Heart for the 1
Have you ever heard that expression "Lord, break my heart for what breaks Yours."? It wasn't until I had been saved a few years, and landed in my church that I really stopped to reflect on that statement.
I mean, there's a lot of things that have broken my heart. Boys, friends, family, jobs, situations, ads for starving children and orphans. But in my selfishness, I only saw up to what broke my heart, not what broke God's.
Once I started to really think about all the things that broke God's heart, I started to think about them as if to magically feel absolutely gutted about said thing. Some of the things made me sad, maybe even slightly heartbroken; but some things didn't get more than a shrug of the shoulders and a "yeah, that stinks!"
I really spent years trying to figure out what it was that broke my heart. Lots of things make me sad. I am extremely empathetic, so I feel deeply even without emotional attachment. Nothing really stood out though, so I just kept trucking along and serving, wondering what it really was that broke my heart.
I have since landed serving in children's ministry- more specifically special needs.
This is "home" for me. I love serving. No matter how tired I am that morning, frustrated or flustered... those kids make me forget it all. I could literally serve every weekend because those kids are amazing.
One day I was thinking about that expression again, and I had an "a-ha! moment":
What breaks my heart, to sum it up, is the one who gets left out or left behind. The one who is overlooked, or assumed is fine. The one who helps everyone, but doesn't have a line out the door when they are in need.
Who I identify as "the one", is really just the little girl version of me. I don't want anyone to ever feel how I felt. I had Jesus with me during my dark times- thank you to everyone to nurtured my faith during those critical years- and every heartbreaking experience I endured can now be used to glorify God and help others through trials.
Every time I cried myself to sleep, or wished I didn't have to live through another day.... God would use those moments to help me be there for others in those situations. I'm by no means a counselor, but if you wanted to grab coffee, I can relate a little better having gone through some things myself.
Church hurt I experienced later in life initially left me hurt, resentful and a little bitter. But God has shown me that no church is perfect, and hanging onto those feelings is NOT what God wants for me. Also, that I have been put in a unique position to not only learn and grow from that experience, but to help other families with kids who are different not experience it. Even that heartbreaking time was used to glorify God.
The one isn't JUST ONE type of person like I originally thought it was:
- It's the mother who just lost a child
- It's the person who received a hard diagnosis
- It's the person who feels unworthy
- It's the person who battles with anxiety / depression
- It's the person who feels unloveable
- It's for the couple who's struggling with fertility
- It's for the person afraid to share their gifts with others
- Its for the person who's ashamed
- It's for the person grappling with pride
- It's me.
- It's you.
Jesus' heart breaks for all of us uniquely.
we are all the ONE Jesus leaves the 99 for. My heart is for you.