Last week, I was trying to quickly put away dishes, mumbling under my breath about roommates who never clean up after themselves, when a ceramic bowl slipped out of my hand and fell to the floor. I stared at it in shock, broken cleanly into three pieces. I looked frantically around to see if anyone had heard the crash. No one came running, so I quickly scooped the pieces into the trash can before anyone could learn of my mistake.
When something breaks, I throw it away.
People have said that it’s part of the modern culture, that it’s the reason for everything from our divorce rate to our piles of trash. When something breaks, we throw it away.
In ancient Japan, when a ceramic bowl broke, they fixed it. Legend has it that a Japanese shogun was unimpressed with the repair done on a Chinese bowl he had sent to be fixed, so he hired some Japanese craftsmen to find a more beautiful method of mending ceramics. They developed a technique called kintsugi, in which the broken pottery is literally mended with gold dust. Rather than trying to hide the flaws in the broken ceramics, they would highlight them in gold, baring the cracks and scars and adopting them as a part of the ceramic.
The technique became so popular that people may have even begun intentionally smashing bowls and plates in order to have them repaired. The ceramics mended with kintsugi actually became more valuable than they had been before they were broken.
It was considered more beautiful because it was broken. Kintsugi craftsmen had to be very skilled and the most celebrated among them were those who could repair even the most destroyed pieces of pottery.
In our culture of throwing-away, our churches and communities are filled with broken people hiding their scars in shame. The church is not always a safe place to show our ragged edges and search for healing, so we metaphorically superglue ourselves back together and hope no one notices the growing cracks.
But we say we believe in a God who is strong in our weakness, who makes us new creations, who is a God of repair and restoration and redemption. What kind of a witness do we give if we say we believe in a God of healing but will not show how we have been healed?
Our God fills in our cracks and puts our broken pieces back together with something more beautiful and precious than gold. In order to show the world that we believe in a God who fixes the broken things, we need to bare our scars in our art and in our lives.
Because the kintsugi craftsmen had another purpose in their craft. As they repaired ceramics from all over the world, Chinese bowls and Korean plates, as they mended the cracks with precious gold, the pottery was no longer considered Chinese or Korean. Once something was mended with kintsugi, it was forever considered Japanese.
The repairman had left his mark on the pottery so distinctly that it was no longer recognized by where it had come from, but by who had repaired it.
Ruth says
Oh my, this is SO powerful, it hurts inside. His beauty, His power, His tenderness, His shalom-wholeness being shown in my broken weakness. He is my creator and my kintsugi-restorer.
Thank you xx
Rachel Haltiwanger says
“He is my creator and my kintsugi-restorer.” Amen! What a beautiful way of putting it. Thanks for sharing!
Becky Fish says
Thank you… ! ! ! !
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you for reading and commenting!
Marty says
I don’t think I have ever heard about kintsugi. What a beautiful example of redemption and restoration…the perfect picture of what Christ does for each of us.
Thank you for sharing!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
I stumbled upon an article about it and then started doing some research because I could not help but see the metaphor of Christ’s redeeming work in us. I totally agree!
Betsy Henning says
This is a beautiful post on so many levels. Thank you, Rachel. Thank you (in)courage.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you for taking the time to read and comment! Hopefully if we can all remember that our scars show the power of the Healer, the church will become a safer place to be vulnerable.
Karen B. says
What a beautiful comparison. Great writing. Well done.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you! I wonder if the craftsmen doing the mending ever thought about the deeper metaphorical meaning of the work they were doing… That broken things could be beautiful as well.
Lindsey Bell says
I LOVE this post. Sometimes we are more beautiful…not in spite of our brokenness, but because of it. Our brokenness allows God to shine through. Love it!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Exactly! When I am weak, then He is strong.
Kim says
This is wonderful! I am sensing God speaking to me through this post. I have just last week gotten to a point in my life where I have felt and processed a life experience that I had set aside for many years. I could not deal with its impact because I felt like I would break into a thousand pieces. But, after finally facing it, I feel healed and loved. I think I am supposed to use my experience-from beginning to end-and share it with others in some fashion.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you for your openness and sharing! I love that you said that you “felt like [you] would break into a thousand pieces.” Isn’t it ironic that what feels like it will shatter us actually makes us whole?
Julie Sunne says
This is a wonderful post, Rachel! Informational and inspirational all tied in a lovely bundle. Thank you!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you for your kind words!
Linda says
Heal the wound, but leave the scar. A reminder of how merciful you are…
~Point of Grace
The repaired plate is a wonderful picture example of the song “Heal The Wound”.
We have been redeemed into something even more valuable than before.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
I just looked up that song, I wasn’t familiar with it before. What a beautiful connection you made! “We have been redeemed into something even more valuable than before.” May we fully believe that today!
Christina says
This is absolutely wonderful!!!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you!
Etta says
Just love this! God takes our brokenness and holds us together with Christ blood.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts with us!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you for that beautiful image: Christ’s blood is even more precious than the gold that holds these pieces of pottery together.
Judy says
“No scars, no stories, no life.”
