In October, 2012 I suffered a devastating fall from a tall ladder onto unforgiving concrete. Despite the best efforts of good surgeons, I live each day with unwanted limitation, imperfection, disability and discomfort.

The falls of life, either literally or figuratively bring limitation to us all. The critical thing is to understand the purpose of collapse and crushing and to know how to respond to them.

On almost a daily basis I find myself wishing that having sustained various injuries and following prayer and surgery, I could be ‘over it.’ But I’m not.

Adding to the mechanical limits caused by the replacement of bone with steel and the “after market” installation of screws and pins is the ongoing experience of a congenital heart disease called Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy or ‘HCM’ as it is typically abbreviated.

Jacob ‘wrestled’ with the Lord and noticeably, conspicuously limped for the remainder of his days. A limp is an indicator of limitation, of frustration, of imperfection and finally, of surrender.

Two years prior to the ladder incident, I underwent a complex surgical procedure to alleviate a condition that should already have killed me. At the world-renowned Mayo Clinic, my heart was removed and detached from my body to enable Dr. Hartzel Schaff to carve out an enlarged muscle that was preventing the heart from doing its job of pumping blood into and out of the organ.

Following my surgery, Dr. Schaff informed me, “I removed the muscle that has blocked blood-flow, but you still have the disease.” I didn’t fully appreciate the gravity and full meaning of those words then, and only with time have I begun to understand and to accept my ‘new normal’ as opposed to my “old normal.”

Through the cross of Jesus, God has removed the influence (our sin nature) that blocked the flow of life, but until we are made fully and divinely perfect, we still have the disease (of being human and error prone)

I often, with or without exercise become almost completely breathless. If that sounds romantic, it’s not. It’s downright frustrating; sometimes scary; always unwelcome when my lungs are screaming for air and my pulmonary system refuses to respond as it was designed.

It’s very much like the feeling of having run a 100 meter dash. You know the feeling: Your body bends at the waist; your hands jut out to grasp your knees. Your chest heaves with the activity of refilling lungs with life-giving air. You’re dizzy, and the atmosphere  begins to blur and to fade. That’s the way I often feel; but without the running. And it’s frustrating. It’s restrictive. It’s uncomfortable. Sometimes it’s actually scary. And it’s an imperfect way to live.

But that’s my life. It’s yours, too: Imperfect. Partial. Limited. Flawed.

Maybe your limitation and frustration isn’t caused by a heart disease that you contracted by being born with flawed DNA. Maybe your limitation and frustration is caused by something else. Maybe your limitation is your fault. Maybe it’s not. As we eventually all discover, and as Alexander Pope observed: “To err is human.”

The apostle Paul was human and imperfect even as he strove for divine perfection. He called his limiter, his frustration a ‘thorn.’[1] He testified, speaking of perfection (resurrection), “Not that I have already reached the goal or am already fully mature …”[2]

And he isn’t the only Good Guy of scripture to have experienced imperfection. Moses lived the bulk of his days anticipating his entrance into a land that flowed with milk and honey. He never got there. He saw, but he did not possess his heart’s desire.[3]

Jacob, of Old Testament fame wrestled – a graphic and apt but somehow unsuitable sounding word to the religious-minded crowd who want squeaky clean, unsoiled, and so largely untested biblical heroes. Jacob ‘wrestled’ with the Lord; a messy, sweaty business and noticeably, conspicuously limped for the remainder of his days. A limp is an indicator of limitation, of frustration, of imperfection.[4

What’s your limp look like? What’s your limitation? Your frustration? We all have one. Or two. Or more. Where did your limp come from? How did it come to be?

David, Samson, Peter, James, and on and on the list goes until it includes you and me and everybody we know – none of us gets through this life without challenge, difficulty, failure. None of us is perfect. None of us can claim that we are without imperfection, limitation; without the limp of life.

Paul’s resume’ doesn’t stop with “Not that I have reached the goal (of resurrection from the dead – consider this not physical death, but dying to himself, to his “old” nature and dying to the world that he might be raised in newness of life), but he writes to the Philippian church, “I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.”[5]

The power of the resurrection cannot be known without our first becoming conformed to death.

We will never know perfection until we have tasted imperfection. We cannot experience full ability until we are intimately familiar with inability.

In Old and New Testament terms, we can’t know the value of Grace until we understand the weight and the price of the Law.[6]

We were all, every one of us born “in sin.” We entered this world with a fully functioning “sin nature.” In our original, seemingly innocent condition, as sweet, little infants, we each arrived with a proclivity for iniquity.

The purpose of our imperfection is to both reveal to us and to lead us to “that which is perfect.” And “perfection” has a name; it’s a person, and his name is Jesus. Paul’s explanatory continues: “I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it (perfection), but one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. But we must hold on to the progress we have already made.”

My imperfection then is engineered by God’s own hand to produce, eventually, perfection. My limitation is designed to encourage and to enable me to press forward. John Wesley explains it as being “stretched out over the things that are before – Pursuing with the whole bent and vigour of my soul, perfect holiness and eternal glory. In Christ Jesus – The author and finisher of every good thing.”[7]

Wesley is careful not to ascribe the effort, the struggle, the process of perfection as the result of our own, valiant and persistent effort. His final, victorious declaration reveals that it is “Christ Jesus (in us) – The author and finisher of every good thing.”

