Curmudgeonly Thoughts: I am not broken, and neither are you
I'm thinking a lot about this concept of brokenness. I think we misunderstand it, throw it around as a cliche, use it as a vague excuse for sub-par living. I don't read that we are broken in Scripture. I read are sinners, and even more to the point, we sin. We exploit others and the actions of others can exploit us. Broken implies no choice or agency on anyone's part, no accountability for what we do. Broken applies passivity. Broken begs the question, "okay, can we be fixed?" Well, can we?
The New Testament has a different vocabulary for our identity. We sin (whether because we are innately sinful from birth or by choices, or a combination, take your pick), we are redeemed by mercy and grace, we grow in Christlikeness if we choose to do so, and in eternity we are remade into His image. No talk of "brokenness." Second, does brokenness come from a moral failure on our own parts? Or from a tragedy we had no part in? Or from someone's exploitation of us? (three entirely different causes, but the word "broken" implies equality of cause).
Worse, do we use "brokenness" as an excuse, or a sort of resignation. "We're broken....what you gonna do?" And how are we really broken? Have we really interrogated this word? And who started making it so popular? (In my world it was a former pastor, and I'm not sure what his reason for saying it so often. To defend/define himself? To make us feel better about our failures? To encourage us to be realistic about who we are?)
I really don't see the point of this obsession with "brokenness." Be real about sin, be even more real about how it is not supposed to define us. I am the spiritual daughter of the Puritan writers, and I don't see Spurgeon or Owen or Calvin going on about our brokenness.
I guess I prefer not to call myself broken. I prefer to
use the words of I Peter 2, which shifts from our brokenness to the
central facts and person of the universe.
4 As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him— 5 you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house[a] to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 6 For in Scripture it says:
“See, I lay a stone in Zion,
a chosen and precious cornerstone,
and the one who trusts in him
will never be put to shame.”[b]
7 Now to you who believe, this stone is precious. But to those who do not believe,
“The stone the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone,”[c]
8 and,
“A stone that causes people to stumble
and a rock that makes them fall.”[d]
They stumble because they disobey the message—which is also what they were destined for.
9 But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 10 Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
11 Dear friends, I urge you, as foreigners and exiles, to abstain from sinful desires, which wage war against your soul. 12 Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.
Comments