Theology of Brokenness

I think we're raising generations of people that are aimless. We are aimlessly scrolling on our phones. We're aimlessly drifting through life. We're aimlessly going with what kind of the world tells us to do with not living with the true purpose that it all points to. [Music] But today we are continuing our study in this series studying through the book of 2 Corinthians. And as we dive into this, we'll be in 2 Corinthians chapter 4. We're going to be starting in verse 7. You can grab your Bible, wherever you find your Bible on your phone and flip over there. As you're flipping there, we are going to get into a hard question and really a hard topic when it comes to the life of trying to follow Christ and follow Jesus because if you're honest, uh we live in a pretty broken world and we live in a time where hard things happen. Show of hands. Anyone have a hard week? You're all liars. All right. Um, anyone have a hard month, a hard year, a hard decade, a hard life? You're like, when's this going to get a little better? Uh, I saw a meme the other day. It's like being an adult is just saying over and over again, this season's a little crazy and hard, but it's going to slow down pretty soon. And it never slows down. And today, as we get into this, and actually came this I had a conversation with someone recently. They're like, "Hey, Andrew, I I I know I'm trying to faithfully follow Christ and trying to read my Bible, trying to follow God, but this burning inside me as I share my faith with other people, as I am trying to be faithful in going this thing is why does God allow his people to get hurt? Why does God allow hardship to happen in our world? Why is it so hard at times? And why do I get hurt? Why do other people get hurt? Why does this stuff happen? Now, now the church answer is you can and it's a right answer and the biblical answer is part of it is Romans 3:23. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Is that sometimes things happen because you're a sinner and I'm a sinner. The people around us are sinners. Especially those who drive on Bell in the 303, okay, they are very much sinners. But there's more to it than that. Is sometimes the brokenness that happens in our lives is not just a result of just being in a sinful world. But sometimes God allows some of that to happen to break us in some different areas so that he can mold us into what he wants us to be. And today as we dive into 2 Corinthians chapter 4, we're going to be starting in verse 7. Paul is going to address that topic here. And as he gets into this and and how he just starts it, he starts it with this metaphor in verse 7 and he says this. Now we have this treasure in clay jars. If you've been with us these last couple weeks, Paul has taken the last two chapters and talking all about how he has this this gospel, this good news about Jesus Christ and how it's the most glorious thing in his life. And he can't help but to tell other people that Jesus is God, that Jesus lived, that he died, that he rose again, that he saves our sins. And he wants to tell more and more people about that. That's this treasure that he has. But Paul here shifts and he tells us a little bit about this treasure where we keep it as he says it's in a clay jar and he kind of moves to this first section we're going to see here as we kind of unpack this is God allows us to be broken when we are Paul uses this metaphor and we're going to talk about some of the ways God allows us to be broken when we have some characteristics about ourselves that need to be broken down but Paul uses this metaphor of a clay jar back then um they had more jars than just clay. They had gold jars which you kept your most precious things in. They had silver that you still was durable. You still put things in. They even had bronze. But clay jars were cheap. They were not that effective. You dropped it and they broke. And when a clay jar broke, it was like 2,000 years ago. It was like the ziploc bag of storage. Okay? You use it a couple times, then you throw it away. And what Paul is getting off right off the bat is that as we approach this and as we go into this, he's trying to seed in the minds of the first church then and seed in our minds today that we are broken vessels. That maybe on the outside we look like we have it on together, but on the inside all of us are pretty fragile. My wife does a really great job at keeping our kids entertained with different activities. I am not so much. But one of the ways she does that is she does these little sensory bins for our kids that they can do. And there's like rice in some of them and little toys they play with and little have little shovels and scoop it. They have kinetic sand which is my least favorite. And I've banished that to be only be outside and it gets rained on and it never goes away. It's like the most durable stuff everywhere. Uh there's Orbeez. They're these little balls that you fill up with water and you let them soak and they get bigger. Um don't swallow it. Don't put it in your plumbing. All right, just a word of the wise. or