478
“AWWW… YOU’RE BROKEN”, 12MAY
Silver linings are showing up in a thousand ways while I am recovering from rotator cuff surgery… And I try to remember that one hundred years ago I would have been stuck for life without use of this left arm… This arthroscopic surgery surely made a rainbow bridge connection reattachment within my shoulder. I’m blessed, despite the pain, to be healing…
Here is a silver lining – a chance to spend time with friends who come to help – I got a trip to the Amish Market yesterday. YAY! A friend called me out of the blue, scooped me up in her car… I didn’t even have time to change out of my pajama-like leggings, crazy green with circling things – I, of all people, can pull off crazy clothes, but these are a bit extreme that I bought to cheer me up in recovery and because leggings are easy getting dressed with one hand… I thought, “Well the sling will distract anyone from noticing the pants!!”…
Walking in, my friend gave me $20 as a gift “just because” right in front of the Amish pretzel place and went off to do her own shopping at the next stall…
I stood there – just happy in the moment – just happy to have God smiling on me… I smiled because I have the best of friends and I smiled while holding the money ready to get goodies – a cinnamon pretzel, some Amish salads, corn on the cob, and pieces of chocolate covered bacon to share… YUMMY!
See, I was already SMILING even before this, I had just told this friend about an opportunity two nights prior that i got a re-affirmation of my faith, verbally stating how i really am needing Jesus as a savior, and how a rainbow video had arrived in my messages box just at the perfect Holy Spirited-time to let me know God was thinking about me and yes Jesus saved me, and yes Jesus saves us… It made me smile then and now – it makes me SMILE at salvation…
So at that moment, I was SMILING WIDE – inside and out… And then this woman sees me as I turn from the pretzel place and immediately she sees my big black sling and blurts out uncontrollably in a motherly fashion: “AWWW…. YOU’RE BROKEN!!!…” I stopped dead in my tracks, ummm… OK, wow, ummm… Well, what she blurted out wasn’t intended to be mean, those who heard it could have considered it rude but it truly was NOT meant to harm me, it was NOT a cut down, she spoke instantly, openly, like she couldn’t help it pouring out of her head and mouth – and said it very very truthfully….
She certainly had no way knowing what was running thru my brain at that very exact moment… But God did… God knows all… See, my mind at that very moment was in a healing place, just like my shoulder is in healing… It is by the grace of God that we are healing from what is our biggest riff – the riff caused by our sins pushing us away, but Jesus the fisherman is casting His net to catch us back… It is the truth that mentally the Lord heals us… My mind was reaffirmed at that moment and I was able to say internally to myself: “Yes, I AM broken… I am a Sinner… I do need a Savior… Jesus is my Savior… I need healing in more ways than she could ever know… God loves me so much He gave His only Son… God knows we are a BROKEN people”…
God gave of Himself – gave us Jesus – to advocate for the sins of all of us – both the known sins and ones we that have no idea that we are doing… at that moment I was STILLED… I was stopped dead in my tracks… I was exposed… I WAS STILL because I knew God made that register to me in that way – God wanted me to understand my brokenness is true – but His healing is real…
BE STILL and KNOW I AM GOD…
BE STILL… I simply smiled back at the lady…. A BIG SMILE… I smiled because the truth was spoken at that very moment… I answered to inform her, “It’s OK. It’s OK because I am healing”… I smiled at her and off she went…
It’s so clear that we all have the greatest of healers in our Lord… We are a saved people BUT we need to realize it and be remorseful and we realize our human-ness… And WE MUST REACH FOR OUR SAVIOR! And we must ask for healing. “But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.” John 3:21 NIV
I am bounced even higher in life by going down the road to admit my faults known and unknown… At the end of the road (and even during the rainstorms of life) shines a rainbow… I smiled…
After this encounter I turned to an Amish woman selling chocolate covered bacon and told her a condensed version of what happened, of what the lady blurted out uncontrollably – and that I was not offended – i was OK because I was healing… and reaffirmed that God is good because I can see so many silver linings and blessings from this “downtime”… She agreed… I smiled…
I can’t possibly process this amazement of being saved without speaking it out at times… I can be STILLED internally, but I must speak it out… I must write it out… and thank the Lord I have so many open faith friends to chat with plus these random strangers who might only see me smile, my joy bubbling out… It was a Jewish friend who sent me the rainbow video… I am blessed with angels…
And guess what? No one noticed these crazy crazy leggings – at least they didn’t say anything…
BUT, I am certain people noticed my SMILE that day… Perhaps they will smile too…
P.S.
That night, I sat at my son’s school band concert, it was great but I was in pain in my left arm from the shoulder surgery was bothering me… I closed my eyes, absorbed the budding musicians’ music, and when I opened my eyes I noticed green color in the sea of children – a left arm of a child playing cello… He was playing with a green prosthetic arm… I was humbled… I have to remember to reduce my complaints about this repaired and healing shoulder… I’ll take my pain and remember that green arm – a mechanical fix to his brokenness which brightens this child’s future… An opportunity for this child to live to his fullest – and an opportunity for all of us to see how we are to count our blessings…
God is GOOD…
AMEN
John 3:17 -21 NKJV
17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
18 “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. 21 But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.”
Debbie Upper 