I was thinking about my name again today, and I remember sharing with my small group this semester about how I really didn't like it since my mom told me that she picked it because it means fragile and brittle. And then I had the image of someone holding one of those shiny Christmas ornaments and squishing it, and it cracking. But, today I realize that I have been appropriately named, but not in a negative way. In thinking about what it means to be the beloved of God, which I do not believe I have written about in this blog, there are 4 words associated with being the beloved: chosen, blessed, broken, and given. There's this quote from Henri Nouwen from his book Life of the Beloved that reads, "Reflecting a little more on the way our friendship has grown over the years, I realize that there is a mysterious link between our brokneness and our ability to give to each other. We both went through periods of extreme inner pain. And during those painful times, we often felt that our lives had come to a standstill and that we had nothing to offer; but now, years later, those periods have proven to be the times that made us able to give more instead of less. Our brokenness opened us to a deeper way of sharing our lives and offering each other hope. Just as bread needs to be broken in order to be given, so, too, do our lives."
Part 2 of this post is about Luke 7. This is taken straight out of my journal from earlier today:
My gospel readings have been very fruitful and I definitely feel like God has been giving me a different set of eyes in reading. Today i read Luke 7 and two things jumped out at me. The first was the story of the faith of the centurion. What I noticed was not so much his faith, but his deep care for his servants even though he was in a high-up position. I feel like this is so rare, but something we should be praying for in our leaders. The second thing that jumped out was the story of Jesus raising the widow's son. I forgot where I read the commentary, but I read a commentary on the story of Abraham and Isaac, which this passage reminded me of. Abraham brings Isaac, his only son, up to the mountain to be sacrificed for the Lord. He is essentially giving him over to God... but God gives him back. Going back down the mountain, visibly there is nothing different, but their whole relationship is different because God has now become a part of it. And it's similar here--the widow's only son dies and is raised from the dead. Visibly it's just a dead man now alive again, but invisibly, their entire relationship is different and transformed because Jesus is now a part of it. This is the relationship I desire with each of my own parents, a transformed relationship taht is centered around Christ, but it seems that there needs to be a certain degree of "dying" in order for God to restore and make new. What does this mean for my mom and dad?
Looking through the gospels... there was also the story of Jairus and his daughter, and the guy with the demon-possessed boy. In both cases one could imply that the parent/child relationships are altered, and the breaking happens in order to bless very many other people, or at least in them witnessing the miracle, since I doubt that the crowds could really see or understand the internal transformation. It makes me think about how Jesus calls us to leave our families, to hate our mother and father, that you should call mother and brother those who are Christians. The brokenness of the relationships with my parents can really only be restored in Jesus. In these stories, the parent comes to seek out Jesus to help them, and I can't help but think that if each of my parents can come to Jesus with hearts like theirs, they could be transformed as well, and so could our relationships.
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