you'll have an ER visit or a really expensive plumbing bill. Um, but then there's also Play-Doh. I I went to the library the other day and my kids had read some books, so they they got a Play-Doh and I'm like, "Why are you giving my kids this? Now they're going to want to play with this like on the car ride home." But my kids will make stuff in Play-Doh and as great of it is and as masterpiece of it looks like you drop that, it usually breaks. You step on it, it squishes. It is a fragile item that can never become more. And as we get into this here, here here's what we need to start with is learning that no matter how smart we are, no matter how strong we are, how successful we are, how well put together are, how tan you are, cuz I cannot tan, so that one's personal for me. All right? No matter any of those things, we are all fragile. So, I'm going to say on the count of three, I want you to say, "I am fragile." And we're all going to say it together. Okay? 1 2 3. I am fragile. you guys will just say anything that I tell you to do, okay? As a chance. But we're going to see how we're fragile today. And and Paul keeps going in this and he he picks up and he keeps going in verse 8. We're going to skip the second part of seven and we're going to see how we're going to skip through this passage and come back and see all of it. But in verse eight, he he dives into this. How does God allow our broken us to be broken in different ways? And he says this is we are afflicted in every way. You see, the first way that God allows us to be broken is when we are prideful. And here he uses this word that he says he he starts here and he says that this word afflicted that he uses that kind of leans to our pride. This word afflicted would in the Greek means to be made uncomfortable, to be uneasy, to be embarrassed. It is that feeling when life doesn't go according to your plan and you realize that you're not as in control as you thought you were. Some argue here that Paul is saying that these are just bad circumstantial things that this is just like the hazard of being a Christian, the hazard of being an apostle, that he's telling people about Jesus. And because he's telling about people Jesus is more people are attacking him. And there is some truth to that. But what also what we see here is when you read this passage in the greater context of 2 Corinthians where Paul stresses that true strength is in being weak that we need to be rooted in holiness in order to endure trials. Paul is seing in their minds and he's seeding in our minds today that God allows hardship to break away the strengths that we perceive in our lives. As God starts to chip away the things that we rely on, our own abilities, he makes us weak so then he can use his strength to fill our lives. And it starts with breaking us down when we are prideful. But he continues in the second half of verse 8. He says we are also we are perplexed. God allows us to be broken not only when we are prideful, but when we're also aimless. The word perplexed here uh means to be at a loss, to be puzzled, to be not knowing which way to turn. There are times when God allows us to be broken, when we are aimless, when we don't have purpose in our life. Now, I could go preach another sermon, and this is kind of a pet peeve of mine that I think we're raising generations of people that we are aimless. We are aimlessly scrolling on our phones. We're aimlessly drifting through life. We're aimlessly going with what kind of the world tells us to do with not living with a true purpose that it all points to. And Paul here says that sometimes when we're more focused on worldly things than God's kingdom, sometimes he allows confusion to drive us back to seeking his direction. I I grew up and I've lived my whole life in Phoenix. I'm a Phoenician and and and being part of Phoenix is I know our city even though it expands every day and we're about to add a new freeway every other day, right? But wherever I go, even though I kind of know the layout of our city is I use Google Maps anytime I drive. All right. I'm like, plug in my destination, see where it's going to be. And I do that for a couple reasons. Is one is sometimes they're just like, hey, this road's perfectly fine, but let's like tear it up and be under construction for 3 months to make everyone's life miserable. All right, that's they just enjoy doing that. I don't know. Some city planners do that. And then two, you don't know if there's like an accident and people will get in an accident, stay in the middle lane, not move, make everyone else's lives miserable, and then traffic suffers for it. So, I always use Google Maps and and I'm pretty good getting around, but where I get super lost, and my wife can attest to this, is when I get into neighborhoods I don't know because I feel like they're like a labyrinth. They're designed to confuse you. All the houses look the same. You go down a street, you're like, "Have I been on this street? No, I'm going down this way." No. Did I see that park before? Oh, there's a second pickle ball court over here. And you just like go