Dropped and Broken
by
Bishop Jeff Keen
2 Sam. 4:4 And Jonathan, Saul’s son, had a son that was lame of his feet. He was five years old when the tidings came of Saul and Jonathan out of Jezreel, and his nurse took him up, and fled: and it came to pass, as she made haste to flee, that he fell, and became lame. And his name was Mephibosheth.
Mephibosheth was only five years old when his father Jonathan and his grandfather King Saul were killed on the battlefield in Jezreel. The young boy barely had memories of them.
When his son was born, Jonathan must have pondered many names for the young prince, names of character and strength. After all, his name had to reflect the high expectations bestowed on an heir to the throne of
Even though the lad was given such a noble name, we are introduced to him in scripture simply as Jonathan’s son “lame on his feet.” No mention was given to his hereditary title, his prominence, or his future. He was identified by his handicap, his infirmity, his inability to walk on his own and his obvious dependency on others.
What a very sad start to life! He was born into a life of distinction and privilege not affliction and pain. His life began dictated by circumstances and problems that were not of his own making. His future, determined by the past mistakes of others, severely limited, even stunted, his growth into the man his father and grandfather had hoped he would be.
Mephiboseth’s nurse, terrified by fear and in her haste to leave the castle at the report of the King‘s death, dropped him and crippled him for life. She didn’t mean too, it was an accident. She was his caretaker and probably had been all of his young life but she made a serious mistake caused by her fear.
Before that fateful day, he was a normal young boy, running and playing with the other children in the palace courtyard until one reckless act changed his life forever. In one moment of neglect, one moment of haste the noble “eliminator of idols” was reduced to a disabled invalid. From the smoldering ashes of his once privileged life crawled Jonathan’s son known only to the world as “lame on his feet.”
The sad fact is, accident or not, it only took a moment to cripple a life that was so full of promise. A young life tragically changed forever because of someone’s neglect, someone‘s momentary lapse in good judgment. It only took a moment…
Broken Lives
Today, moment-by-moment, lives are being broken. Every second of the day is a tragic testimonial to the lives that began so full of hope and promise but are now merely shells of what should have been. It all begins innocently enough.
It starts with the strained look on a young mother’s face as she struggles with a temper tantrum from her toddler in the grocery store or the frustration in a father’s voice as he angrily rebukes his youngster for some rebellious act in the local mall. Jobs, careers, money problems and the pursuit of the “American dream” are the outside entities adding to the pressures of family life. Patience wears thin, tempers flare. These things are to be expected and happen in every family to some degree but soon, something begins to take place that no one could have predicted.
The young parents, fueled by frustration and fatigue, begin to entertain the thoughts of days gone by and the perceived good times of a single, childless life. As these thoughts begin to flood into a mind fevered by the intense struggle to raise a family, frustrations and angry feelings cause them to fall off of the edge of a rocky marriage into divorce or into the black chasm of abuse.
Drugs, alcohol, divorce, physical and mental abuse, neglect…nobody planned it, it just happened. As in many homes selfishness takes over and the children, caught in the middle of it all, suffer the most.
In the twenty-first century parents are dropping their children at an alarming rate. Abuse, neglect and fear are causing children to slip from the arms of those charged with the responsibility to love and care for them. Just as Mephibosheth‘s nurse dropped him, these dropped children are casualties caught in crossfire of a war they did not want and are not responsible for.
Children are being crippled and innocence lost because those who were entrusted with the fragile care of a child, got in a hurry and dropped their most delicate gift at a crucial time in their development.
Though the crippling is not always apparent, many children bear the emotional and mental scars of someone else’s actions just under the skin, out of view. Without help, these crippled children will never walk through life in a normal fashion; they will always need some assistance.
Children with talent, purpose and bright futures, dropped and crippled physically, mentally and emotionally by selfish parents in a hurry to fulfill their own lust, their own desires. Children with their whole lives ahead of them are dashed to the ground and the sad fact is that most the time it never starts out this way.
Before the fall
When a baby is born the new parents stare into the eyes of their miracle with wonder. As they bond with their newborn, they ponder their new son’s or daughter’s future and the aroma of a new kind of love fills the home.
