Several months ago, my daughter told me that one of the posts holding the roof of her ancient golf cart up had broken. I guess after 20 years, these things can happen. After assessing the situation, I decided that some long screws as splints and duct tape to hold things tightly would do the trick as some sort of temporary fix. Well, after a month or so, she let me know that another post broke. A few more screws and an ample wrapping of duct tape and she was back on the road. Another month, another broken post, and another splinted fix. Finally, the last post broke, but since the others were still essentially intact, I splinted the fourth post and my daughter was back on the road.
Of course, I hadn’t really fixed the posts. I did my best with what I had at the house to keep my daughter rolling. Unfortunately, my splints had significantly less strength than an intact, solid post, and it wasn’t long before the normal vibrations of dirt road driving loosened up my splints. An unfortunate consequence was that these same posts that held up the roof also served as the anchor points for the windshield. The wobbling of the posts caused the windshield to pop off, and before the cart could stop, the windshield got run over and destroyed. One break, not properly dealt with, led to three other breaks and another failure as a bonus. The ultimate bill to fix everything was a good bit more than it would have been had I simply taken the time to get the problem fixed correctly when it first happened.
Perhaps you’ve had some similar sort of experience in your life. Something breaks, and instead of properly addressing it in a manner that will completely restore it, you make some sort of quick fix that allows you to keep on rolling. For some of you, that may have also meant actual duct tape, but for many others, it mostly involved ignoring how much something really hurt and simply persevering after as brief a pause as you could stand. You never truly addressed the real problem, but you didn’t or couldn’t take the time to properly fix things so you did the best that you could and kept moving. Unfortunately, that may also mean that your windshield is about to pop out.
It is impossible to get through life without a few breaks. Whether those breaks are emotional or physical, at best they keep us from living life as well as we were created to live it. At worst, those breaks can cripple us and steal our joy. When we fail to devote the time and resources to correctly fixing those breaks, we may ultimately see other parts of our life crumble as a result. We think that we are doing the right thing by slapping some duct tape on the problem and moving forward, but what we are really doing is making it much more complicated to fix later.
Today, would you consider taking stock of those things that are broken in your life – those things that you have never properly taken the time to fix? No doubt there will be some things that you cannot fix, like a broken bone that wasn’t set straight before it healed. But you may find some areas where it isn’t too late to restore full and proper function, if you take specific steps to set things right.
Peace and blessings – Pastor Aaron