Episode 31 - Broken
Episode 31 - Broken
Hello! Welcome to the Seasons of Joy Podcast.
Before I begin, I would like to invite you to the Seasons of Joy Community Facebook Group where I will be going live on Thursday, October 13th at 12 pm MDT. I am going to be talking about Grace. I will also be taking questions as well as coaching. I would love to have you join me live or you can watch the recording later. All you have to do is join the Season of Joy Community Facebook Group. My hope for this community is to have a place that fosters connection, hope and joy. I would love to have you join me there.
So I just had my An Awakening Retreat this last weekend and it was all I hoped it would be. It was an intimate group of amazing women who decided to take a chance on themselves and me. To share and be vulnerable as we spent our time together refocusing, reconnecting, and rejuvenating. It was incredible and I am looking forward to doing another one in the spring. Details for that will be coming near the end of the year.
So I have been thinking alot about the word broken. Oftentimes, we hear people refer to themselves as broken. Life experiences that have brought feelings of pain and heartache can cause us to feel broken. So what I want to discuss today is not meant to discount someone else’s trauma or pain. My hope is quite the opposite actually. I want to share a perspective that I recently came to in my own mind that has helped me in a deeply profound way.
I looked up the word broken on google recently and this is what I found. Broken is an adjective that has two meanings. One is “having been fractured or damaged and no longer in one piece or in working order.” Such as having a “broken arm.” The other one is “having given up all hope; despairing” or “suffering emotional pain that is so strong that it changes the way you live, usually as a result of an unpleasant event.”
Can you see the difference? One definition is about being broken and needing to be fixed. The other definition is about feeling broken, affecting our ability to show up in our life the way we would like to.
I believe that many people equate their feeling broken to being broken. Now, I know this may seem like a small difference but it is a big mindset shift. When we believe we are broken, there is a sense that something is wrong with us. That we are flawed. Less than.
But the truth is each one of us is complete, whole, 100% valuable and worthy. For example, if you have two $100 dollar bills side by side and one is dirty and one is brand new one is not worth more than the other. They are of the same value. That is the same with each one of us.
The world would have us believe that someone can be better than another, move valuable. Even in the church, we sometimes can think that oh so and so is better than us because they have their life put together or they are doing everything “right.” So we believe that we are of less value. I mean President Nelson has to be more valuable than us, right?
The opposite is also true. We may have adult children that have chosen differently than we taught them growing up. We feel disappointment with the direction they are going and in some ways believe we are better because we are on the path. They could be better if they would do what we believe is right. Now, I am not saying that we shouldn’t believe staying on the covenant path isn’t right. Of course we do. That is why we are trying to be on it. However, our adult child is not less valuable because they choose differently. They are not flawed or broken.
There is no hierarchy to value.
Jesus Christ is the Son of God but even He is no more valuable than you are I. We are of the same value. We are loved just as much as the Savior of the world. Let that soak in for a minute. We are no less valuable than Jesus Christ.
Now Jesus Christ’s role and His mission that he was sent to earth to do is different from ours. But, He is no more valuable than you! He came to save all. He came to redeem all. He came to succor all. He came to heal all. But you are just as valuable.
So you and I are not broken. We experience being wounded. Being emotionally wounded. We feel broken in moments but we are not broken. And through Him we can be healed and made whole emotionally again because we are His. Because we are valuable. We are worthy.
As members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints we often hear that as we are obedient the commandments and enter into a covenant relationship with our Father and our Savior we will be armed with the Power of God. His healing and strengthening power. So our ability to access that power increases. But what I think many of us get wrong is that we equate the love of God with power. Now I believe the love of God is powerful. However, God’s love for us is unchanging. We don’t earn his love. We don’t earn his love by honoring our covenants. Our covenants bring power but God’s love is always there.
This made me think of the story in the scriptures of the woman at the well found in John 4. Jesus is leaving Judea and is heading to Galilee. It says, “And he must needs go through Samaria.” This says to me that he deliberately went to Samaria. This is in a time when every Jew would avoid Samaria. Samaritans were considered dirty. He went straight to Jacob’s well to get water and rest in the heat of the day. There he meets the Samaritan woman who is coming to get water at that time because she was even looked down upon by her fellow Samaritans. Jesus perceived that she had had five husbands and was not married to the man she was living with at the time. He came into her story as she was. She didn’t need to change. She was not broken. She was wounded. Christ came to her to teach and minister unto her where she was. This was also one of the first declarations that he gave that He was the Messiah. It was to a woman who was feeling wounded and thought she was broken. But He taught her she was not broken and he was there to heal her wounds if should would let him. She left that moment and became a powerful witness of the Savior because he came into her story and she chose to believe him and to believe in him.
In speaking about this same story, Susan Porter shared the following, “Her past and present circumstances didn’t determine her future. Like her, we can choose to turn to the Savior today for the strength and healing that will enable us to fulfill all that we were sent here to do.”
But I think this begins by understanding this truth. You are not broken. You feel broken. There is a difference.
Our most fundamental doctrine is that we are children of loving Heavenly Parents. The relationship is powerful and divine. We are Their joy and we are here on earth to experience Joy. And the Savior’s Atonement is an expression of God’s love for each one of us.
The first great truth is you are loved by God. You are not broken.
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