Growing Strong in Broken Places

Yesterday–or some other day–may have been the final day of your divorce, the day you were rejected, or the day you lost or buried a loved one; but as difficult as it seems right now, and as extremely sad as it is, in time it can become a day of new beginnings. Be gentle with yourself but do begin the grieving process as soon as possible so you will be able to resolve your pain. To do this effectively, there are several valuable qualities that will help you to face the future as uncertain as it may seem right now.

The Right Attitude

Make sure you have the right attitude. You attitude can determine whether your painful experience turns you into a failure or a success. Your painful experience can be your teacher or your tormentor. As someone said, “Don’t let success go to your head or failure go to your heart.”

We all need successes to encourage us along the way. But in truth we learn more from failure than from success. It is down in the valley that we take time to assess our lives and move towards a new level of growth and maturity.

Know Your Purpose in Life

“Josh McDowell tells about an executive ‘headhunter’ who recruits corporate executives for large firms. This headhunter once told McDowell that when he interviews an executive, he likes to disarm him. ‘I offer him a drink,’ said the headhunter, take off my coat, undo my tie, throw up my feet and talk about baseball, football, family, whatever, until he’s all relaxed. Then, when I think I’ve got him relaxed, I lean over, look him square in the eye and say, “What’s your purpose in life?” It’s amazing how top executives fall apart at that question.

Be sure you have a clearly defined, deeply embedded purpose in life so that when trials and problems do arise you can get off the floor, dust yourself off and get on with your real purpose in life.

A spacecraft en route to the moon is off course 90 percent of the time. It is pulled back by the earth’s gravity and is continually drawn to one side or the other by additional forces. But it has a built-in computer that has a singleness of purpose that homes in on the moon. The computer is making continual corrections to keep the spacecraft on target with its purpose and goal.

Life is like that. If our eye is on our goal, if we have a singleness of purpose, nothing will stop us getting to where we plan to go.

Failure is Not a Person

If you have failed in a relationship or experienced some other set-back in life, remember failure is an experience, not a person. You are not a failure as an individual. The only real failure is the person who simply gives up and refuses to get up and try again. You have to learn from your failures. Use them as opportunities from future growth. The person who never made a mistake never made anything.

Give God a Chance

If you feel you have failed and been in the wrong ask God to forgive you, and be sure to forgive yourself. With God’s help you can turn your failure into an opportunity to develop a better you.

Where a bone has been broken and heals it become the strongest part of the bone.
The same goes for those times and places in your life where you have been broken, or failed or fallen. When you bring it to God He can make you strongest in the broken places of your life and bring healing and strength to your life.