Broken and Beautiful

Many years ago Husband and I were given a pottery goblet and platter by our dear friend, Harry Miller. The set was made in Montana by a talented craftsman and we never served communion with anything else… until I accidentally broke the goblet. Clearly, we couldn’t proceed without it.

That’s how it is with the church also.

God created us as a full set of talents and idiosyncrasies in His “Universal Church” which is the entire family of Christians in every location, denomination, and through all time. Baptism is our sacred initiation, the moment when we come (or are carried) to Him. Broken and alone we are invited to join with all His other pottery.

I find it troubling that baptism is often dictated by denominational doctrine and used as a tool of divisiveness. It doesn’t really make a difference WHEN or HOW you were baptized. Different church traditions cannot divide us--- because all baptisms join us.

Some churches dunk, some pour, and some sprinkle the water. If you were baptized as a baby, you probably had godparents who made a public declaration that they would provide your spiritual covering until a time when you could take responsibility for yourself.

Some denominations wait until the infant “comes of age.” They encourage families to delay baptism until the child knows why they are being baptized and what that means for their life.

I grew up in the Anglican Church and was baptized when I was a few months old. Husband likewise. We could not possibly have known it as infants, but we were joined together in that moment over 65 years ago. While God was forming him into a beautiful chalice, I was being shaped into the platter that would eventually serve alongside him.

After the goblet was broken I felt heartsick, but Husband found the original potter online and quickly ordered a new one in the same pattern and colors. It arrived and is just as beautiful as its predecessor. It holds wine. It serves the blood of Christ to the body of Christ. It does everything a goblet/chalice is supposed to do.

But the flawless new one didn’t feel “right” to me; its perfection was oddly discomforting.

None of us will ever learn to live flawlessly. Life shatters everyone: discouragement, addiction, fear, hurt, abuse, disease, trauma, failure. No one is exempt. But from our baptisms until our deaths we are given opportunities to grow into an understanding of how our brokenness causes us to fit in, not flunk out.  

Our imperfections are what make us perfect in the family of God.

We cannot fix ourselves. But God can.

Thankfully, I never threw out the old goblet pieces. A few months ago I discovered “Kintsugi,” a Japanese technique for repairing broken pottery with seams of gold. The word “Kintsugi” means “golden joinery.” It makes the object even more beautiful than it was prior to being broken.

Husband found a “Kintsugi” repair kit and we reverently went to work on the pieces of pottery.  

Likewise, baptism is God’s way of incorporating His broken children into the church and making them even stronger than they were before. The breaks in our personality and chips in our character become part of our unique beauty. Every failure is an opportunity for Him to repair us with permanent seams of gold.

That’s what the family of God is meant to be: a set of broken, beautiful human pottery vessels the Holy Spirit has repaired with the gold of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross.  

Today the goblet serves again, more beautiful than before it was broken.