Broken.

My heart is broken this morning.  It’s a good place, because there are some things on my heart that simply need Your removal.

You are so faithful.  Even a simple truth is too much for me to bear all at once – so You deliver it slowly… 

You’ve already revealed that I have spent my life as a spectator.  That I just mold myself to each situation and watch.  Blending and hiding.  I’ve made every effort to blend into the crowd that was warming the benches for that particular game.  And then just watched.

Sometimes passively, if the game didn’t have much going on.  But sometimes it got really ugly…if holiness is the standard.  I was the riotous fan that thought they knew the rules and plays better than the umpire and well-trained athletes on the field.

Yelling, or at least wanting to, that a play wasn’t going right, or a bad call was made.

And there I sat with my nachos giving a full commentary to whoever was seated next to me – or sometimes just to myself – but I was giving it.

“Why did he do that?  What was she thinking?  Doesn’t he know better?  Where was she raised?”

My heart is broken this morning, because You make me aware of me.

Idle.

But the people on the field were in a whole different place.  They were in the game.  They not only knew the rules, they knew the nuances of them.  Now that I think about it, it’s obvious that they were trained.

They had studied their sport, practiced every possible move and lived in a consistent place of discipline.  They were healthy, active and alive.  And I was watching.

Today I hear You add to the revelation and say to me – “Look, this was the iniquity…pride, fullness of food, and abundance of idleness…“.

I have been arrogantly watching from the sidelines, devouring Your abundance and doing nothing.

Sometimes, despite my behavior, You have invited me to the field.  I get to throw out a pitch, or make play…and somehow, You move there.  But then I amble myself back to my bench, pick up my nachos, and say “Go team!”.

Again, I hear You say to me – “Woe to the shepherds of Israel who feed themselves…I will destroy the fat and the strong“.

Watching.

Why do I sit in the masses – watching?  Watching…but not seeing.

Not the players…I could see them.  But what about those around me who were trying to be players…trying to get on the field to engage, and I didn’t help them.  I mean, I would have had to put down my nachos for cryin’ out loud.

“…neither did you strengthen the hand of the poor and needy“.

“The weak you have not strengthened, nor have you healed those who were sick, nor bound up the broken, nor brought back what was driven away, nor sought what was lost“.

I was merely keeping a seat warm.

I am broken at what Your law and love have revealed to me.

Choices.

I want to be a player.  I want to be trained, equipped & ready.  Whether I’m in the field or on a bench, I want to be engaged in seeing, hearing and moving…with compassion.

You awaken in me truth.  Painfully seeing what You have seen.  But truth is a treasure, and from it comes a well-spring of life.

A heart of pride, consumption and idleness, in Your hands, is redeemed. And love, as an action, engages me in the game of living.

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