Love Them Broken

I recently worked as a volunteer coordinator for a non-profit organization. Its mission is to bring hope to vulnerable children and struggling families. They serve foster families, single moms, hungry children, and trafficking victims locally and around the world. 

While meeting with the director of the Anti-trafficking program, she said something to this effect: “People want to come and help. They think they will 'fix' the girls. But it doesn't work that way." As I drove home from work, I replayed the conversation, and my fix-it brain went into hyperdrive. There must be something we can do!

Immediately a phrase popped into my head. Love them broken. If I can't fix someone, maybe, the best thing I can do is love them broken. Instead of trying to manage, control, and make their lives work, I could learn to love them just as they are. I could listen to their stories with my ears and my heart. I could look into their eyes with compassion, not condemnation. I could be a gentle, soft place for their hard heart to land. I could let my own heart break with, and for them. 

Immediately a phrase popped into my head. Love them broken. If I can't fix someone, maybe, the best thing I can do is love them broken.

This mantra doesn't just apply to victims of trafficking. It's for family members, church members, and the people getting on my nerves because they are rude or belligerent. Maybe our calling is to love them broken. Isn't that, after all, what Jesus did for us?

But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Rom 5:8 (NIV)

…while we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son… Rom 5:10 (NIV)

As we encounter difficult people, maybe the best way to follow Jesus is to do for them, what He first did for us. And love them broken.