask for what you need. This is the truth of the Cross! He broke His body and spilled out His blood to make it possible for you to be in an intimate love relationship with Him.
He killed your sin on the cross and when He died, He took your sin with Him into the grave. Live like your sin is now washed away and the real you is waiting to be unveiled. He wants you because of who you are, who you are made to be. The truth of that must be spoken directly to your heart - ask Him to do that - and He will! He longs for you to rest in this truth. Ask Him to make it one with who you are and He will teach and transform your innermost being these truths. We need a Savior not only to wash us clean but to walk with us everyday so we might learn what it means to die to our old self and be resurrected into our New Creation selves. This can happen even here on this version of planet Earth, we don’t have to wait for the fullness of Eternity to experience true lasting change now. Open up your hands and welcome the Holy Spirit into every place in your soul, to minister in places He has rarely been allowed to enter. Welcome the beautiful, gentle Counselor to come in and do what only He can do in you. He will teach you to know your own brokenness. He will teach you to recognize your deep, desperate need to be totally dependent on Jesus. He will call out to your heart and speak the truth of your belovedness into you. He will breathe into your soul the immense love of God. Ask Him! These are the prayers He delights to answer! Then wait with expectancy as He plants these glorious truths deep within your soul.
Aimee Taylor is a Spiritual Director, counselor, and pastor’s wife, who wants to know and love Jesus more everyday.
