Broken Vessel

Many people come to a state of brokenness in their life where everything is falling apart: A divorce, a financial breakdown, a devastating medical diagnosis, the loss of a certain job or career. One’s life is shattered into pieces. This state of brokenness can lead into a time of depression where life seems not to be worth living anymore. In this state of hopelessness some people seek comfort in alcohol or drugs. The emptiness of such a situation is illustrated very well in Gottfried Helnwein’s painting “Boulevard of Broken Dreams” in which a few people are sitting in an almost empty bar having drinks.

But it is not necessary that the brokenness of one’s life ends in hopelessness, loneliness or despair. God can turn the broken pieces of our lives into something very beautiful. He can grow something beautiful like the rose in my painting above out of our brokenness. Often we don’t have the sight to find our own way out of the brokenness of life. It is also not happening automatically that brokenness turns into something good. That’s why we need help from outside. If we give God a chance, he will prove that he is there to help us and that he is able to turn things around. He can use the experience of brokenness to change our way of thinking and help us into something we would not have been able to reach without this painful experience before. This way we become a “Broken Vessel,” a vessel God can use for his purposes for the good.