A Prayer for Transformation in Brokenness
With the crush of exam’s weighing heavy on all, the cracks of stress can be seen. Signs of brokenness, perhaps, but potentially far more hopeful than that. One student has been a faithful attendee of the weekly Alternate Service. However, she’s not particularly keen on engaging in discussions that happen there. “We die, we get buried in the ground, and that’s it.” was her take on life after death. But with the pressures of life weighing down, another story unfolds; an emotional melt-down and an opportunity on the benches outside the school clinic. Her confidence is no longer there - just a young girl overwhelmed by the worries of life and the fickleness of friends she expected to support her. In that moment, the words hit different. “I’m scared. I’m scared that people will try to fix me when I don’t think I’m fixable.” Through the tears she seemed a little more willing to accept words that would otherwise feel like meaningless “Christianese” to her. “There’s no taking the hard of the situation away, but two of my favourite things about Jesus are, 1) He’s always there, and 2) He specializes in working with broken people. There is no such thing as ‘unfixable’ with Him.”
The tears subsided, the emotions dissipated, and life picked up and went on. Is this the moment of transformation? No, I don’t think so. But with the Holy Spirit and prayer I hold fast to hope that words and moments like this can root themselves somewhere in that overly-confident-yet-uncertain heart of hers, bringing about the glorious transformation that happens when Christ is given control of the “unfixable”. Oh for grace in her life, that this story would be so!
Father Forgive Them
Who knew that at 2500 metres above sea level while struggling to get my weary legs to keep going I would experience such a deep encounter with some of Jesus’ last spoken words from the cross.
It had been nearly 6 weeks since I’d been on my bike. The first ride back in the saddle was tough, not to mention I was the only female in a group of mostly-teenage energizer-bunny-boys. They quickly left me in their dust on the long climb back up the mountain.
As I rounded a bend, a grey coupe filled with some rowdy tourists popped their heads out the window and shouted, “Looser! Looser! Looser!…”
I felt utterly scandalized! How could they? They had no idea how much effort I was putting into pumping those pedals, that I was the only girl on the ride - a nearly-40-year-old nonetheless! Not to mention it was my first ride since February. How could they be so thoughtless, degrading and rude!? Really, some people!
Immediately Jesus’ words flowed into my mind as the only worthy response to their actions, “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.”
