A Broken Spirit

“The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” Psalm 51:17

When I was meditating on Psalm 51 a few months ago, I had a hard time with this verse. I didn’t like the idea of being “broken,” until God inspired me to take a deeper look at “brokenness.”

A broken spirit is one that has submitted its will to the will of another, like when a horse is broken and trained to do what its master wants. This involves a relationship of trust. The horse needs to learn to trust the master and to accept that the master is in charge.

To have a broken spirit, I need to submit my will to God. I need to pray as Jesus prayed, “Not my will, but thine be done.” I also need to trust that God is in control and that he wants what is best for me.

Brokenness in this sense does not mean to damage something so that it is no longer useful, like when a glass is broken. Rather, the opposite is true. A horse that is not broken is not useful for anything, because it cannot be controlled. A broken horse, on the other hand, can be trained to do all sorts of useful things.

In the same way, God cannot use me until I am “broken,” until I submit to Him and allow Him to use me as He wills. Once I learn to trust Him and submit to Him, He can do great things in and through me.