In 2009 I had the chance to hear the message in this video live. At the time it was enormously powerful. I don’t remember many sermons I have heard over my lifetime in the church and attending conferences, but this one has stuck with me. Over the past 2+ years the words of Matt Chandler in this clip have become especially meaningful and alive to me. I suspect many of you have seen this, but it is worth watching again. And again after that. And probably one more time after that.
You do not have to be a 26-year-old single mother carrying on an affair with a married man to be the broken rose. Every person is that wilted, broken flower. Maybe it is sexual deviance or dalliance. Maybe it is lying. Maybe it is arrogance, apathy, legalism, lawlessness, anger, passivity, or something else. But each of us has lost our petals and are nothing more than a trash heap worthy busted stem.
But may the phrase “Jesus wants the rose!” be a motto of hope and a cause of repentance and a purpose for living for you as it has become for me.
