Seeing Beauty in the Imperfect

Sometimes in our brokenness, imperfection, and past experiences, we ask ourselves if we can ever be used by God and whether we matter to Him. We might feel like a shattered pottery piece beyond hope and repair.

Yet we have a God who loves us even in our imperfection. He loves us so much that He picks up our pieces and puts us back together again. We are in the hands of a Master Potter.

God, pick up the pieces. Put me back together again. Jeremiah 17:14 MSG

But now, O Lord, You are our Father; We are the clay, and You our potter;
And all we are the work of Your hand. Isaiah 64:8 – NKJV

In Japanese Ceramics, there is an ancient art technique for fixing broken pottery called Kintsugi, which is poetically translated as “golden joinery”. Instead of using common adhesive to seal broken pieces, this technique uses a special sap lacquer with powdered gold, silver or platinum. And once pottery is put back together as whole with this, you can see beautiful seams of gold within the cracks, which gives it a unique and beautiful appearance to each “repaired” piece (Kelly Richman-Abdou).

This golden joinery technique resembles the way God takes care of us and brings restoration to our lives – putting the pieces of heart back together – making us even more beautiful than we were once.

God loves us flawed and sent us Jesus to repair our brokenness with golden threads of His Holy Spirit. When we feel that our lives didn’t matter Our Father God, the Potter, added value to us by sending His Son. He accepts us and stitches us back together through His blood and sacrifice. He seams us together beautifully with gold glints making us whole again.

But because of our sins, he was wounded, beaten because of the evil we did. We are healed by the punishment he suffered, made whole by the blows he received. Isaiah 53:5 GNT

He is before all things, and in him, all things hold together. Colossians 1:17

When we surrender it all to Him, our cracked lives suddenly become one-of-a-kind masterpieces handled and repaired by a loving Father, giving us a renewed purpose. He does not want us to hide those cracks or disguise them. He wants us to trust Him to touch them to give us a purpose. He does not waste a hurt or experience. On the contrary, He wants us to share our life experiences with others to help them see the good works Jesus has done in us.

You might think of your life as broken ugly pottery just put together with weak adhesive, yet God sees you as a masterpiece created in Christ Jesus for good works (Ephesians 2:10) fixed together with golden joinery.

Imagine how beautiful it would be to let Jesus and His light shine inside of you, emanating brightness through your golden cracks, bringing beauty in your imperfection for His glory.