Broken and Beautiful

Broken but beautiful. Ever had the experience of seeing the same pattern over several days? I don’t mean patterns like traffic or how we arrange silverware in our kitchen drawers. No, I mean patterns that speak to something deeper. If you have experienced them, what follows may resonate with you. If patterns are lost on you, skip this altogether. I write as one convinced that patterns are important. Why? Because confluence, convergence, and the coming together of ideas may serve as presages. Patterns exist for several reasons. One of those reasons is to act as messengers. Let me explain.

Last week I read a short theology book. The author wrote of how all people who are honest admit that our world is broken, and that we all are broken people. We know intuitively that the world is a fallen place. And we know that we’re fallen, too. Witness the current destruction of statues and monuments to America’s history by angry mobs. Witness the targeted slaughter of law enforcement officers. Witness the rancor among pundits who seem to have relinquished reasoned debate and replaced it with ad hominem attacks. Most of us would admit that the world we live in is hostile, rancorous, and well—broken. This brokenness is not just external to us. It is not merely “out there.” If we are honest, brokenness is part of the way we see ourselves. No pattern yet, right? Hold on. It is coming.

So I kept reading the book and thought, “Yes, this rings true. We are broken.” But then the author did something else. He used the term “beautiful” to describe us, too—amidst our brokenness. For many readers, that term might not signify much. But for others, that term denotes that a lot more is going on; namely, there is beauty in this broken world. There is an aesthetic to the universe. Yes, there is ugliness, deformity, depravity, etc. The list is long of how brokenness manifests itself in some people’s cruelty to one another. However, humanity is still beautiful. Then I put the two words together—broken but beautiful. That was last week.

Now to this week. In a Sunday school class, a teacher was leading us in an examination of some of what Scripture teaches about how Christ-followers will—not may—but will suffer. We looked at Peter’s words: “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed” (1 Peter 4:12-13). And then we read James’ words: “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness” (James 1:2). Do you see the pattern? The world is broken, but beauty abides still. These broken people are beautiful in the crucible.

Then we looked at Paul’s words from prison: “For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake, engaged in the same conflict that you saw I had and now hear than I still have” (Philippians 1:29-30).


Then the teacher said this: “We are broken but still beautiful.” I almost slid out of my chair. The same terms, the same truth, the same pattern—broken but beautiful.
The pattern asserted itself through experience, through a book, then through a teacher at church—with its simple message: broken but beautiful.

When we had eaten lunch and returned home after church, and changed into comfortable clothes, my son said, “Dad, let’s throw the football.” Even though I had a thousand other things to do to prepare for the week ahead, the pattern emerged. Excuses came to my mind: I need to work in the basement; I need to wash my truck; I need to prepare for the course I’m teaching, and on they ran. But here was my son, asking to do what is beautiful to him.

As we threw the ball to each other, I watched him run the hill and sprint for passes. I saw the white laces spin round as the football arced towards him. I heard the sounds of his cleats on the earth and watched the way sun fell in patches on our driveway and through the overhanging white oaks. And the pattern whispered—broken but beautiful.

Tyranny of the Temporary?













The Death of Appreciation?

Very recently, I led another memorial service for an 84-year old Army veteran of the wars in Korea and Vietnam. The man had been a sergeant major (SGM) when he retired. He continued his service as a defense contractor upon retiring from the military. In the last chapter of his life, he moved near Ft. Benning, GA to be near a longtime friend under whom he’d served as a first sergeant (1SG) during the early 1970s. He spent his last years deer hunting in west Georgia. Finally, the cancer he’d battled for years conquered his body, and he died. When I spoke at his memorial, and before we committed his asheist2-4686483-word-death-on-paper-and-broken-pencil-in-hands to the ground, most of the chairs on the rostrum were vacant. Most people did not know or care of this man’s passing. As I read Scripture, prayed, and consoled a couple of his friends, I had an overwhelming sense that there were multiple deaths at hand. We were not just marking theimgres-1 passing of another veteran’s life. I was witnessing in microcosm a culture that chooses to forget what is praiseworthy. What/whom one generation fails to honor, thenext generation will forget altogether.

People are busy, I understand. No one can be more than one place at a time, I understand. However, I fear that there’s a sense of callousness in our culture today towards almost everything once viewed with honor. What was heretofore praiseworthy is now neglected or even mocked. It is as if many people’s consciences are seared. But should we not laud that which is praiseworthy, when it’s in our power to do so? What does it say about a culture that forsakes its warriors? What does it reveal about us when we inventory what fills our time? What/whom one generation fails to honor, the next generation will forget altogether.

Nothing quite diagnoses a culture’s ethos as clearly as seeing what it worships. Man becomes like what he worships. But what does it mean when many worship at the altar of self, or at the altars of what Francis Schaeffer called personal peace and affluence? In other words, are we now so self-absorbed that we fail to recognize the passing of those that lived lives of sacrifice, courage, and honor? Are we so taken with our conveniences that we cannot think of those who gave of themselves for the greater good? Some of the deepest lessons I have learned come from times I’ve spent in cemeteries. They are among the quietest places on earth. You can hear yourself think. As you survey the tombstones, the mausoleums, the white markers, you relearn that this life is passing. You learn that man is a vapor. You learn that generations come and go. In Ecclesiastes, Solomon writes: “For of the wise as of the fool there is no enduring remembrance, seeing that in the days to come all will have been long forgotten” (Eccl 2:16a ESV). But Solomon’s thesis in Ecclesiastes was how not to succumb to that. The answer is to look to God, not to oneself alone, not just to our personal peace and affluence, but to recognize that which endures. But I’m suggesting that we are living in a time and culture that largely chooses to neglect what should be appreciated and worships that which should be minimized. The banal has replaced the praiseworthy. What/whom one generation fails to honor, the next generation will forget altogether.

When the apostle Paul was in prison in Rome, he wrote a letter known as Philippians. It’s a short New Testament book about Christ’s humiliation and subsequent exaltation. It’s also a NT book of encouragement. But what I want to focus on here is how he instructs the Philippians in matters of what they should honor, of what they should deem important: “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things” (Phil 4:8 ESV). It’s vital to understand what is honorable and praiseworthy, not what our selfishness deems honorable and praiseworthy.

If we want to know what we honor, let us examine how we spend our time. We are not witnessing the death of appreciation; we are witnessing idolatry—the appreciation of the wrong things/ideas/gods/people.