“Will my baby grow up to be successful?”
“Will my baby make a difference in this world?”
“Maybe my child will be president of the
“As long as my child is happy, that is all that really matters.”
The new parents then contemplate of a good name for their child, a name with strength, to set their identity in the world. Maybe a biblical name like Elijah, John or Paul or maybe they name their child after a relative or a role model they respect and admire.
The point is no one ever intends on setting his or her newborn child up for failure in the world. Almost everyone starts out life with someone who loves and cares about him or her.
Time marches on. The family faces the struggles and trials of everyday life and for the most part life is good. The child is playing normally with the other children in the neighborhood and the way things are, seem to be the way things will always be.
Out of the blue, tragedy strikes. The attitudes and aspirations that seemingly devoted parents once shared toward the children suddenly begin to change. Events take place and suddenly the family suffers as if caught in a vortex of destruction. Piece by piece lives are dismantled; marriages bust up, parents become self-centered and no one seems to care anymore.
New homes, new families, new schools, arguing, hatred, poisonous words fly back and forth like arrows from a bow and in the heat of the battle, with the enemy hot on their heels, the child for all intents and purposes, is dropped. Scarred forever with physical, mental or emotional trauma, and crippled with little hope of recovery, damaged children become damaged adults and the vicious cycle starts over again.
Perhaps this answers some of the questions that have plagued your mind concerning some of the people you come in contact with each day; the person across from you at work, your next-door neighbor or a classmate at school. Maybe their attitudes and actions are their way of acting out a tragic start to life where they experienced the trauma of a fall from love.
Hope for the broken child
There are many broken people in the world today, people who were dropped by someone who should have cared but didn‘t or by an out of control circumstance that shattered their lives and flooded the broken pieces with heartache and pain.
Maybe the issues of life that are being suffered through now are the “left overs” of a tragic past but there is still hope. The word of the living God contains the power needed to overcome the issues that have crippled so many and kept them from attaining their potential. God’s word offers hope for their future.
Second Samuel chapter 9 is full of hope for every damaged child. These thirteen verses in God’s holy word are packed with the hope that every abused, neglected and wounded child needs!
If you are a broken child, study this scripture and replace Mephiboseth’s name with your own and I know that you will find somebody does love you, somebody does care…the King!
2 Sam. 9:1-5 And David said, Is there yet any that is left of the house of Saul, that I may shew him kindness for Jonathan’s sake? 2And there was of the house of Saul a servant whose name was Ziba. And when they had called him unto David, the king said unto him, Art thou Ziba? And he said, Thy servant is he. 3And the king said, Is there not yet any of the house of Saul, that I may shew the kindness of God unto him? And Ziba said unto the king, Jonathan hath yet a son, which is lame on his feet. 4And the king said unto him, Where is he? And Ziba said unto the king, Behold, he is in the house of Machir, the son of Ammiel, in Lodebar. 5Then king David sent, and fetched him out of the house of Machir, the son of Ammiel, from Lodebar. 6Now when Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, was come unto David, he fell on his face, and did reverence. And David said, Mephibosheth. And he answered, Behold thy servant!
Beloved, learn from these scriptures, glean from them the healing balm you need to sooth your tortured soul and bring you into a relationship with the King. Begin with what was taken from Mephibosheth at the beginning of his tragedy…his name.
What’s in a name?
Mephibosheth is King Saul’s grandson, a prince, an heir to the throne of
Who wants to be identified by what is wrong with them? No one likes the cruel names we call each other that would cause a judgmental light to shine upon our problems. No one wants to be known as fatty, skinny, alcoholic, crack-head, stupid, whore, gimp or queer! These cruel tags only serve to drive people into hiding who they really are in order to keep anyone else from peering deeper into their already inferior existence.
A person’s name is important to them. Names cause such sensitivity within that a mere whisper of a person’s name while they are asleep will cause them to awaken. No matter what other noise or clamor they seem to be able to sleep through, the mention of their name jolts them from even the deepest sleep.
