Every day, we are confronted with brokenness in our world. We see it in the pain of division, in the wounds of injustice, and in the hurts that weigh on our own hearts.
Sometimes life feels like shattered glass—sharp edges and scattered fragments that seem beyond repair. The artwork pictured here (and hanging in my office) was created from pieces of sea glass—fragments that once began as broken bottles or jars. Left in the ocean, those broken shards are shaped by the rhythm of the waves and smoothed by the sand. Over time, what was once discarded and even dangerous is transformed into something new—something beautiful and treasured. What once was thrown away becomes valuable.
That transformation is a picture of what God does with us. The broken pieces of our lives are not beyond God’s reach. In Christ, God does not cast us aside as useless. Instead, through the cross and the power of the Holy Spirit, God gathers up our fragments, smooths our rough edges, and makes us whole again.
What once was broken becomes a sign of God’s grace. What once was overlooked or forgotten becomes precious in God’s sight. Notice the colors of the sea glass in the cross: the earthy beige recalls our human
beginning, the sea- foam green suggests baptismal renewal, the blue evokes Christ’s peace, and the deep teal points to divine mystery. Surrounding it all is the pearly white of resurrection hope—a reminder that
Christ’s life has the final word.
The Apostle Paul put it this way:
“So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; look, new things have
come into being!” (2 Corinthians 5:17)
Even in the midst of brokenness, God is creating something new. The cross of Christ assures us that our stories—like sea glass—can be transformed from fragments into treasures, from wounds into witnesses of
grace. That is good news worth holding onto, and good news worth sharing with a broken world.
In Christ,
Pastor Mark