around in circles and have no idea what you're doing. And sometimes our life can be the same. is that we run around lost, perplexed, confused. We're aimlessly seeking and God, we almost need God's life GPS to guide us to the right direction. But he continues in verse 9, he says we also we are persecuted. God allows us to be broken when we are prideful, when we are aimless, but also when we are comfortable. This word uh persecuted means to be expelled, to be rejected, to be pushed out by the world. And I I firmly believe that God allows us to be broken at times when we are too comfortable. When we're getting so cozy with the world's values that we've forgotten that we're supposed to be different, we're forgotten that we're supposed to be set apart from the world. When we are more concerned with fitting in than standing out, sometimes he allows rejection to remind us that we don't belong here. Jesus told his disciples in John 15:18, he says, "If the world hates you, understand it hated me before it hated you." Jesus, God, the nicest man that was ever on the earth, the savior of the entire world, when he was here, people still hated him and they will hate us, too. And here Paul is saying like there will be persecution, but this is not our home. That maybe it's because we're doing something right. We're moving in the right direction. And look at the second half of nine. He gives the last reason as we kind of break through this. He says we are struck down. You see, God allows us to be broken when we are prideful, when we're aimless, when we are comfortable, but also when we are overconfident. This struck down means to be hurt badly. It it it literally means to be knocked off our feet. And and God allows us to be broken at times when we are overconfident. When we start thinking that we're invincible, when we forget our need for him and his people, when we're self our self-reliance becomes our religion. Sometimes he allows us to be struck down to remind us of our desperate need for his strength. One of the things I love watching with my boys, and my boys are they're our middle kids, bookend by girls. We have a 7-year-old boy and an almost four-year-old who'll be four in 1 month from today. But my four-year-old, I love to watch them fight. Not not like yell at each other fighting, but like physically fighting. All right. I'm like, I'll throw a left right there. All right. Get him below the rib cage. Okay. Um like talking them through it, but but more realistically when they like wrestle, like get out all their aggression and kind of go crazy um towards one another. and and I love to watch him at times, but what's funny is my almost four-year-old is way crazier than my almost seven-year-old. And and Arlo is a little punk and and sometimes he'll hit Archie as hard as he can. He'll take cheap shots. He'll try to do things and sometimes he is overconfident. Like he likes to run around in his underwear and show his muscles all the time. Um he actually has like a six-pack for a three-year-old, which is pretty impressive. Um, I asked him his secrets and he said just by being a three-year-old, I don't know. Um, but there's times when he gets over in his head and then all of a sudden big brother has to remind him that he actually is stronger, he is bigger, and he lays the pain down. And then I'm like, "All right, let's stop before any blood or broken bones come before mom comes home." You didn't catch that last part, right? We got to cover it up. Let's wipe up the blood and then we don't speak about it. But I think sometimes life comes the same way that that we get overconfident in our abilities. We think we have things figured out. We think we're successful enough or fit enough or smart enough and we think we have this life thing handled. And then all of a sudden a brokenness happens that beats us down to a point that reminds us that it is God we rely on and not ourselves. And look what happens when God knows we need to be broken a little bit. It moves into verse 10 and he says because of this we are broken. And then this is kind of where it starts leading is we always carry the death of Jesus in our body. Here's the thing is in this next section God will break us when we are prideful or we are when we are overconfident when we are aimless when we are comfortable. But then God allows our brokenness to do some things in our life. And here's the thing is God breaks us so that we have the room to carry the death of Jesus with us. This is what he's saying is we're carrying the death of Jesus in our bodies. No longer are we depending on ourselves what we're depending on God. And how do we carry the death of Jesus? How does this happen? Verse 11, he says, "For we live, for we who live are always being given over to death." Here's the first part of this is we see God allows our brokenness to give us to death. Now, now you hear that and you hear that in isolation. You're like, "This sounds pretty morbid, right? We're talking about like dying a lot and and Jesus's death being carried in us and then giving us over to death." And this is a little morbid here, but