I stood at my kitchen counter with a delicate white bowl in front of me and a hammer in my hand. The tiny piece of ceramic looked too beautiful to break, but that was what I was here to do, so after taking a few deep breaths, I began. The first pound of the hammer cracked the bowl in half. I continued with another blow, more breaking, and a large piece fell to the floor and shattered into even tinier pieces. I finished with one final pound and looked at the pieces scattered across the counter and on the floor. Just a few minutes earlier, it had been a useful container, and now it was a broken mess.
Kintsugi is the ancient Japanese art of repairing ceramic pieces with gold, leaving the reconstruction visible as a symbol of fragility, strength, and beauty. Like ceramic, people can be strong, but we can also break. Kintsugi teaches that broken objects are not something to hide or throw out, but to display with pride. There is strength in brokenness.
My goal was not to sweep up the broken bowl mess and throw it out, but to repair it using the Kintsugi method. My book, “It’s Better Out Here: Stepping Out of Brokenness into Purpose” will be released in the fall, and it’s all about our broken places and how to walk through them. After we release the book, I’ll be leading a Bible study, and Kintsugi art is one exercise we’ll do together. Before I lead others in making this art, I wanted to prepare by breaking and repairing my own bowl.
I thought this practice session would be interesting, but certainly not an emotional process. I was wrong. It took a while to work up to breaking my bowl. I spent time admiring its beauty, and when I could finally land the first blow, tears welled up as I watched it fall into two broken halves. I didn’t expect tears, but with each pound of the hammer, and more breaking, emotion welled up in me from deep places. It was as if every fresh break represented a place of brokenness in my own life, and every time I heard shattered ceramic hit the counter, it reminded me of the jagged, sharp edges of loss, hurt and betrayal. After I finished, it was no longer a bowl, just like the broken times in my life that have made me feel like I was not a person, just a raw, shattered soul, exposed with the pain.
I wiped my tears and continued the process.
The next step was to use a special glue and gold that would repair the pieces and make the bowl whole again. I stared at the mess on my counter, certain it couldn’t be done, 
but as I smeared the shimmering epoxy on those broken edges, even the jagged pieces fit together. Not perfectly, but that wasn’t the goal. The gold made up for the places where edges didn’t come together easily. A unique work of art was happening here. The cracks were still there, but now they were beautiful. After I glued the final broken piece into its place, I stood back and looked at my bowl. Lots of emotion rose to the surface as the process reminded me of my own broken places. Each gold crack was symbolic of the cracked places in my life. This past year, I walked through a deep, wrenching blow of my own. I didn’t see the hammer coming down on me, and it shattered me to my core. The breaks felt unrepairable. But this experience of Kintsugi made me realize pieces that had appeared hopeless to repair were the places where the bowl looked more beautiful. It took more gold filling to repair the largest cracks, and their beauty drew more attention. Now, as I looked at my repaired bowl and all the gold cracks winding through the ceramic, I thought about the recent blow that forced me to walk through a broken place. There had been pain, but also resilience to bounce back, repaired and shining again. God had done this work with me during the past year–repairing, healing, walking me out of brokenness and into purpose.
Part of that healing included forgiveness, love, praise, gratefulness, community. They were all like the gold epoxy, mixed to form a bond that will not shatter so easily next time. I am stronger in the broken places, because of the broken places!
Without that last final dark place – a blow of the hammer that broke me, I could not have completed my book. God used that pain to teach me life-changing lessons, including forgiveness. It shines like gold and fills the biggest cracks. Forgiveness and love go hand in hand. God’s redeeming love is bigger than your enemies and His love is always redemptive. Have you been abused, insulted, betrayed, lied to? Do you feel shattered? If so, let go of the anger or unforgiveness. There is freedom in forgiveness, and it frees us to see the beauty in the cracks. Stop believing that you are broken beyond repair. God is your redeemer, and He will perfect that which concerns you. (Ps. 138:8). You are not broken beyond repair!
After you allow forgiveness and love to repair those broken places, praise and gratefulness will follow. There is praise in knowing that God restores what the enemy meant for evil. There is praise in redemption.
And communities of grace bring healing. Through my own broken place this past year, I recognize more than ever how important a healthy community is. And I’m now able to better identify unhealthy communities. Walking out of my brokenness has made my vision clearer, and I can see God revealing to me how important it is to be with genuine souls who have pure motives. A healthy, inner circle of friendships and community help heal our broken places. Who is your community? Are they building you up, or tearing you down? Are their motives pure? Is there gossip and slander? Are they praying for you? Healthy community is part of the gold glue that holds us together.
If you are looking at broken pieces of your life and wondering when redemption will come, don’t give up. Keep hanging on because God has work to do with those broken pieces. If you allow Him, he will repair your brokenness, and create a beautiful masterpiece with your life. This is the promise of Romans 8:28. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him.
Do you believe your broken places are beautiful? Trust that God has all those pieces and is waiting to fit them back into place, cracks gleaming like gold, resilience shining, preparing you to walk out of brokenness and into purpose.