Married to my high school sweetheart with 3 beautiful kids, a brick house in an ideal neighborhood, loving family and friends…it all sounds picture perfect, right?
It wasn’t.
I was depressed, exhausted and overwhelmed. Our marriage was in trouble. The kids were getting all I had, but I was nowhere near the mom I desired to be.
Then it felt like everything fell apart. And that’s when things started to become so beautiful.
Instead of creating ugly scars, the cracks and imperfections allowed love and joy to shine in.
So what happened? A health crisis in my husband’s life shook us to our very core. Everything changed about our lives and relationship—with each other, with our kids, and with God.
You know the saying that trouble either drives you apart or closer together? I’m so grateful that we have experienced trouble that has driven us first of all to the Lord and secondly to each other.
Last fall we took an overnight trip to the beach, and while looking for seashells I came across this beautiful conch shell that had a big hole in it. In spite of the broken part, I couldn’t help but pick it up. Tears welled up in my ears as I immediately identified with it. It so perfectly represented myself and my husband as individuals and our marriage.
Only God can make a broken situation absolutely beautiful, but we have to allow Him to.
How can you allow God to turn your brokenness into something beautiful?
- Realize you are nothing without Him.
- Remember He has your best interest at heart. (What He knows to be best, not what we think is best.)
- Spend time every day in gratitude and appreciating the small things.
- Surrender your expectations of what “should be.”
- Allow God to rewrite your story.
Do we have it all together? Not anywhere close! But we are enjoying the ride so much more. We will never be perfect, but we are perfectING, and that is making all the difference!
“To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified.” (Isaiah 61:3)
