Broken Hallelujahs

This week has been one of extremes for me – an emotional roller coaster ride on which I was barely strapped in, in moments shouting for joy and in others crying out in frustration. We all have those weeks, right?

As the weekend arrived, I fought to break the surface of the water to catch my breath – only to be shoved back under Friday evening with the reality of my “aloneness” broken open and spilled out in front of my very eyes. You see, sometimes you can be surrounded by many people or have many friends and yet still be entirely, utterly alone. That’s where I found myself on Friday after taking a risk and stepping out of my comfort zone.

I’d like to say I responded well, but I can’t.  True to form, I sunk to the very depths of self-loathing and anxieties besieged me at every turn. The “me” of Friday night was perhaps as raw, as exposed, as vulnerable as I’ve been in quite a long time. I knew that things would look better the next day, but that did little to comfort me in the moment.

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Thankfully, I awakened Saturday to a rested mind and heart and while it was still hurting and raw, I was also ready to listen and to learn.  It was in the quiet moments of Saturday that God began to whisper to my soul.  And do you know what He whispered, again and again?

Yes, depend.

Ouch. I committed to God that I would embrace this as my word for the year, and here I am, less than two weeks in and already being brought to my knees by it?  Oh, how clear a light this paints of my stubborn, independent soul, doesn’t it?

The word resonated and bounced around in the empty, cavernous chambers of my heart and mind on Saturday, seeking a resting place with none to be found.

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It was only today that God spoke again, and this time it was convicting to the core:

“My beloved child, when you go about life determined to do it on your own, without any dependence on others or on Me, you are essentially closing yourself off to life itself. You’re going through the motions.

Oh yes, I know what you’re doing and why. You close yourself off to protect yourself from hurt, pain, and rejection. But in the very same breath, you are also closing yourself off to love, to joy, to fellowship. Your days become flavored by your fears and worries instead of enveloped in peace and hope, the way that I designed it to be.

Precious daughter, you must learn to depend. Dependence doesn’t always take the form of asking for or accepting help. Sometimes it is simply depending upon others to love you the way that you need to be loved, depending upon your friends and family not to let you down, depending on others enough to keep taking risks again and again and again.  

Trust Me. Trust them. Trust yourself. Depend.”

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My heart was stilled … my mouth was speechless. I have such a tendency to listen until I get the gist of what God (or someone else) is trying to say and then taking off, determined to conquer the world with that course of action. But today all I could do was sit, humbled by the truth of His words and convicted by His intent in sharing them.

In that moment, slowly the words to a song that I love dearly began to run through my mind and my soul began to sing ….

In those moments of humility and brokenness, God caressed by troubled heart in His gentle hands and whispered Love, Hope, and Peace over my mind and soul.  So often when I come to God with fragments of a concern or a situation where I’ve completely made a mess of things, I come before Him ashamed, unable to lift my eyes to Him.

Yet in these moments, God cradled my chin and lifted my eyes up to His – and again whispered, “Sometimes your broken moments are the sweetest of all, because in those moments, the melody you sing is joined in precious harmony by the very thing you struggle so hard to give: dependence.” 

How about you, my friends?

What is God whispering to you in the broken, topsy-turvy roller coaster we call life? Do you hesitate to come before Him broken, wanting to dust yourself off and freshen up your make-up first? Have you closed yourself off to keep away the hurt and now find yourself calloused and apathetic?

May God caress your heart today, too, and remind you that indeed, sometimes our brokenness is better than a hallelujah…

Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful.
~~Hebrews 10:23~~