Blessing and Brokenness...

It was an accident.  The nativity was in it's box on top of a pile of other boxes stored away.  I asked my husband to get it down for me before I got home that afternoon.  Somehow it fell, and some of the pieces were broken.  In a panic, (am I really that frightening, that this sent him into a panic?), he called our daughters for advice and help.  He brought the broken pieces to one daughter who started glueing what she could.  Another daughter started searching ebay to see if she could find replacement parts.  Between the glueing, and a few pieces found on ebay,  the nativity scene, broken years ago now, looks pretty intact...except for Mary.  She's broken, but if you keep her facing forward, you can't really tell.  You see, she's broken where you can't see..she's got a gaping hole...but you can't tell unless you turn her around.

I find it strangely appropriate that out of all the broken pieces, she's the only one still visibly broken.  She who was "blessed above all other women" ,(Luke 1:42 Amplified Bible), had to be willing to be broken to be blessed.  This is a God principle, you never get the one without the other...if you want to be blessed, you must be willing to be broken, and if you are willing to be broken, you will be blessed. Mary had to be willing to be broken by the false accusations of others...a virgin conceiving.  Surely we are not too prideful to realize that none of us would have believed her story either.  She had to be willing to see her flesh and blood falsely accused, beaten, blasphemed, hanging on a tree.  He wasn't just Son of God, He was Son of Man...her son, hanging there pierced, bloody.

I want to be blessed above all other women too...and yet I constantly fight against the brokenness part of the deal.  I hate, yes I said hate, the fact that being used by Him is accompanied by misunderstanding and often, the gaping wound kind of pain.  The hardest part is keeping my best face forward so that no one sees the jaggedy edged hole in my soul.  But He sees.  And He cares. And He heals. And when I surrender, and offer up to Him my brokenness, He blesses me and He uses me to bless others. ( Matthew 14:19)

I'm so glad the story didn't end there for Mary.  I'm so thankful that her last images of Jesus weren't of Him on that tree.  Three days later, she saw Him again.  Oh, the healing joy that must have been to her.  The final seal of God that yes, He really is Who He says He is.  Not just Son of Man, her little boy, but Son of God.