Broken but Healing

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By: Velvette Williams

So about 3 weeks ago, I was visiting a friend. After saying our goodbyes and closing her door, I started the journey to my car. I was walking down their cobblestone walkway, and sure enough, I fell off the curb and broke my ankle. Yes, I fell off a curb and broke my ankle! After years of being on my feet doing all that God has called me, this is how I broke my ankle.

Anyhow, I ended up dislocating and breaking my fibula bone. I had surgery, and as I write this to you, I am all wrapped up in a splint. I am patiently waiting to get a boot on, then I can transition to physical therapy, where I will practice walking again.

While waiting for my surgery to be approved and scheduled, I asked myself and God, “God, what are you trying to show me in this? Why did I break my ankle now? As a mom and teacher, I’m in the busy season of life. It’s Spring, and the kids need to be at their activities. This is just so strange to me.” My best friend asked me a similar question. She asked if I thought the foot correlated with something in my life or spiritually? I told her that I had had similar thoughts and questions. A couple days later, my friend shared that she had a conversation with one of her spiritual mentors, and they were talking about the calf muscle. Honestly, I was a little distracted and only caught a glimpse of what she was sharing. It got me thinking, and later that night, I prayed and asked God, “What does this calf have to do with my broken ankle?” After researching, I learned that the fibula is called the ‘calf bone,” and the calf is considered the body’s (human) second heart. It is one of the strongest muscles that pumps blood from the bottom of our feet for our entire body. The contraction and use of this muscle actually helps stimulate 70% of the body’s blood circulation.

With this new information, I felt the Lord nudge me. He said, “Velvette, this broken bone is a physical representation of something going on in the spiritual…your spiritually broken heart. Let’s check your heart health.” Come to find out, doctors often check patient’s feet to see if there are things going on in the heart. I hurried and scrambled through some old journal entries in this God-like light bulb moment. Something familiar was stirring. Sure enough, there was an entry almost the exact year before I broke my ankle; March 2022. In this writing, I was sharing that God gave me a vision of different pathways: cobblestones, beachy sand, staircases, etc. Further down my entry, I shared another vision of my sad heart. I described my heart’s anatomy in sections of the atriums, ventricles, and veins as different pathways I was on. These different pathways represented the different aspects of my life. I had one listed for my current family, spiritual growth, guilt path, and others. I had been learning then and now about the spiritual heart. The Bible actually talks about the heart 800 times. While sitting and thinking about all this.

God is showing me, and I felt Him nudge again, “Velvette, you’ve been so busy on your feet, dealing with so many day-to-day activities, I want you to sit here with me, and I want to heal your heart. Just like the surgery on your foot, let’s work on this heart.”

So with each passing day, laying on the couch, elevating this foot of mine for 23 hours a day, I was learning more about the spiritual heart. Remember, I said that the Bible mentions the heart many times. Well, it also explains the spiritual heart in 4 areas, thoughts, emotions, physical, and will. I started to realize that I had been dealing with a lot of hard physical things, sad emotions, and bad choices the past year, all having to do with my spiritual heart health. God showed me some things he wanted me to pay attention to a year ago. He gave me a couple scriptures in that same journal entry I mentioned.

One of them was Psalms 139. The beginning of the chapter says, “oh Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know, my sitting down and my rising up. You understand my thoughts. You are acquainted with all my ways.”

At the end of that chapter, it says, “Search me oh God and know my heart. Try me and know my anxieties.” What I didn’t know at that time was that I would come to struggle that year with lots of anxieties about my health, having to choose different paths, facing a complete hysterectomy, finding out I had Lynch Syndrome, and then dealing with difficult family matters. Sometimes, when we journal and write down visions or things God shows us, we may just skim over them and not heed what He is trying to do in our lives. As a fast mover and talker, I believe God is using this time for me to be off my feet and to point to my heart.

This ankle will take some time to completely heal. But as the days move ahead and I get that boot, I use crutches to help me walk with proper weight distribution and more strength in my calf, aka ‘second heart,’ I will be reminded of my spiritual heart. In order to work on the broken parts of my heart, I need a spiritual heart surgeon, God. Just as I will have a plan of action to help my ankle in physical therapy, I will need a plan for spiritual growth. I vision my physical crutches, one on each side, as a friend on each side of me for accountability and help. I signed up to be a mentee for mentorship at our church.

A verse one of my friends gave me last year was Hebrewers 12. The entire chapter is beautiful; the Race of Faith. God brought this specific scripture to mind this week 13 “Therefore strengthen your hands which hang down and the feeble knees and make straight paths for your feet so that what is lame may not be dislocated but rather healed.”

God wants to heal, So I give my broken ankle and heart to you, Lord. I pray that you will give Him any brokenness you are dealing with today. I pray you may be swooped up like a husband does his bride. May you lean on Him for the strength you need today, and please know you are not alone. And may you receive the loving care of God, who loves you and wants to heal you. He is a God who heals! As always, Arise in health and multiply in wholeness.