What if God doesn’t fix it?

There’s a scene in Thornton Wilder’s play, The Angel that Troubled the Waters, that captures the essence of waiting on God to fix the broken thing, or things, in our lives.

The scene is a medical doctor that comes to the pool everyday wanting to be healed of his own depression, anxiousness, and deep sadness.  Finally, the angel appears and the doctor goes to step into the water to receive his healing when the angel blocks his entrance saying, “No, step back, the healing is not for you.”  The doctor pleads, “But I’ve got to get into the water.  I can’t live this way!”  The angel says, “No. This moment is not for you.”  And he says, “But how can I live this way?”

The angel says to him, “Doctor, without your wounds, where would your power be?  It is your melancholy that makes your low voice tremble into the hearts of men and women. The very angels themselves cannot persuade the wretched and blundering children of this earth as can one human being broken on the wheels of living.

All grace, light, truth, and power are communicated though the vulnerability of broken people.  Healing comes through the honesty of men and women who have been shipwrecked and broken on the wheels of living.  In love’s service, only wounded soldiers can serve.  Your power lies in your unblinking honesty.  Mountains move as a result of your deeply moving sincerity.

Wounded healers heal.

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Christian Author Brennan Manning said these words about his friend and musician, Rich Mullins.  You can watch the full video here.