Yesterday, when Matt was editing a freelance project about the life of Christ, he asked me, "When Jesus fed the 5,000, why did he tell the disciples to collect all the leftovers and not to waste them?" We looked up John 6 to see exactly what it said: "When [the crowds] were full, He told His disciples, 'Collect the leftovers so that nothing is wasted'" (v. 12). I honestly didn't even know that detail was in there! But then the Lord brought to mind a short passage from Elisabeth Elliot's book Passion for Purity:
“One morning I was reading the story of Jesus’ feeding of the five thousand. The disciples could find only five loaves of bread and two fishes. ‘Let me have them,’ said Jesus. He asked for all. He took them, said the blessing, and broke them before He gave them out. I remembered what a chapel speaker, Ruth Stull of Peru, had said: ‘If my life is broken when given to Jesus, it is because pieces will feed a multitude, while a loaf will satisfy only a little lad.’”
Ultimately, Jesus is the Bread of Life, whose body was broken for us. Each time we take communion, we remember this. But as we share in the suffering of Christ, we're broken, too, for the good of others. And from John 6:12, we know Jesus doesn't waste a thing. Those times when we feel like our suffering is pointless, that God can't possibly have any good purpose in it? Even those He doesn't waste. Even those will ultimately fit into a pattern for our good, the good of others, and His glory.
I can look back over my short 32 years and see how God has used my few Hosea 6:1 seasons — "Come, let us return to the Lord. For He has torn us, and He will heal us" — to help others along in their journeys. For example, I was single for all of my 20s - I didn't meet Matt until I was 30. There were some difficult times during those years when I had to lay my singleness at the foot of the cross over and over and over again. But since the Lord allowed me to go through that season, I am able to minister to other young women who find themselves there. I know the fear, the heartache, the loneliness that comes with singleness because I've been there.
God has also allowed me to go through a season where I couldn't find a professional job in my field for over a year. When God brings people in my path who are in the same boat I was in 5 years ago, I can empathize with them. I can also encourage them that although it seems like God has forgotten them and they'll never find a job, it's simply not true. In due time, God wills set their feet in a spacious place.
I also think about the life of Elisabeth Elliot - what a testimony of a life broken so that multitudes may be fed!
Simply put, God uses our brokenness to feed others. Just like the apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians 1, we're called to comfort others with the same comfort we've received. So often in our suffering, we say, "Why me?" instead of, "Lord, how can I use this experience to help someone else?" We don't just suffer for ourselves (although that's certainly part of it); we suffer for the sake of others.
Think about what God has allowed you to endure, and then ask Him how He wants to use it. None of it it wasted; it all has purpose.
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