here's what Paul is saying is that we must die to our life of sin. Not that we must tolerate our life of sin or even repent of our life of sin and then go back to it. Is we must die to our life of sin. And if we cannot die to our sin, then we are not truly fully broken enough to see our sin as a problem. Recently, it has rained in the valley. And when it rains in the summer in Phoenix, you know what comes next? Yeah, you all have landscapers, so you don't know what it has, but you get weeds in your yard. All right? And it's because it's hot and you get a little bit of rain and all of a sudden these weeds start popping up everywhere. And and when you go see these weeds, uh you have some options. Uh at my old neighborhood in North Phoenix, we didn't have an HOA. So the option some of my neighbors chose was to let those weeds grow all over their front yard and literally, this is a true story, they would then get their lawn mower out and mow it. I'm like, bro, that's rock. That is not a lawn. All right, you can fool other people, and you really aren't, but you can't fool me. I know that's just rock under there. Uh and those are just weeds. That ain't real grass. But when you go get rid of these weeds, you have a few ways you do it. Now, a cool thing is to like burn it with a blowtorrch. You can spray it and have the pesticide kill it. But the other thing is you do is you grab that and you rip it out. When we go with our sin, it's not about trimming that sin down so nobody sees it. It's just under the surface and they don't see it over the top. Because what's going to happen if it's the root is still there, that sin will come back. And often we are in the business of trimming our sin. And Paul is saying, "No, no, no. We got to let death work in. We got to let we got to give our sin to death so that it is gone. That it is done. And when we die to our sin, here's what then and I almost alluded to in a second. In verse 12, it says, "So then death is at work in us." See, God allows our brokenness to give us to death, but then also for death to work inside of us. And when we die to our unholy strength, we admit that we are weak so that Christ's strength fills us. You see the whole first half of this passage in verses 7 through 12, it's all about the hard stuff of life that happens. That when you're just going through life, hard stuff is going to happen. When you're just trying to live in this life, hard stuff is going to happen. But then when you start following Jesus, it doesn't get easier. I would argue it actually gets harder. And through scripture, Paul says, especially when say, "I'm going to be faithful. I'm going to read my Bible. I'm going to start praying regularly. I'm going to start telling other people about Jesus. I'm going to start sharing the hope I have." He says, "When that happens, before and when and after, hardship will come." But here, he he shows that this hard stuff happens. And the point of this hard stuff is to break us. It's to kill us. When God allows that stuff to happen, it's not because he's being mean. It's not because he's a cosmic bully. He's doing that so we are less reliant on our sin in the way we do things. And we look for Jesus to be the strength that we need. And this all goes back when we see it through that lens is this idea that we are these clay jars, that we are weak, that we can't do this on our own. All of the sudden when we reread this passage, it illuminates so much more. And start back up at verse 7. He says this. Now we have this treasure in clay jars. The these weak jars. These things that if you drop it, they'll break. That are disposable. That this is our life. That on the count of three, what do we say? 1 2 3. I'm fragile. You weren't as on that time. I threw it at you too much. We'll try it again. On the count of three, 1 2 3. I'm fragile. that when we have this strength in clay jars, we are broken. Why? Listen to this. So that this extraordinary power may be from God and not from us. You see, here's where the shift happen. If God allows this brokenness in our lives, he allows it to tear us down to be less reliant on our sin and more reliant on him. But here's the result as that prunes us, as that shapes us. And it kind of moves in the second half of digesting this passage is God awards us when we are broken with. And we're talking about some of the practical ways that when we are broken by those things, how he awards it. But in here, I I love this. He says that it's this extraordinary power. This extraordinary power is not our power. It it is the power of God. And and when we are ready to acknowledge his power in our fragile clay jar and not relying on our own, all of a sudden it shifts on how we view life. And here are the practical elements to this. Starting in verse 8, he says, "We are afflicted in every way." But here's how that verse continues. He breaks us when we are prideful, when we are afflicted in every way, but we are not crushed. You see, God awards us when we are broken with protection. We are not crushed, but instead we are protected. That even in our affliction, even when life