I noticed how sensitive I was to my own name while I working in a noisy factory as a maintenance technician. Because I was responsible for the repair and up keep of the machinery, my name was often called over the company PA system. Most of the time, because of the noise, I could not hear the other announcements that were made throughout the day but I could always hear my name when it was called. No matter how much ambient noise there was, I would hear my name every time.
The first thing that happens when a person is incarcerated in prison is they are stripped of their name and given a number. The idea behind this is to dehumanize the prisoner so that they are easier to manage and control. This is exactly what happened to Mephibosheth after spending years dealing with his own identity crisis, he had no sense of himself, only his handicap.
When King David questioned Ziba as to the existence of anyone that was left of King Saul’s house, Ziba indicated that there was one in Lo-Debar but he was “lame on his feet.” Once again Mephibosheth was identified by the infirmity he had suffered. Ziba identified him by what he might have perceived would be the one thing that would change the King’s mind of even bothering to show kindness to one that had been brought so low.
King David was not deterred; notice what the King did in verse 6, he asked, “Are you Mephibosheth?” He didn’t mention his infirmity or ask him how the accident happened; he just extended his grace to a lad who appeared starved for kindness and mercy. King David, by speaking Mephiboseth’s name, brought him back into the realm of humanity and let him know right away that the days of his past were over. It is now time to move into the presence of the King just because he deserved to be there.
What’s in a name? It is our identity by which we are known. Who are you? How are you Identified? Did you know that you are being beckoned into the court of the King just because you deserve to be there?
Nothing grows in Lo-Debar
His fear and shame had driven him to hide in a dreadful place where nothing grows called Lo-Debar. Away from prying eyes, ridicule and crooked judgmental fingers that point out the horrible facts of his life over and over. Not only was his body broken the day he was dropped but his life was broken too. So, veiled in secrecy, he loses himself in a place no one cares about.
Painfully disfigured and afraid, Mephibosheth is doomed to a life marred by rejection, caused by the uncontrollable actions of others, a life that is no better than a prison. None of the things that had happened to him were his fault, yet he is the one paying the price. In the black despair of his life the only hope he could find to cling to was to be forgotten.
How many of the dropped children in the world feel this way?
How many countless lives have been stunted, never able to fulfill their goals and dreams because of the uncontrollable, selfish acts or fears of another?
How many trusting, loving babies grow up to experience the pain, ridicule and torment that would cause them to silently scream…
“It’s not my fault that I am this way, someone else did this to me!”
“I am horribly disfigured, please don’t look my way, I have a defect!”
“It may not be seen on the outside but I am crippled on the inside!”
“All I want is to hide and be forgotten!”
“You can’t love me, you can’t care about me, just leave me alone!”
So they hide in the places where their identity doesn’t matter, in the places where no one can know their disability or be exposed to their feelings of inferiority. Incognito, they silently pass into Lo-Debar. Just out of reach, out of sight and out of mind. Though we may still see their physical form, the soul of the broken child is locked away, insulated from the cold, hard realities of the world’s cruelty.
Because so many are suffering the pain of a tormented past, Lo-Debar seems to be experiencing a population explosion.
If Lo-Debar is the place where nothing grows then alcohol and drug abuse is it’s inner city, it’s ghetto. There seems to be a mass exodus of people escaping the reality of their broken lives into the dark alleys of Lo-Debar’s slums and at younger ages too. On the streets of the place to hide and be forgotten, live defeated souls determined to burn out the pain of the past with legal and illegal substances.
The alcohol distilleries and pharmaceutical companies make millions of dollars a year off of the pain and suffering of shattered, broken lives just as the illegal drug pusher on the street corner. These enablers are the slumlords that are continually expanding the growth of Lo-Debar by building the projects that keep broken lives trapped in addiction and abuse.
Though some hurting people never result to masking their pain with drugs or alcohol, there are plenty of other ways to escape, plenty of dark corners available to hide in. Food, sex, gambling, almost anything can be transformed into an addictive lifestyle and become the vehicle of escape from the awful reality of a broken life.
The pain of a broken life must be confronted if it is ever to be conquered and dropped children know to well the secret pain of Mephibosheth.
They too, have trusted another to care for them but were hurt through uncontrollable circumstances.
