What does it mean to be broken to love? It may not be what you’re thinking.
Ponder these questions:
What if we allow God to begin to deal with our hurts and bring healing? What would we look like if we were healed and whole? What would evangelism look like if we loved the way Jesus did? What if we didn’t have prejudice and false mindsets clouding our vision? Jesus said that we would be known as his disciples if we have love one to another.
What keeps us from love? Our past hurts; those broken places that become hard in our heart.
When we’ve been hurt in the past, we see things in our lives through the lens of that hurt. For example, if you have “daddy issues” you take those issues into every relationship you have; with your spouse, your kids, your work and ministry. Our “issues” limit our capacity to love others the way God intended. Our past hurts limit our ability to love others unconditionally, the way Jesus did.
Our whole purpose in life is to represent Jesus to a lost and dying world. How can we properly represent him if we are broken ourselves?
Everyone has issues from their past. We know what our “issues” are most of the time. We know where that deep hurt comes from. We know what it has caused in our lives. I had the same “issues” in my life. My problem was that I covered them up. I thought once I came to Jesus and gave my life to Him that it was over. Problem solved. Not so.
I still had to allow Jesus to walk me through healing. Exposing the lies I believed and bringing His truth to each broken place in my heart.
Often these broken places will rise to the surface, beyond the hard exterior we’ve created. The closer we get to Him the more we are exposed in the areas that are not reflecting Him. As God gently reveals these things to us, we have a choice. We can say “no Lord, I don’t want to deal with that, let’s just keep it covered up and go on with life, it won’t hurt anything, I can work with what I have”. Or we can say “yes Lord, I know you are showing me these things to dig up infection in my heart, bring healing, and enable to love others in a deeper way, I give you access to this hurt place, touch it, heal it, make me whole”. It is so hard to allow God to touch those deep wounds. We have kept them covered up for so long. We have put on a strong face. People don’t even know what we’ve been through. But God recognizes that as long as that thing is there, deep inside you, it creates a limit to the amount of love you can show others. And what is our greatest commandment? Love one another. I got to the place in my life and ministry where I had reached my capacity to love. I had reached a ceiling, a limit to how effective I was in ministering to others. I had a hard heart and a line that I would not cross in feeling empathy for others and showing them the love of Jesus. It was hindering the kingdom and the work he was wanting to do in me. I began to seek Him. “God there has to be more to this Christian
life than this!”. I started to follow ministers and evangelists that had an amazing love walk. I began to pray “God I want to see others how they see them, I want to love people in a selfless way like that”. God began to press on me, like only He can. I would have encounters with Him where I would be at a crossroads. He would impress upon my heart, “you can pick either path, I will still love you either way, one path will have less resistance but you won’t meet your full potential in me, the other path will not be easy but I will be there to help you and it will yield the most fruit”. Those are hard things to consider. I chose the hard path and boy did things begin to change.
There is a pattern to the healing. I have friends that pointed it out to me. After I saw it, I realized this is what God has been walking me through repeatedly.
God will begin to impress an area of focus on you: this could come through a circumstance outside of your control, a memory that keeps popping up, an attitude that isn’t Godly that continues to surface, etc.
Once the pain of staying the same outweighs the pain of allowing him to change it, you will begin to ask: God, why do I feel this way? I know this mindset doesn’t line up with your word and your will for my life, show me the truth as only you can.
Open yourself up for digging deeper: God may begin to show you things you have forgotten or memories you have suppressed. Open your heart. Pray for Him to guide you through this process.
Once you see the truth do the 5 R’s: Repent – Ask God to forgive you
Rebuke – Take the legal right away from the enemy
Replace – What does God say about you and your situation
Receive – Accept what He says
Redirect – How will this change your behavior from this point forward
Once you say “yes” to Him and allow Him to walk you through this cycle, you will see that hard shell you’ve placed on your heart begin to soften. You will see that people look different. You will know how to love those the Lord sends you. Every place of hardness turns to healing and every place of healing into love.
You will then become broken to love.
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