gets hard, even when life gets uncomfortable and our pride gets checked, we're not crushed. God puts a protective hedge around the breaking process. There's the old terrible statement that you see on coffee mugs is like, "God will never tempt you beyond what you can bear." or God will never allow you to be hurt beyond what you can bear. And that that's just not good theology. God will allow you to be broken more than you can bear. But if you add a few words in there, it does actually make it correct. Is God will never allow you to be more to be broken more than you can bear in him. When he enters the process, God's not going to give you anything that he can't see you through. And even when our pride gets checked, there is this protection around us. There's this barrier that he takes us through. But he keeps going in verse 8 it says we are perplexed but we are not in despair. This not in despair is we see that God awards us not only with protection but with hope. That even when we're perplexed even when we don't know which way to turn we don't fall into despair. Even when we have an aimlessness in our life, God maintains hope in our hearts even when our heads are spinning on where to go next because we have a hope in him as something greater. But he continues in verse 9, he says, "We are persecuted, but I love this, but we are not abandoned." God awards us when we are broken with community. This might be my favorite one is he says we're not abandoned. Meaning that we're not alone, that we're not just left out by ourselves. Instead, God gives us community. But God also surrounds us when community. Even when the world rejects us, even when we face persecution for our faith, God doesn't leave us. He doesn't abandon us. And neither does his people, the church. I've seen this play out beautifully in our church time after time after time. This is a crazy thing that has seen and and this is just a product but one of the cultures of cross church that we've created is a lot of times when people are going through hard stuff, they don't come and talk to me first and they don't come talk to the pastor. Instead, they go talk to the people that they're living in community with daily. They're talking to their Bible group leaders, the people they see and they have coffee with on Sunday morning, the people they go to lunch and their kids play together or they're doing activities. They go to the people they have community with. Just this past week, uh, we had someone going through a hard time and was not ready to disclose that to a group at large, but they confided in one person they are close with. And then it was just a prayer request and and you know, it was just almost like an anonymous is like, "Pray for this situation." And there were so many prayer warriors, so many leaders in our church who are ready to take up that mantle, intercede, and pray for people on their behalf. And when you're going through hardship, God's design is he not only gave you his presence in the Holy Spirit, but he gave you his church and a community of believers. And the last part we see at the last half of verse 9, it says, "We are struck down, but listen to this, we are not destroyed." God awards us when we are broken with protection, with hope, with community, but more than anything with salvation. We are not destroyed. We are saved. Even when we're struck down, even when we're hurt badly, even when we are knocked off our feet, as the Greek word said, we are not destroyed. Our salvation is secure. Our eternal impact. Our eternal hope is intact. And and here's the deal. This is the beautiful tension of the Christian life. We get broken, but we're not destroyed. We get afflicted, but we are still protected in that. We get perplexed, but we still have hope. And we see how all this beautiful brokenness is rewarded in this kind of hinge verse that he keeps going. In verse 11, he talks about what we read before. We we live uh we're always being given over to death. I'm sorry, in verse 10, uh we always carry the death of Jesus in our body. But listen to these two words. So that all this is leading up to this that he's saying, "Hey, you're going to endure hardship and it's not going to be fun." Paul had to endure more hardship than most of us probably will touch in a lifetime. Paul, as he says here, he was afflicted. He was perplexed. He was persecuted. He he was struck down. All these terrible things happened to him. And he could have been like, "Why, God, are you allowing this?" Like in some of instances, Paul was like, "I'm being faithful." And God had to chip some things on his character way. But God's like, he's like, "I'm telling people about you. Why is this happening?" Well, you're carrying the death of Jesus Christ. So that and here's what kind of moves us to almost this final part of this passage is that God awards our brokenness in you see this tiny little phrase so that is God uses the brokenness of a season. He uses the hardship we face. He uses the exposing of our character. He molds us into it and he uses this. He awards this in a way so that we would rely on ourselves