The Reality of Brokenness

I don’t know if I’ve ever been faced with the reality of our world’s brokenness as I have in the past month. I’ve never had so many nights where I am just to exhausted to move—not because of any physical exertion, but because of the weight of my emotions. This world is far more broken that I have ever realized. Just this past week:

- One of my close friends dies while playing pickup basketball. Eric was 24, and a leader in the African-American community. He was laboring for the Kingdom, and loving his wife and children well. This world is so broken…
- A player walks into the weight room in street clothes. “Are you lifting today”, I ask. He responds, “I don’t know. I have to see when my dad can come by to help me move my stuff. My grandma put me out.” Another player responds through laughter, “Again?! What did you do this time?” To them, it’s just the way it is…
- We bought protein powder to give to our guys after workouts. Many high schools do this in order to get their players bigger and stronger. That would be a great perk for us, but our main desire is that our players simply have some type of nutrition, because there is no guarantee they’ll get it at home…but that’s the way it is.
- One of our players will be a star. He’ll be able to go to any college he wants to, and he talks about it all the time. He’s always leading by example. Yet, yesterday he decided he wanted to be cool and hold someone else’s marijuana. Caught, suspended, arrested…how can he not connect holding that bag to his chances of college? Something is wrong here…
- A player opens up to me and tells me a lot about his life. His mom was able to buy a house, which is a huge step. But she put her boyfriend’s name on the deed, only to discover he was little more than a cheat and a drunk. She can get no help from the authorities because they are all his drinking buddies. She has to spread her kids out in various places. “I sleep on my sister’s couch. My mom won’t let us near him because she knows we’ll beat him up. I just want to have a room again.” Does it bother him? “It makes me mad, but that’s just how it is.”

The difference between my view of the brokenness of this world and that of these youth is simple: To them, “it’s just the way it is”. I agree, “it’s the way it is”…but that’s not how it should be. And I can claim the promise that the broken world we live in will be restored to the fullness God intends. That truth keeps me going, and keeps me praying that these youth will one day embrace the gospel, giving them a reason to hope in the midst of more suffering than I’ll ever experience. The reality of “the way it is” might not change, but at least they’ll know the truth: “It’s not how it should be, and it’s not how it will be”.