IF IT AIN'T BROKEN

If it ain't broken...  you probably have one eye closed.

In my world, the broken is part of my life.  It's everywhere.

• 2 weeks ago my dishwasher broke and destroyed my kitchen cabinets.
• I now have broken cabinets and I re-installed my chipped and stained 25 year old sink in 2x4's. 
• my truck's power steering is broken
• my wife's car has a fan that only works of mach 5.  settings 1-4 no longer work.  So it's all air or no air.  The back glass latch is busted.  The passenger door spring is busted.  
• my yard sprinklers are still busted and we have watered by hand all summer cuz I don't have the time or money to fix them yet. 
• my wife's macbook mousepad is broken.
• my boys have broken lamp shades in their bedrooms from various "events".

Do I need to go on?  Let me just assume you get the picture.  The list is much longer... 

Truth is, the same is true of my youth ministry.  I could make an equally long list of stuff that is broken in various programs, a trip that is not working, a mindset we need to shift, a facility change that needs to take place. I could go on for days about what I think could and should be. 

I have a list of the broken in me, in my family.... pretty much anything. Stuff is both working and broken all around me.

So with this reality and for my own peace and sanity's sake, I've decided a few things about the broken... regardless of where in my life I find it. 

SEE THE BROKEN THROUGH THE "YEAH, BUT LOOK AT WHAT THIS COULD BE" LENSES:  Anybody without a blind eye can point out the problems.  They super easy for me to see too.  But I need to celebrate the potential around me and look toward what could and should be instead of what is and is not.  I need my eyes looking forward and up.

DO SOMETHING:  With every day, I become more and more convinced that the tortoise really does beat the hare.  People get physically, emotionally, financially, mentally, spiritually... healthy one step at a time.  The best way to fix my house or myself is to make continual, methodical, slow progress in the right direction.   Maybe I can't solve all my problems or fix all the broken, but I can make movement towards repair.  Pull one weed.  Do 10 sit ups.  Resist the temptation to buy that one item.  Send that one encouragement note.  One day.  Small steps in the right direction. 

DON'T BE COMPLACENT, DO BE CONTENT.  I need to not exchange working toward the best for being content in the present.  Sure, my kitchen looks like someone bombed it.  Actually, it looks like someone took a sledge hammer to it.  Which I did.  But anyway, the sink works and we now have a temporary cupboard/counter top to buy us some time.  So I can be discontent until I put a more "permanent solution" back in place or I can make movement towards my preferred future while being content with how God has provided today.  

The broken seems to be here to stay in this temporary world I live in.  So my goal is not to rid the world of  it (this is impossible).  Instead, my goal is movement towards redeeming the broken for the best.... one day at a time.  

Game on.