Simply put, we cannot, by any measure of effort or valiant struggle or dogged determination be made perfect. “It is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.”[8] “We have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.”[9]

No wonder the words of the Apostle ring loud and clearly through the ages until we find them resounding in our own hearts, “the life that I now live I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me.”[10]

Perfection is achievable, attainable, reachable, only as we give way so that He can have his way in our lives, through our imperfections, in spite of our inadequacies, despite our limping, wobbling weakened conditions. So long as it is “Christ in you,” there is more than hope for your tomorrow; there is promise, divine promise, from the God who will never leave you, or forsake you and who cannot, in any sense, fail. [11]

The Hebrew writer discloses concerning those faithful saints of history, all these died, and “none of them received what had been promised, since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.[12]

And until then? Until the day of perfection? Until then, we see in part, we know in part,[13] we live in partial fulfillment of the promise that surely, one day will be achieved and we shall be presented, without defect or flaw, before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy —“[14]

[1] 2 Corinthians 2:7-10

[2] Philippians 3:12

[3] Deuteronomy 34:1-

[4] Genesis 32:22-32

[5] IBID

[6] Galatians 3:24

[7] Wesley’s Explanatory Notes

[8] Philippians 2:13

[9] 2 Corinthians 4:7

[10] Galatians 2:20

[11] Colossians 1:20

[12] Hebrews 11:39,40

[13] 1 Corinthians 13:9

[14]  Jude 24,25

What images do these words conjure for you?

Abandoned

         Deserted

                      Discarded

                              Forsaken

                                      Alone

Whatever impressions emerge or pictures are drawn in your mind as you consider these words, it is likely that you have also experienced the feelings, the emotions, yes, the hurt and pain of abandonment or rejection.

Perhaps it was a parent – a mother or a father who abandoned you. Maybe it was a spouse or a child or a brother or a sister who rejected you. Those you believed were your friends, fellow “believers” in Jesus coldly and inexplicably forsook you and you found yourself suddenly and silently alone in your aloneness, shivering in the icy chill of your isolation, waiting in stunned silence for some sense, some understanding of what had happened, some reconciliation between what you thought you knew and believed and what you so painfully experienced.

Rejection and abandonment can come in a thousand costumes and speak with myriad voices. The effect, the result produced is always the same:

Rejection brings injury to the soul and anguish to the mind. Abandonment makes the heart grow weak, but more; desertion destroys self-worth. We learn early in life to discard what we do not need; what we do not want; what is not essential or profitable or useful or even acceptable.

Garbage is disposed of; trash is discarded. We keep only that to which we attach value.

An abandoned soul feels valueless, worthless, insignificant, useless.

A forsaken heart is more than empty and crushed and bruised and injured; it is a playground for devils, a gymnasium for demons.

From the soil of rejection flourish the sour fruits of bitterness, resentment and, dark, brewing rage. Implacable, stone-hearted and pitiless wrath proceed from hearts that have known the frigid winds of torment spawned by the uncaring, the unfeeling and the unaware.

From such renunciation Americans have become familiar with the name “Columbine” and “Red Lake High” in northern Minnesota and other, more recent scenes of torment and terror.

Most rejected and broken hearted people never pick up a gun or seek to lash out at others. There is no need and no desire. The slow, grinding suicide begun by the deadly injection of aloneness and friendlessness is as deadly as any bullet that ever roared in tortured anguish.

We cannot control if and when or by whom we will feel the lethal claws of abandonment.

What we can do, what we wield control over is our response to rejection. Options exist for the heart that was crushed. Brokenness may come, but annihilation is not inevitable. No soul that was crushed was ever beyond repair.

And there is Someone who knows…..feels….. empathizes…..understands….. cares, who is “touched by” our pains and who also possesses the power to heal even the most trampled upon and crushed heart. It was foretold of Him;

“I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice…He will not cry out, nor raise His voice, Nor cause His voice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed He will not break, and smoking flax He will not quench.”

Who is this shining Knight; this Rescuer of offended hearts? Who is this Champion of the soul Who comes to right those who were wronged and to heal those who’s destruction seemed certain?

He came forth of misinterpreted illegitimacy and was raised in humble anonymity; He came forth from obscurity and moved about in lonely exile. He left His home country and renounced his nobility, He was self-effacing and pointedly unassuming. He sought nothing for Himself and was content by Himself.

He was “despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.”

It is He Who “will bring forth justice for truth,” and God will hold His hand; “He will keep You and give You as a covenant to the people, as a light to the Gentiles to open blind eyes, to bring out prisoners from the prison, those who sit in darkness from the prison house.”

And to the One Who promised, “I will hold Your hand” hear the anguished cry from the central cross on that Crucifixion Day of all Days when Innocence was fixed to the Tree of Final Death: “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”

“Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him….” because He saw your face and knew your brokenness and He anticipated through forsaking Him, your wholeness.

This Man above men, “made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the    likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross” So that He might see you, find you, know you, touch you, heal you, a bruised reed, tender, delicate, nearly too far gone to be repaired, but repairable in the Hands of a Master Physician.

And when we – you and I – accept and receive healing and restoration and the comfort of friendship with Him, we then carry within ourselves the knowledge, the ability and the sympathy to carry Him to another abandoned, rejected, forgotten heart, “that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.”

So, we reach to the “least of these.” We find ourselves among “orphans and widows.” We observe pure religion and undefiled before God because we become what He has always been; a Father to the fatherless; a Lover of the unlovely; a Friend to the friendless. A visitor of prisoners and a provider of a cloak, a meal, a home…a heart that knows, that feels, that sees, that understands.

Our Abandonment was essential for anothers Recovery

We were deserted so that we might learn to Salvage

                     Discarded so we could Recapture

                              Forsaken that we might Comprehend

                                         Alone that we might find the true Companion

What images are conjured in your heart? What scenes play before your mindscreen? Someone has been abandoned, deserted, discarded, forsaken. And who will notice? Who will go? Who will touch them in their brokenness and in their loneliness and who will bring them to the Forsaken One who alone has the antidote for this poison of the soul?