less. so that we would have more purpose in our life. So that we would live a more risk-filled life for Jesus. So that we would not think that we have everything figured out. So that we would become better people in him. And he shows us how we can become better people in him by picking up in verse 11. And he says for uh or verse 10 he says we always carry the death of Jesus in us so that what the life of Jesus may also be displayed in our body for we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake. And he uses this again so that Jesus's life may also be displayed in our mortal flesh. God rewards our brokenness in displaying Jesus in us. When we're broken, when our self-sufficiency dies, suddenly we make room for Jesus to be displayed in us. People see his strength in our weakness. People see his peace in our chaos. People see his joy in our sorrow. Have any of you guys ever taken a selfie before? Yeah, I know you have. Now, have you ever taken a selfie with like 10 other people? Okay, in the selfie and it's like I I got a big family. All right, there's six of us. So, taking a selfie and fitting all of us in one picture is not always easy. Um, we got one baby we got to handle. And then if we the toddler, he can walk Arlo and stuff, but he's also this tall. Uh, so you're like, "Hey, can you like jump up and we'll like catch it at the right time maybe and you'll get in the picture." But but it's hard. I need longer arms, I guess, when I do that or use a selfie stick. But if you carry around a selfie stick, don't you just feel weird? Like people will judge you for that and for good reason. Um, but when you take a selfie, you can only fit so many people in it. And often I think our life is living like a selfie. When we are focusing on our own strength, our own abilities, our our own passion, our own stuff to be able to handle the load, we don't leave room for Jesus to come into the picture in him to be displayed. But what Paul is saying is that when we when we realize how we're not as strong as we think we are, that we're not as well off as we think we are, but that we are broken people, we are humbled, all of a sudden Jesus has room to enter the picture, and Jesus is displayed to the world around us. And as we do this, look at where it leads in verse 12. He says, "So then death is at work in us." We looked at this before how death is chipping away our sin and death is working us. But instead he says this but life in you. You see God awards our brokenness and displaying Jesus in us but also giving us life in Jesus. The death that is at work in us that is chipping away our sin. That we are dying to our old self and being renewed. We are being renewed to a life that is a life in Jesus. And this isn't just any life, but this is a Jesus life. This is a kind of life that's abundant, that's purposeful, that's eternal. The kind of life that is only available because God in human form came down, lived a perfect life, died on a cross, rose again so we could know something greater. And here is what Paul is trying to get at is this kind of life that changes everything you know about how we are to live our lives. It is all about how these broken times show our sin but expose how God is greater. But as you read all that, the story doesn't end there either because there is a purpose that this ultimately points to that not only is it forming our character, not only is it chipping away the sin in our lives, but look at verse 13 and we'll read through the end here. And it shows kind of the end product of everything we've read up to this point. He says this in sense we have the same spirit of faith in keeping with what is written. I believed therefore I spoke. We also believe and therefore speak. Paul says even though all this hardship is happening I believe that Jesus died for my sins and I'm sharing that with the world around me. Verse 14. For we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus will also raise us with Jesus and is present with us. Indeed, everything is for your benefit so that as grace extends through more and more people, it may cause thanksgiving to increase to the glory of God. He said, "The more that that people see how much you've been forgiven, the more honest you are with how broken you are, the more people say like, "Oh, you're not a great person, but you know a great God." Verse 16, therefore, we do not give up. We don't give up in the hardship. We don't throw our hands up because we have no hope. Because we're dependent on someone bigger. Even though our outer person is being destroyed, our inner person, this new life in Christ is being renewed day by day. For our momentary light affliction, is producing for us an absolutely incomparable weight of glory. So we do not focus on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. You see, when we come to this passage and we say like, why why does God allow this brokenness? Why does God allow this hardship? Why does God let me get hurt? Well, as we've seen in this passage, he's using you maybe to chip away your pride, to chip away your aimlessness in life, to chip