Beauty in the broken

This past year, particularly the last few months, have been filled with a roller coaster of emotions and hardships.  There have been challenges at work, significant family problems, and feelings of incredible loneliness.  I have friends that I love, yet since I am one of the few single ones, these relationships that I value tend to be primarily by appointment.  I completely understand and respect the fact that my friends' priorities lie with their own families, where they should be, but it can be taxing coming back to my place and being the only one who occupies that space.  Times when the loneliness hits tend to be when my friends are enjoying their family time and so I feel as though I would be intruding on some level if I were to reach out.

Truthfully, I want someone to come home to; someone to share life with.  Especially during the times of brokenness, I wish I had someone with whom I could curl up next to and share the depths of my heart.  I've had some pretty intense moments of brokenness lately as I learn to let go of preconceived notions of how my life would be.  Allowing others to be who they are, even when their choices are hurting me.  To honour the process of healing that my loved ones are walking through while my heart is breaking.

My one constant is my relationship with Jesus Christ.  I'm starting to understand that He truly loves me, unconditionally, just as I am right now.  He embraces my brokenness, my weaknesses, and my failures.  He's not afraid of who I am, even when the sight isn't very pretty to behold.  He won't love me more if I do more for His glory and He won't love me any less if I stop doing what He desires me to do.  I am safe with Jesus, especially my heart.

In His presence, I am stripped of all pretenses, all attempts at being strong in my own eyes.  I merely am who I am.  Yet somehow, God looks at me and only sees the beauty that He has placed there.  I feel valued and cherished beyond measure, not for what I can do, but rather for who I am...imperfections and all.  There is no guilt or shame in His presence and I am learning to rest in the comfort of God's embrace.

As much as I long for companionship and my own love story, the ability to turn to God first when feelings of brokenness and loneliness are threatening to swallow me whole is a habit that I highly value.  No human being will be able to be everything to me at all times.  When I seek God's heart and perspective during the storm, He opens my eyes to the hope I still have in Him.  I also begin to see the good that He has already been bringing about in my situation as well as the good that He has in store.  I am trusting that He will bring healing and restoration: that there will be beauty in the broken.  This pain will not be wasted, but rather, turned into a monument of God's grace and mercy in my life.