They too, know the pain of falling out of the arms of the people they were sure would be strong enough to hold them for a lifetime.
They too, have had to suffer ridicule as poison words spew from tongues that declare over and over again their inadequacies and shortcomings.
They too, hide in the dark, secret places of Lo-Debar to keep their identity concealed and the whole world at bay.
Yes, dropped children know the pain of Mephibosheth and they hide with it in the place where nothing grows, where they secretly remain dropped children.
Recognize the FEAR!
2 Sam. 9:7 And David said unto him, Fear not: for I will surely shew thee kindness for Jonathan thy father’s sake, and will restore thee all the land of Saul thy father; and thou shalt eat bread at my table continually.
After King David called Mephibosheth by his name and not his infirmity, he addressed the one and only thing that had been a constant in his life since he was five years old…fear.
Fear had caused him to run, fear had caused him to hide and fear caused Mephibosheth to quake before his King. King David knew that his fear had to be tackled and brought into submission as the enemy it was.
Some of our fears are substantiated but most are only products of over active imaginations. Regardless, fear is a real enemy and this enemy can be terrifying.
1John
The spirit that processed King David was not one of fear but of love. Love for God, love for Jonathan, love for King Saul and love for Mephibosheth. David did not allow fear to mar the unconditional love that ruled his life; therefore, he was able to share this love with one who desperately needed it. We can see that it was a love born of God almighty since David desired to love Mephibosheth even before he knew him.
1John 4:19 We love him, because he first loved us.
Fear is the enemy that keeps you bound in the desolate prison that is Lo-Debar.
Fear is the enemy that puts the bottle to your lips, the pills on your tongue and the dope in your veins so you can escape reality.
Fear is the enemy that causes you to physically and sexually abuse those you love to keep them from contacting the real you that is hiding behind fury and rage.
Fear is the enemy that causes you to hide in a self-destructive lifestyle that only pushes you deeper and deeper into an inhumane existence.
Fear is the enemy of love and has had control of you for so long you may feel that no one has the desire or is capable of loving you.
Fear is the culprit that is robbing you of your life and because someone else dropped you years ago, your bitterness has blocked all avenues leading to other relationships.
Fear is the enemy, not the one who dropped you…FEAR IS THE ENEMY!
Don’t let your fear rob you of one more day. It may be another person’s fault that you had to live part of your life in hiding but make these quality life decisions today…I’m not living in Lo-Debar anymore…I’m listening, the King is calling me…I will arise from my lowly state and bow before the King!
The King is looking for you
There is hope. No matter how long you have tried to hide your infirmity, no matter how deeply you have been hurt and no matter how old the wounds are there is still hope! Just because no one seemed to care in your past, doesn’t mean all hope is gone, you see just like Mephibosheth, the King has been looking for you.
Beloved, Mephibosheth was summoned by King David but a King that has the power to change anything about you and your life that would cause pain, embarrassment or indignity is calling you. His name is King Jesus.
In the presence of the King you can rise from your infirmity and have all the privileges of any of His other children. In the presence of the King, your past doesn’t matter only the hope He offers for your future. In the presence of the King every issue of your life is healed as you reveal your hurts to Him. There is peace and joy only, in the presence of the King.
You don’t have to live identified by your broken life any longer. No matter how you were dropped, you can rise before the King, eat at His table, and be prospered by His grace and goodness.
In chapter 18 of the book of Jeremiah, we can see the desire of God to reform and reshape those found to be marred and imperfect…And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it. Because the potter doesn’t throw the clay away, God sends His assurance to those who have been damaged these words…cannot I do with you as this potter? saith the LORD. Behold, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are ye in mine hand…
Bringing glory to the King
In v. 13 we see Mephiboseth’s story ends much like it began, “and he was lame on both his feet” except for one main difference; this was not a reference to his identity but a tribute to his victory through the grace of the King!
You see, it doesn’t matter who hurt you, what you have gone through or how deep your wounds go, it doesn’t matter if the scars you have are old and you have always believed that no one cares, it doesn’t matter to the King. When you are in the presence of the King, you are the King’s child; the infirmity that would imprison you and keep you bound has become your praise to His grace and glory.
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