away your comfort, to chip away your overconfidence. But all that as he chips that away as he replaces it with the glorious things that he has set aside for us all this leads to and this is the one thing if you don't hear anything else that I want you to hear and take away today is God uses our brokenness to show his glory. Now there are a lot of things that are going to happen in your life and there are going to be things that you ask why God why God why God. Usually when we step back and look at what God did in that situation, we see how some way or another it points to him, it glorifies him and illuminates him in a great way. This past Thursday, I had the privilege of going to see my former pastor, who is also my father-in-law, be elected as, and you're not going to care about this title. I promise it's a long one. the executive director of the Arizona Mission Network of Southern Baptist. I you you knew exactly what I was talking about, right? But he he is now overseeing Arizona Southern Baptist, what we participate in. So helping that leadership and and Dr. Monty Patton or I like to call him Monty. I don't call him dad cuz that's weird. All right. But Monty's been a very influential voice in my life since he was my pastor and then when I married into his family and now in this role he's in now. But I had a conversation with Monty about a year ago where I was getting ready to leave our Phoenix campus to come over to here to our surprise campus to be the campus pastor here to preach regularly to lead our staff and to fill the shoes of Pastor Jackie. Now, put yourself in my shoes for a second. I got to follow and fill the shoes of Jackie, who's pastored for 40 years, who is a lot wiser than me, who has been here for 12 years, who has seen immense growth happen in this church, who has then taken us multi-sight and started four campuses with more on the horizon, who has done so many things. The only thing I have on Jackie is I'm younger and better looking. All right, but hopefully he watches this later. And I asked Monty, my father-in-law, I said, "How do I know I'm ready for this?" And I was expecting him to say like, "Well, hey, in the past 9 years, you've uh you've learned to pastor people. You've been a great pastor." He's like, "He you went to seminary and you learned some things as your theology is sound. You've become a a great preacher and learn how to communicate." I was waiting for him to say all those things and he said none of them. So, I left the conversation and said, "I'm going to go find a new one." No, just kidding. But here's what he told me. He says, "I know you're ready cuz God has broken you in these last nine years." He's like, "I've had a front row seat to see how your pride has been broken time and time again. How you have had purpose and you have been directed in seeing where you have go." He said, 'I have had a front row seat to see where you've been broken and in and being overconfident in your own abilities instead relying on what God is doing in his church. He said, I have had a front row to being broken that no longer can you be comfortable, but that you had to be on mission for him. And when he told me that, it was just like a slideshow in front of my eyes of all the ways that God had broken me in my previous season. But he didn't do it to hurt me. He didn't allow that brokenness to happen so that I run away or run further from him. He did it so I would die to my sin. I would run to him and so that his glory could be seen in my life and not my own. You all have your own story. And maybe right now you're in a season of brokenness. And maybe there's struggles in your families and your job. Maybe there's things that do not seem fair, stuff that does not seem right, and God is just allowing this brokenness to take place, and you're like calling up to God in prayers. Can you stop this anytime soon? But maybe he's looking at you and saying, "Son or daughter, I know this is happening, but I got a better plan for it." And just as he used Paul's brokenness to bring him glory, he will use your brokenness, your hurt, your season to do something great, to make known the name of Jesus in the world around us. So if you're a believer today during this closing prayer, here's what I ask that you be honest as we pray together as I just pray over all of us, but you have a personal time. you pray to God is saying, "God, how have you broken me? And God, how are you using that?" And if that's not you today, maybe you're just checking out this Jesus thing. Maybe you've never given your life to him for the first time. Maybe you've never surrendered to him. I ask that you would recognize your sin. You would recognize the brokenness that our life presents to us. and you would see that you can only be put back together, that you can only be saved, that you can only know a true new life in Jesus and Jesus alone. Church family, my prayer is as you leave these doors, you see your brokenness for his good. You see your heart, how it showcases his glory. And we can leave this place praising God in the good and praising God in the bad. [Music]