Broken

People tell me that I am strong and positive. Honestly, I am weak, but the Joy of the Lord is my strength. My world can be crashing down around me, and only those with a discerning spirit will know the hurt I feel and the burdens I am bearing.

I don’t know when I started being that way. Maybe it was work. Maybe it was when the last person who really knew me and all my life died. Maybe as I changed and realized there were not people in my life I could share honestly with and trust. I am not sure, only that I realize I am tired of it.

Lately, I have realized how broken I am. The mask I have learned to wear so convincingly in the world, has only fooled the world about who I am. I realize that mask has greatly changed my personality.  It has kept me from making relationships with those God has placed in my life.

I long to be transparent, to share my life – the good, the bad, the ugly. I find it easier though, to share only the deep or the superficial. I can tell the darkest secret of my life if it will help someone. I can keep it superficial when I find it hard to trust, and I usually do. However, I never allow anyone in to the real.

But today, as I cried out to God in my brokenness, I realized He sees the real. He loves the real. He knows the real. He is the place where I can be honest and broken, and real.  I enter into worship, and almost immediately begin to cry before the Lord. I find there with tears streaming that I am free. I don’t want to leave that wholeness I find in Christ. He brought me to this place, and He does not despise that sacrifice.

Psalm 51:17  The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, A broken and a contrite heart These, O God, You will not despise.