The early morning beach stretched out before me, littered with the detritus of the previous night’s tide. Shrimp trawlers dotted the horizon, busy bringing in their wares, and the freshening breeze told of the cold front moving closer. Calm waves lapped gently seeming to have forgotten the anger of last week’s storm.

Shells were everywhere. Clam shells, moon shells, whelks, tiny periwinkles, oyster shells and abalone joined an array of broken pieces entwined with sea weed and grasses. Shells so numerous that my footsteps crunched even though I tried to be careful. Sand dollars, waiting on the next tide, were spaced out as they covered themselves in the damp sand. I even found one almost perfect angel wing.

I confess that I am slightly obsessive about shells. I have searched for them, examined them, and collected them since childhood. My footprints on the beach are vaguely reminiscient of the Family Circus cartoons of the past, zigzagging back and forth between water and dune as I spy various interests. Jars of collected shells occupy the shelves in our home, and I find it difficult to part with any of them.

Recent years have forced me to be more selective because of diminishing shelf space. Now, while I enjoy them all, I look for the perfect specimens, bypassing the broken, like a treasure hunter in search of gold. I may walk the entire beach and only pick up one or two to carry with me.

Today, as I viewed the beauty under my feet, I thought about that.

I picked up a broken abalone with its shiny rainbow of color. I found a whelk, long discarded by its owner and pitted from its interaction with waves and sand, that had become home to barnacles and other minute sea creatures. And while there were many living sand dollars at the edge of the waves, I particularly noticed the broken ones that had not survived the journey from sea to sand.

Broken.

“Broken, but beautiful”, I heard God’s whisper in my soul.

God loves the broken. He picks up the broken. He redeems the broken, and they become His trophies of grace.

Some days I tromp through this world of broken people, and I fail to see their beauty or their worth to God. Like the shells, they crunch under my feet, while I go about my business of everyday, choosing whom I will notice.

I was broken, but God reached down and redeemed me.

I was covered in the mud and debris of the world, but He washed me clean through the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus Christ.

I was not and am not perfect, but God treasures me.

My prayer on the beach this morning asked God to open my eyes to the beauty of the broken and to open my heart to treasure the broken, knowing how much He loves the broken. He picks up the broken that turn to Him and washes them clean. He redeems the broken, and they become trophies of His grace.

I know, because He did it for broken me.

As usual, I brought back a variety of specimens from the beach today, but many were not perfect. A broken sand dollar, part of an abalone, an empty crab shell, and the top of a lovely whelk were part of my bounty. They will join my collection to remind me that

God loves the broken.

God picks up the broken and washes them clean.

God redeems the broken,

and He calls me to love them, too.

Jesus speaking – Luke 4: ¹⁸ The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, ¹⁹ To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.

Mark 2:17 When Jesus heard it, he saith unto them, They that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick: I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.

Romans 5:⁸ But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.