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Amen! This reminds me of that CS Lewis quote: “To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.” Thank you for sharing!
Debbie says
This was beautiful. I love how you weaved in the history/story of the Japanese culture. How often we think that our brokenness is something to hide, when in fact those ashes can be turned into beauty. 🙂
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Amen! God is in the business of bringing beauty from ashes.
Kate says
Love this.
I’ll have a broken plate filled with gold in my mind’s eye for a while now.
So good.
Thank you for sharing.
Blessings,
Kate 🙂
Rachel Haltiwanger says
I kind of want to figure out how to do some simple kintsugi so I can have a small mended plate somewhere in my house, to remind me.
Trudy says
Wow! This is so inspiring, Rachel. And so insightful. It really fits into what I’m struggling with – to be “real.” This action statement especially impacts me – “In order to show the world that we believe in a God who fixes the broken things, we need to bare our scars in our art and in our lives.” Thank you.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you for being ‘real’ and sharing here! I am praying for real-ness and openness in the church and in you today.
Andrea says
I love this imagery – there is beauty in our brokenness because of Who has put us together. Love, love, love this – I’m going to keep that in mind all day today.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Absolutely. If only instead of shame for our cracks, we could see them as a testimony to the skill of the Mender.
Alicia says
Wow! How beautiful and how fitting for me….because it’s true, if something is broken, the easiest thing to do is throw it away, even a marraige. But, my husband and I are attending a conference on marraige this weekend….we truly want to save our marraige. Like these broken plates, I KNOW without a doubt that God can repair us and we WILL see HIM, the repairer, through this process. Thanks for such an inspirational post. Love it, needed it!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
You are so brave and faithful! I pray that this weekend will heal and that the cracks and scars you have developed over the years will become a beautiful testimony.
karyn says
O how lovely.
🙂
Happy.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you!
Terri says
Love this! Authenticity is sadly a rare thing in the church at large, however, it is coming up in more and more conversations that I have had within my circles of influence. Wonderful writing!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Hopefully that means the culture in the church at large is changing!
Patricia says
Beautiful imagery. Thank you for the uplifting thoughts.
Blessings to you this day of grace.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Blessings to you as well! Thank you for stopping by.
Gwendolyn says
I really love this– genuine, transparent, broken, redeemed believers. That’s what our world needs. To see the One whom holds us together. Thank you for this post.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
I completely agree. And to let the world see Him, we need to let them see us as we really are, with scars and cracks showing.
Sara says
I love this metaphor of making something beautiful out of the brokenness of our lives. This was why I started a blog after the death of my son. I realized there were so many people who were walking a journey of loss or discouragement or crisis or hard days. It doesn’t matter what brokenness you have, we all have it.
I realized that words can bring healing. That words can make us feel less alone.
Thank you for the reminder that our brokenness can bring about beauty too.
Continuing with you in using words to heal,
Sara
My latest post:
When our Plans Fail (Make something beautiful out of this day)
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Absolutely! I just clicked over and your blog is beautiful and transparent and encouraging. Thank you for sharing!
Lauren Huss says
Oh what a beautiful analogy of our Father’s love and redemption!! I am so grateful that because of His compassion and careful mending, my identity is forever HIS!!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Amen! And we truly are better than we were before.
Josephine Schmidt says
It certainly takes great courage to give our broken hearts to Jesus. Trusting Him that He will not handle our hearts the way this world does. Cast all our cares onto Him for He cares of us. (1 Peter 5:7) We give Him the little things and discover that He cares about them and works good. So we learn to trust Him with the most precious guarded pain that we have, like the smashed useless plate on the floor! Buy from me gold He declares, without money. The exchange Jesus is looking for is trust. But who can put a value on the restored soul? I love the idea that when people see the repaired plates that they become more valuable than the original. May others see my life in the same way. He has done such an amazing restoration with the irreparable wreckage I had become.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
“May others see my life in the same way. He has done such an amazing restoration with the irreparable wreckage I had become.” And what a testimony that can be! Thank you for sharing.
Kiki says
A wonderful post! Thank you so much for sharing your experience – I totally agree with you and your commentators above AND I learned about a ‘new trade’ which is so old that I can’t believe I never ever heard of this technique before 🙂
I shall look at my sometimes’ brokenness with a different eye from now on. I also searched more about the Kintsugi phenomena and found this lovely video on an open platform – just fascinating!
http://dorftv.at/videos/open-space/424
Also, I love old ‘stuff’ (including people! lol), I live in an old house, am surrounded by the cast away things of people long dead – they all tell stories and I love them, the stories and the people who lived with them. I’m glad to read that God loves broken people too….
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you for sharing the video! I love learning more about this technique- I agree, it’s so interesting!
Mandy says
I love this metaphor!! Thank you so much for sharing! What a great reminder to be real with each other about our hurts to point to our healer.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
“…our hurts point to our healer.” Exactly, thank you!
Christine Wright says
What a powerful word. This esp moved me: “The repairman had left his mark on the pottery so distinctly that it was no longer recognized by where it had come from, but by who had repaired it.” There is such beauty in the broken. Thank you for sharing.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
There is such beauty in the broken because our Mender is so capable. Thank you!
