A Little Bit Broken

Yesterday was Palm Sunday, but because the church we had started attending is still (wisely) all online, and I wasn’t up to going to pick up palm fronds in the middle of a hailstorm, our celebrations consisted of a lunchtime conversation. It started out explaining what Palm Sunday was, and then quickly devolved into my favorite bible fact, which is that women, who weren’t believed to be competent enough to be legal witnesses, were trusted to be the first proclaimers of Jesus’ resurrection. We talked about how, because they were women and, for most of history, women were seen as barely above children, they were able to be and do things that the male disciples couldn’t or wouldn’t. They could stay at the cross, weeping, without being a threat to the Caesar. They would be the first at the tomb, because that type of caring work was for the women. They could proclaim allegiance to a dangerous idea because their lack of political power made them less threatening. They used their weakness (being second-class citizens) to become the most important witnesses in the world.

The girls, who are coming off of Black History Month, connected this immediately to Martin Luther King, Jr. Everyone expected black people to be out of control, they said. So it was startling to see the white people committing violence against the peaceful protestors, they said. Those marchers used their weakness (the racist stereotype of violent black men) to flip that racist power structure on its head.

I love these stories. Because those weaknesses weren’t from personal failings, they were unjustly put on the protagonists. And in the face of that injustice, through great strength, the world changed. I truly believe, that in much smaller ways, we must use our hard experiences to help others. To me, that’s the only way to make sense of the senseless pain that many of us have experienced. Our suffering can make us kind, it can make us strong, it can make us funny, and it can make us humble. It can also break us. In fact, it can do all of those good things and still break us. And so we walk around the world, a little bit broken and a little bit better.

For Christians, the week ahead is one where we are supposed to realize that every single one of us can go from celebrating God to betraying Him. None of us are immune. Some of our suffering comes from a broken world and some comes from our own bad choices. But if we can be our best selves and bear witness to our own suffering and the suffering of others, that pain can be transformed. Transformed by our willingness to accept that sometimes suffering creates sacredness and sometimes it just breaks us. Often it does both.

This past year, all of us have suffered. When we come out of our caves, we have a choice. Are we going to pretend like it never happened? Are we going to try to have a competition to see who suffered the worst? Are we going to get stuck in the security of cynicism and fear and refuse to hope again?

Or are we going to be the people who can make room for the compassion and humility we have learned? The people who allow the painful stories of those around us to be told? The people who, having lived and heard of so much suffering, allow ourselves to be changed by it?

Let’s choose to walk through the world differently. A little bit broken and a little bit better.