Most people are familiar with the Leonard Cohen line, “There’s a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.” Recently I have been thinking about the reverse. There’s a crack in everything and that’s how the light gets out. As Christians I think this idea is especially important. Somehow, we got the idea that we need to be perfect to reflect God’s love. Perhaps it is just the opposite. We worship a man who was condemned as a criminal and executed by the authorities – not what modern society would consider a success. Yet, in that seeming failure is our hope. In the crucified humanity of Jesus, we see what God looks like in self-emptying love. Might the same be true of us? In our brokenness, our woundedness, perhaps we reflect the divine most clearly. When we show up shattered and vulnerable, our true selves, there is no pretense or pride. We show ourselves as the anawim, the lowly ones, who can only rely on God and so incarnate the love of God to the world.
-Suanne Reed