Sarah says
Rachel, wow this is powerful! Such a great illustration. We are made whole because He made us whole. He took our brokenness and made us new. He put us back together. Thank you so much for sharing!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
“We are made whole because He made us whole.” Isn’t it awe-inspiring to think that, even had we somehow never been broken, we are now MORE WHOLE than we ever were before? Thank you for your thoughts!
Angela Nazworth says
Oh Rachel! So powerful. So beautiful. Thank you for so eloquently sharing such a timely reminder.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
I’m glad it was encouraging!
Tina Evans says
This…”The church is not always a safe place to show our ragged edges and search for healing, so we metaphorically superglue ourselves back together and hope no one notices the growing cracks.”…and this…”The repairman had left his mark on the pottery so distinctly that it was no longer recognized by where it had come from, but by who had repaired it.”
For so long I lived by that first statement. It has been a slow, albeit steady, struggle and climb to get where I am today {and God knows, I am not done, maybe never will be}. So thankful that all because of His love and grace and forgiveness and peace, that we can become more beautiful because of His healing in us and that by His doing we can point to {only} Him when we tell of our healing. Such a beautiful and powerful post you have written, thank you. <3
Rachel Haltiwanger says
“So thankful that all because of His love and grace and forgiveness and peace, that we can become more beautiful because of His healing in us and that by His doing we can point to {only} Him when we tell of our healing.” We can only point to Him. Amen.
Brooke says
This is so good! Thankful we have a God who can fix our broken pieces into something beautiful-thank you for this reminder!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thankfulness is absolutely our only response to Grace that puts us back together. Thank you!
Kristin Waters says
Hi Rachel,
We are moving along the same path! I just love, “Our God fills in our cracks and puts our broken pieces back together with something more beautiful and precious than gold. In order to show the world that we believe in a God who fixes the broken things, we need to bare our scars in our art and in our lives.”
Our scars are unique and make us who we are – and the world needs to see them for them to believe in the power of His healing in our lives. That’s exactly where I am in my journey. I am finally ready to let my light shine through my brokenness. It’s been my mantra-of-sorts this year along with my 2014 word, “release.”
I can’t wait to see more of your writing!
Kristin
Rachel Haltiwanger says
I love that your word for this year is “release”! We are moving along the same path. I feel like everything I have been learning lately has been about letting go, unclenching my tight fist and approaching God and life with an open hand. Thanks for sharing, Kristin!
danelle says
This is beautiful thanks for sharing and inspiring me.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you!
Deb says
I feel like I will think twice before throwing something broken next time. And be more open to being “mended” myself. Thank you for writing.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Agreed- I’m trying to come up with creative ways to craft my broken things into reminders that my own cracks and scars are beautiful instead of throwing them away.
Jennifer Watson says
This is such a beautiful post, so thankful that God pieces us back together with beauty and purpose!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
How important to remember that when we are put back together it is with purpose. Amen! We are not healed for our own sake but for the glory of the Mender, always, in all things.
Andrea says
Oh my! How beautiful. This speaks to a very deep part of me. I know that God is calling me to show my “scars” but I am reluctant to. I don’t want to be known for what caused the scars. Like you said, I want to be known for who repaired them! Pray for me.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Andrea, thank you for sharing! I will absolutely be praying for you.
Penny says
“…it was no longer recognized by where it had come from, but by who had repaired it.”
I will remember that line for the rest of my life.
Rachel Haltiwanger says
What if we all looked at each other like that, not looking for what caused the cracks but admiring the work of the Repairman?
Robin says
I am speechless……. I am going to remember this story for the rest of my life. What a beautiful visual for our amazing gift of life and all it’s gold lined experiences. I don’t know why I should be surprised……
Rachel Haltiwanger says
But it IS such a beautiful and surprising reminder of our “gold-lined” experiences, isn’t it!
Debbie McDaniel says
Rachel, this is beautiful, thank you for sharing these words. Life words. This truth peeled back layers, so revealing of where we live, “In our culture of throwing-away, our churches and communities are filled with broken people hiding their scars in shame.” Thankful for our Savior who redeems our brokenness and mess, who heals us and says we do not have to hide, who makes us beautiful, and gives us purpose, scars and all. Blessings on you dear sister in Christ!
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Blessings to you as well! Thanks for sharing.
Satin P says
Oh Rachel, this goes along with what my post today (When Healing Hurts)! Wow! I love several of your quotes & am sharing this one for sure! Love to you for sharing such a powerful message, so boldly! ♥
Rachel Haltiwanger says
Thank you for your sweet words! Your blog is beautiful, thanks for sharing!
Susan says
Awesome post! What a beautiful story and metaphor of our Repairman! Praise God for healing us beyond what we were before! Blessings to you Rachel for sharing!
Stacey Monaco says
Simply love.
Angela says
Thank you for sharing.
I’m just reading this article it touched me soo, deeply.
my eyes and my heart is filled with tears of gratitude to The Lord whom redeemed me from the
Broken life.
Thank you
Sarah Rosangela says
Oh, I just love this.