When Wendy and I got married, money was tight. She had an art class in which part of the supply list was a huge set of oil pastel, every color of the rainbow and then some. Let me tell ya, they weren’t cheap. But, oh, they looked so good, just like the ones real art teachers had. On the first day of her class, the professor had them get out their pastels and break each one. And she cried (and I cried) as she broke the set of her new pastels.
The point? Broken pastels still have art in them. I know many times this year I have felt broken… Times I felt that life as we know it in America is broken… Moments when I wondered out loud if there was hope in this broken world.
And yet, we have been called to sing in this holy season, and create love, justice, and welcome right in the middle of this brokenness. So, what will we create from the broken pieces of 2024? What ministry, what service, what liturgy will sing of healing amidst brokenness, of brightness in the shadows?
God has a history of picking up what you and I think are broken pieces, broken people, and creating anew. The Bible is full of stories about God using broken people to do marvelous things. Nadia Bolz-Weber captured that image when she wrote that God doesn’t scan the room and look for the brightest, best, most perfect example to carry the gospel. No! God calls those of us who stumble and fall far more than we want to admit… Those of us who have broken pieces in our lives.
What ministry, service, and liturgy is God calling us to as individuals and corporately amid our brokenness? Could God be calling us to paint, to draw, to create a new song of service and kindness and love?
Could it be that God is calling us to live out our love of creation, neighbor, and children right in the middle of our fractured lives?
My answer is a firm, yes! It’s our Feet-N-More Shower Trailer going out to the people. It’s volunteering and checking on your neighbor, it’s welcoming the stranger, it’s caring for the environment, it’s clothing and feeding the refugees, it’s giving hope to those who are distraught.
You see, broken pastels still have art in them. Broken people, do too. We still have ministry, service, and liturgy within us. Let us sing the song of hope, of peace, of joy, and of love.
Shalom, Paul