I woke up thinking about my parents-in-law. Things aren’t going well with them, and I’ve been very distant because of that.
I’m angry with them. I’m angry about how they treated my husband, their son, as he was growing up. I’m angry about how they abused him. Their own history of being mistreated isn’t enough to excuse it. They should have known better.
I’m angry about how they haven’t listened to my advice on where to live, so they keep needing to ask for help. I was the one to suggest they move up here, closer to their sons, but that is all they have listened to. Five hours away was too far to help them, so they came closer, but they are still too far. Thirty minutes one way isn’t ten.
They should have bought a condo, or gotten an apartment. Basically they shouldn’t have gotten a yard and a place that has to be maintained. At their age, they personally need to be maintained more than their homes. I told them this, and they ignored me. I told them that my husband, their son, barely has time to take care of our house.
Now they need help. Often. Just like I foresaw. There is no need for these emergencies.
They continue to ask for my advice and input, but they continue to ignore it. They waste my time and that of my husband.
They are very needy.
They are too old to be this childish.
And then I stopped and remembered. Ask Jesus into it.
Jesus Jesus Jesus, I said. I visualized all of these problems as big blocks. I saw the light of Jesus entering them. It was like a glue, filling in all the cracks, making them stronger.
And I came to understand that the brokenness is part of the plan. The brokenness is necessary.
The poet Rumi reminds us that bread can’t become bread unless the grain is ground up. Then it is mixed with other ingredients and heated in an oven.
Clay isn’t useful unless it is shaped and heated too.
These broken bits, these hard times, these trials that we all have – these are what make us who we are.
They aren’t the bits to run away from. They are the whole story. They are it, everything.
They are what make us human. They are what make us who we are.
God isn’t the “bad guy” for letting bad things happen to us. These “bad things” are just the hard things that push us out of what we are and into who we are supposed to be.
They are what get the baby bird to get out of that shell. They are what get that same bird to jump out of the nest and fly for the first time too.
We are those birds.
Stuck in our shells, we would die.
Stuck in the nest, we would never live.
Adversity isn’t.
It is opportunity.
Jesus is the glue that holds us together, is the hand that pulls us out of the hole, is the thing that rescues is from being stuck.
Jesus is “out there” but is also “in here”. Jesus is instantly available -all you have to do is call on him. Ask and you shall receive, after all. But Jesus is also inside every person who has let him into their lives. Jesus builds houses for poor people through Habitat for Humanity. Jesus feeds people at the rescue mission. Jesus holds people’s hands when they die in hospice care. Jesus teaches children how to read.
Jesus wears a lot of faces and goes by a lot of names, and he’s here.
But he had to be broken and blessed for that to happen.
He wasn’t crucified for our sins. He was blessed and broken on that cross, just like how he blessed and broke the bread and the fish to feed thousands.
He became more, so we could become more.
Thanks be to God.
betsybeadhead 