Broken Cisterns, Shattered Dreams

"My people have committed two sins: they have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water." Jeremiah 2:13

"Blessed in the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. He will be like a tree planted by the water, that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit." Jeremiah 17: 7-8

"Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, yet it did not fall because it had its foundation on the rock...but everyone who does not put these words into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rains came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against the house, and it fell with a great crash." Matthew 7:24-27


God has me in a very uncomfortable place of weakness out of which I cannot dig myself. It's amazing how you can go through life thinking you depend on God. But it is when you are confronted with circumstances that you find you don't have the personal capacity to overcome that the waterless cisterns you've dug manifest themselves clearly. That's the best description of where I am presently.

I thought I'd built my house on the words of Christ; but what can I say of this mess of building supplies and rubble that surrounds me as I sit shivering and shocked by the effects of the storm? Christ, my foundation and rock, appears to be all that is left standing when I look at my wreck of a life. Only his work in me and through me remains after the fires of refinement have their way. He wants to make sure that everyone knows that Jana Watson Villanueva is nothing, but in Him, she is and has everything. May all people know that there is no one like God!

I am in a long term drought, and all the wells I am accustomed to frequenting for strength, motivation, and purpose are dry. You know what, I don't like to be in a place I can't work my way out of. I hate being vulnerable and being confronted by all of my heart's deceitfulness. It's not what I refer to as a good time to realize that my view of God falls devastatingly short of who He says He is. It's a shame to come face to face with my idols, the most important one to me being my plans, and be forced to give up my security because I'm lost in the wrong identity. Oh, I can't tell you how disturbing it is to sit in a pile of shattered dreams day after day, paralyzed by disappointment, confusion, and fear.

But I have to thank God for it. I have to thank Him for not allowing me to go another year with a false idea of who he is. Who I thought he was has not proved to be enough for me through the storms I've had to endure the past few years...chronic illness, my parents' divorce, suffering with panic attacks, and surrendering dreams I thought the Lord had placed in my heart...it's hard to lose everything that once gave you comfort and satisfaction.

I am used to having the endurance to succeed despite adversity, to tirelessly spend myself on serving others, to run and play sports, and to study large volumes of difficult information. But the decline of my health terminated any possibility of escaping the trauma through doing more, trying harder, and being more disciplined. Long-term giardiasis, migraines, and the crippling anxiety that resulted from malabsorption combined with a host of emotional and spiritual aches and pains have brought me to the end of myself. Any false hope has been burned away--only the real promises of God's Word can offer me relief in my groaning.

When my mom divorced my dad, there went another layer of security. My whole world flipped upside-down. And when fear and panic started to take over my mind through a series of unfortunate events, I lost the security I once found in denying emotional disappointments through mental toughness. The reality of my situation is this: I can't fix this.

So many people who have watched me receive one blow after another in the ring of this broken world have wanted to help me find the solution I need to get through this. My husband, my family, my friends and church family, doctors galore, and so on...everyone wants the pain to be over and for me to thrive,AS DO I, so of course, in my prayerlife with the Lord, I have asked him, "Why do you say you love me the most, more than anyone else, and yet, where are you in my sufferings? What role are you playing in bringing me a remedy?"

Well, the answer I feel he has given me is that what he has planned for me through all of this is more about me learning who he really is than it is about him rescuing me from pain and suffering. The reason why I strive to love people well and even wanted to do medicine in the first place was to make God known. However, to make him known, I have to know him--to know the real Him, the one that is applicable to the desolate, helpless, needy, sick and poor. Before now, I've known the God who has blessed me with everything I could ever want along with success in all my endeavors. But would I praise Him if he wrecked me like Job? Or better yet, will I praise Him now, even when what he is doing is unexpectedly difficult?

All broken cisterns are being cast aside to make room for the spring of living water to flow over my life...all the shattered dreams are being swept up and tossed to make room for God's perfect plan for my life. I have to choose to believe that God is good and that he will rebuild me. For your name's sake, Father, build me up with the bricks that proclaim who you are and what you've done in me! Give me a new dream--one that involves knowing you and representing you in an unpleasant world instead of worshipping you only when life is pleasant.

"I have loved you with an everlasting love. I have drawn you with loving-kindness.I WILL BUILD YOU UP AGAIN, and YOU WILL BE REBUILT, O Virgin Israel. Again you will take up your tambourines and go out to dance with the joyful." -Jeremiah 31:3-4