Broken

I've been thinking a lot about the phrase "I'm broken", these past few days. It's made me consider what it means to be broken, in all it's forms, and how that relates to the Gospel. After all, we are to strive for a broken heart and contrite spirit. 

So I ask myself, what does it mean to be broken? We can be broken in our heart, our mind, or our body. To be broken in mind refers to mental illness. In body refers to physical disability. But what about the heart?

We often hear the term "broken heart" when referring to the result of being dumped by a girl/boy friend. In this sense it means that the love of your life has been ripped from your heart, leaving only a hole.

In a very real sense, this is what The Lord is asking for when he says he wants us to have a broken heart. Only, that which gets ripped from our heart is anything that keeps us from Him. 

We are to Love God with all our heart, might, mind and strength, and then our neighbor as ourself. That love should pretty much consume all the faculties of our heart, leaving no room for worldly or non righteous desires. 

Often when we experience a spiritual broken heart, what happens is we suddenly realize that our other desires, weaknesses, pursuits and appetites are not bringing us peace. We have to realize that they are merely our little rebellious acts that keep us from God. We are broken as we make this realization, and rip them out of our hearts, leaving only a hole where they once were. Like a building burned down to its frame, we are humbled to the sole basic truth that we are children of god. 

This is truly what happens when we break a horse. The process of breaking a horse is one that replaces the horses will with that of the master. So it is with us. When we have a broken heart we view the Master's desires as more important than our desires. We obediently follow Him, instead of following our selfish and prideful whims and desires. We tame the inner beast.

Humility has been described as comparing ourselves to God, and desiring to be like Him.

Our contrite spirit tells us that our ways were wrong in the sight of god, and urges us to reconcile with Him. As we do so, the Grace from Christ's atonement literally fills us, not only repairing the hole in our heart, but lifting it to much heigher heights.