Brokenness

On Saturday, I attended the memorial service of a child. A baby, really. Just over nine months old, she had begun her life prematurely, with a myriad of medical problems, but the image of God stamped upon her. In her short life on this earth, she touched the lives of others in ways they will never forget.

As heart-breaking as the death of a child is, there was something more heart-wrenching at that service: the brokenness of her family. Her parents are estranged and with other people. Her grandparents are divorced. One of her grandparents saw her for the first time at her memorial service. I could feel the tension and division in the air, and because I love each of them, I wept. I wept for their pain, and the scars they have accumulated and given one another. I wept for the way God created things to be, and the distance between that and the reality of all of our lives.

It made me think of Romans 8:18-25:

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

I could hear the groaning of the creation at that service. I could feel the groaning of my own spirit, and it's longing for things to be made whole again. I long for healing for me and for the family of this dear little baby. But that patience part, that's the rub. I am growing impatient for the promises of God to be fulfilled. I am so longing for the brokenness of our fallen world to be made right, for healing to flow, to find rest in God's arms. What precious promises these are! And I guess, after all, they are worth waiting for, and I can wait expectantly for their fulfillment. But oh, what longing...