Inviting God Into Your Brokenness

The other night I spent some time with my wife at her job. She's a summer camp director at a Christian camp in central PA. This week she has a guest speaker from Minnesota and his ministry team joining the camp. The speaker shared a very powerful message that night about brokenness, it was actually his testimony of how God saved him. Not your typical message - or testimony. God literally saved him from death, at his own hands. The speaker shared his story about how on a morning in 1992 after a half hour of panic, Billy, a tough but broken young man faced all of his brokenness collapsing in on him - or rather the walls he built. Billy has a unique story of a life with a broken home and an alcoholic and ultimately absent father, a tendency toward perfection in sports and religion, and a few years of military service.

This particular morning not long after Billy had come home from his time in the military, he opened the door of his house with the awareness that someone was in the house. His newly honed military skills and senses kicked into action as he prepared to take care of the unwitting intruder. However, as he stealthily checked every room of the house and finally found himself in the basement with only one room left, he found no one there. But still, he was keenly aware of the presence of someone - or something just behind him. It was the feeling of tangible evil.

Over the next several minutes Billy's years of brokenness and the walls he had built which held it back came crumbling down on top of him until finally he found himself sitting in the makeshift office in the basement with a rifle aimed square at his chest. He couldn't quite figure out a way to hold the gun and fire it, until he balanced it on a ledge. As the thoughts ran through his mind, "Do it!" and, "Well, I don't know," the gun shifted toward his shoulder as it went off. Bang!

As Billy described the next few moments in his own words: "The pain was unbearable. The stench of burning flesh was ungodly. The blood was unreal." Billy collapsed from the pain, shock and loss of blood. His right shoulder had been nearly completely blown off. His deltoid muscle was gone. Part of his collarbone had been blown into his lung. The bullet had gone completely through his body and out the other side.

As Billy regained consciousness he heard the voice of the Police chief descending the stairs of his house to the basement where he was, gun drawn. "Are you OK, kid?" The police thought there was a shooter involved. The paramedics soon arrived, and had to literally carry Billy in a body bag up the stairs because the staircase out of the basement was too narrow and steep to get a gurney in. One of the first paramedics there was a kid who went to school with Billy. Tears streamed down his face, as Billy said, "I'm going to die, aren't I. Am I going to be OK?"

But what happened between the time Billy fired that gun and when he regained consciousness is something amazing - an unique. As Billy says, "What happened was God."

The investigators reports show that from the desk in the makeshift office downstairs where Billy shot himself there were blood footprints on the floor all the way over to the bed where police and paramedics found him lying. When Billy was found he was still wearing his size 11 running shoes he had on when he came home that day. The footprints were size 8, barefoot.

There is also no explanation for the towel from upstairs that was used as a dressing already wrapped around Billy's shoulder when police and paramedics arrived. No one was home but Billy.

And there is no explanation for why the Emergency Dispatch Service to this day cannot find the recording of the 911 call that came in triggering the dispatch of police and paramedics to Billy's home.

Billy stood before the audience and with determination and conviction in his eyes said, "Don't tell me there is no God."

What followed is perhaps just as miraculous as what happened between the gunshot and the arrival of medical professionals. God saved Billy's life even though Doctors in the Hershey Medical Center and Johns Hopkins University thought Billy was going to die. They thought they were going to have to amputate his arm to even have a chance at saving him. Three days later, on his little brother's birthday, Billy regained consciousness and began a long period of pain and recovery - and of transformation.

Billy shares how for two years after his life was dramatically different and still broken. But through it all God worked in his life and ultimately was able to change Billy. His heart behind the testimony and something he repeated over and over was that he prays that none of those who hear his story have to go through the same level of suffering before they allow God to help them.

The whole point of Billy's story is that he had years of brokenness that he thought he could bear on his own. He thought he could handle it until it all came crashing in on him.

As I sat listening, touched, I knew that what he had to say was just as much for me as it was for anyone else in that room. So often I try to handle everything in my own strength. I try to build walls to hide and protect me from my own brokenness. But in it all, God wants to come into my brokenness and bear it for me.

It's just like the Apostle Paul said in his letter to the Corinthian believers, His strength is made perfect in weakness. We think we must be strong to survive, but really we must be weak and allow God to come into our weakness. We must invite Him in, because being a God of love He will never force His way into your life.

Do you have it all together? Is your world just falling apart? If either answer is yes, you need God. Because eventually all of your pain or all of your success is going to come crashing in on you and you are going to need God to lift you up - to carry you through.

Hitting the Big Time

Today I was on LinkedIn. I am a member of several groups on LinkedIn for design professionals. The groups provide a very valuable resource to get feedback, ask questions and network with other professionals in my field. I've used the discussion boards many times to get answers I needed or just to follow a discussion on an interesting topic.

I get regular email updates about weekly questions that people are asking in the groups. Today one caught my eye in a forum called Designers Talk. It read:

You hit the big time … and then what?

When you've made your millions, what do you intend to do? Help others in the same field? Provide free solutions for charities? Perhaps fund causes close to home? And - not unrelated - have you ever told anyone your honest reasons for your burning desire to succeed? (Are they related to the first question?)

Here was my response:

I have always dreamed of hitting the "big time" - like most people. I've always wanted to have disposable income to do fun stuff like taking my wife on dream vacations, buying a quad and going on quad trails, supping up a Nissan Skyline GTR, spoiling my kids, taking care of my parents in the old age, and giving to ministries and other causes I would love to greatly support. To be honest though, a lot of my desire for success - upon close examination - has to do with approval, and justifying myself, and my choices.

To be completely honest, I have recently begun to look at "success" in a new light. As I get older (and I'm only 27) I begin to see that money is not the answer to life's problems. In fact, many times it is the beginning of life's problems. How many people have you seen or heard of in the media or elsewhere who made it "big" and next thing you know they are getting a divorce, or in trouble with the law? Money clearly doesn't solve all problems, and I think it is wisdom that recognizes putting trust in money is foolish.

Some people misquote that Bible verse that says "money is the root of all evil" (misquoted). What the text actually says (and I had two semesters of Bible Greek at a Christian College) is "the LOVE of money is a root of all kinds of evil." Money is sort of a-moral. Smart people can do smart things with it. Dumb people can do dumb things with it. Good people like wise good things, and bad people likewise bad things.

The point: there are so many other things in life that I am beginning to aspire to OTHER than money that I believe will truly define "SUCCESS" for me.

What do you think? What defines success in your life?