Double Tears, XSnot, Broken Human

Starbucks lingo clearly haunts my day-to-day life now. Exhibit A (blog title).

It's been a while. A lot has happened. Let me fill you in.

First of all, in college, you learn something new at least once a day. With that math, that means I have roughly learned 23 things since the last time I've blogged. I'd said that's fairly accurate. They don't necessarily have to be huge realizations. To name a few minor ones:

• working at Starbucks gives you a lot of baby name ideas for the far future
• even though I'm a girl, I am fully capable of eating three burgers in one sitting (that actually happened) 
• the last possible second I can sleep to make it to my 9AM on the dot
• sacrificing something for religious purposes is "lent", not "lint" (oops--hi journalism major) 

The list goes onnnnn. It's to the point of me enjoying someone characterizing me as "naive" in certain areas. Though the ones listed above are light-hearted, a moment struck me in this past month where my ignorance, yet again, was proven at understanding something that surrounded me my entire life. For as long as I can remember, I was enthralled by the thought of an ideal Christian, missing grasp of what it fully meant. You rejoice in the worship songs, the writings of the disciples, the promise of eternity, and it seems that with the title as a Christian, life will demonstrate the closest thing to perfection. 

HAHAHA. Life as a Christian= HARD. 

For me, I bought into the belief that if I fully devoted myself to God, I would never stumble, nor should I. That the word "broken" strictly belonged to the nonbelievers, the lost and the lonely. 

Side note: These beautiful words just came up on my Spotify: 

Is there anyone that fails
Is there anyone that falls
Am I the only one in church today feelin' so small

Cause when I take a look around
Everybody seems so strong
I know they'll soon discover
That I don't belong

So I tuck it all away, like everything's okay
If I make them all believe it, maybe I'll believe it too
So with a painted grin, I play the part again
So everyone will see me the way that I see them

Coinciding with those lyrics, I hope we can all admit that at some point that confession has been one of familiarity. If I felt broken, I felt undeserving to be sitting with a church pamphlet resting on my lap. These seats are reserved for those that have it all together. If at any given moment I felt a sense of incompletion, I felt unworthy. "But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me." 2 Corinthians 12:9

Hey friends, breathe. You don't have to have it all together. In fact, the scripture reveals the weaker you are, the greater His power. 

Testimony after testimony, I heard the word "broken" out of Christians' mouths, even in sharing my own. We all struggle. Hypocrisy makes an appearance beacause of this. "How can you all be living your life for God if you do that?" 

We mess up, Christian or not:

-We gossip

-We judge

-We're quick to anger

-We're slow to forgiveness 

-We indulge ourselves with idols

-We compare ourselves to others

We're humans living in this broken world and we are all broken. 

The inspiration for this blog post came from the song "Broken Together" by Casting Crowns:

Maybe you and I were never meant to be complete
Could we just be broken together
If you can bring your shattered dreams and I'll bring mine
Could healing still be spoken and save us
The only way well last forever is broken together

Come to God. Bring your troubles, your baggage, your shame, your brokenness. And the awareness of this will lead to many tears and lots of snot, FYI. 

"Come, let us return to the Lord. For He has torn us, but He will heal us; He has wounded us, but He will bandage us." Hosea 6:1 

Let's be broken together.