Where Brokenness Runs Deep

LORD, you alone are my portion and my cup;

you make my lot secure.

The boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places;

surely I have a delightful inheritance.

—Psalm 16:5–6

Our sweet little dog, Chelsea, is not the brightest bulb in the lamp around cars driving down our long driveway. Though she has plenty of room to run and play inside our fenced-in yard, she is obsessed with trying to attack the tires crunching against our gravel drive whenever someone drives on our property. As a result, she had an unfortunate encounter with a moving vehicle one day.

I wept like a baby when I saw her. But, other than a broken front leg, a severely scraped-up back leg, and a nose with half the flesh missing, she fared okay. Mercy.

The vet informed us that in order for her leg to properly heal, we’d have to keep her calm for three weeks. Yikes. It would be a challenge to keep Chelsea still for three minutes. But three weeks? That seemed impossible!

Well, two weeks into the healing journey all that stillness got the best of sweet Chelsea in the middle of the night. She decided she would punish me with a fit of whining, crying, and banging my closed bathroom door. She wanted out and she wanted out now. She wanted to run and chase some unsuspecting night creature. The temptation was too strong and she was sick of sacrificing her freedom.

To be honest, I wanted her to be able to run and chase a night creature too. But my love for this dog would not permit me to allow her to harm herself. Her brokenness couldn’t handle that kind of freedom.

Not yet.

As I tossed and turned in the wee hours of the morning, that statement about Chelsea’s brokenness struck me as quite applicable to myself as well. How often do I find myself in situations where my brokenness can’t handle freedom outside the boundaries God has set for me?

I was made to be a victorious child of God.

Sometimes we need boundaries around our own unique struggles and temptations. Food. Screen time. Shopping. A certain relationship. God helps us put boundaries in place, knowing that we need more time to heal before we can step outside of them. Honoring those boundaries helps strengthen us and move us forward in our healing. Here are a few things I try to remind myself when I find myself like Chelsea—upset, crying, and trying to step out beyond what God wants for me in that moment:

• I am not made to be a victim of my poor choices. I was made to be a victorious child of God.

• When I am struggling and considering a compromise, I will force myself to think past this moment and ask myself, How will I feel about this choice tomorrow morning?

• If I am in a situation where the temptation is overwhelming, I will have to choose to either remove the temptation or remove myself from the situation.

• I have these boundaries in place not for restriction but to define the parameters of my freedom. Psalm 16:6 reminds me that the boundary lines God has placed in my life are in good and pleasant places. My brokenness can’t handle more freedom than this right now. And I’m good with that.

This battle is hard. Really hard. It can feel like a war is being waged in your head.

It breaks my heart that so many of God’s girls feel powerless in their struggles. But we can band together, get honest, grab hold of the truths that will set us free, and do something about it.

One of my own greatest struggles has been in the area of food. It’s what some of the following devotions will be about. But I don’t want you to skim over them if food isn’t your struggle. I am praying you will take the truths I share and apply them to your own battles. Your own personal areas of weakness and temptation that the Lord has been stirring your heart to believe you can overcome.

Yes, victory is possible, sisters, not by figuring out how to make this an easy process, but by choosing—over and over and over and over again—the absolute power available through God’s truth.

Dear Lord, You know where my brokenness runs deep. Please help me to set some healthy boundaries and to heal. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.