BROKEN, AGAIN

Broken, Again.

When I was little, I remember admiring these doll figurines in my mom’s night table. I think they were made from Avon and were perfume bottles. They were beautiful, delicate works of art that I sometimes secretly used to play with as I pretended to put on musical productions imitating the ones Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire showed in their musical films. As I got older, I guess mom saw how much attention I gave those dolls and allowed them to graduate into my nighttime table. I don’t think I can truly express the pride and the joy I felt in knowing my  mom had entrusted something so special to my care.

Time passed, I got older and married. These precious gifts moved on to adulthood with me when I moved away to begin my new life. It wasn’t until one day, cleaning away, I tripped and as I tried to stop my fall, pushed against the dresser and one of the dolls fell to the floor. My heart began to ache as I witnessed the poor doll lose a few pieces here and there.

My husband saw my pain and immediately picked it up and decided he would attempt to fix it. Ladies and gentlemen, yes he would attempt such a feat with gorilla crazy glue. He really has used them so many times he sort of swears by it. My mom used to say, when I was a child that if something broke to just throw it away. Someone had told her it was sort of bad luck to keep it. Anyway, although I usually take her advice, I couldn’t this time. I decided to trust my Hubble’s fix it spirit.

He sort of put it back together and I loved her so much that I proudly displayed her on the table once more, just on the side so you couldn’t see the areas that were scarred. To better protect her, I placed her in a display case in the living room. One day, during a birthday party in my home, one of my guest knocked down the curio in my living room. Everything on it crashed down to floor into billions of glass pieces, and the poor cherished doll said her last farewell as she knew no amount of tears or gorilla glue could put her back together again. I was so broken hearted that night.

Why talk about a broken doll? Not just broken once, but again.

She was something precious to me. No, she was my treasured possession as invaluable and uncostly as it was in the eyes of antique dealers putting her up for a bid. She was broken and no longer suitable for repairs.

So it seems that our lives, our hearts, and/or our spirits can come to a place where they face being broken time and time again. The difference between our lives and my doll is that she was without help, hopeless, and left to remain a memory. Our lives may go through the abuse of being broken and battered, yet they are not within reach of healing and restoration. 

Many times my life has been like that doll. I’ve seen beautiful things happen and come into my life, to then be pushed to the side and I’ve fallen. Circumstances beyond my control, situations that were not foreseen and even people that I had trusted completely pushed me off the display case of life and I fell, no one hearing my cry for help at times, and my world fell to the floor into a billion pieces. I believe if you are honest, maybe you understand what this feels like also and have experienced something similar.

The good news is not that my Hubby will show up with the gorilla glue, crazy glue or special tape. The good news is that God is still able to see what happens, bend down to where we are, whether from innocent reasons or by our own faults, and he stretches out his arm and picks us up. He begins to restore and heal us in our brokenness. He renews us in our blown up and away moment. Someone might say, if he is a loving God, why he doesn’t just stop all the hurt before it all happens. I don’t know if I can answer that, but I’ll try.

Perhaps the only way I would ever know he is able to heal is because I have been on a deathbed before. Maybe, the only way I know he can heal the broken hearted, is because he’s taken all of the let downs and all the hurts and not only allowed me to forgive, but to love the people that hurt me.

I guess I couldn’t call him Awesome without seeing that He has showed up in my life, not only on great occasions, but in my desperate ones as well. So, although I can’t rejoice over the loss of my doll, I can be thankful for the times my heart has been broken, because He’s made me stronger and able to stand. I thank Him for the areas in my life, even now, that seem perfect, but He and I know they are falling apart. Because the best part about keeping the gorilla glue away is knowing that my Heavenly Father can put the pieces back together again. The best part, I won’t have to walk or turn sideways like I did with my doll because when God heals, you won’t see the scars unless He leaves them so I can prove what He can do.