I am a man, and a man’s job is to fix things. It becomes especially important to fix the broken when a man lacks resources or the ability to replace the broken. That is the easy answer, to replace what is broken. Sometimes however the broken things cannot be replaced…they must be fixed. How frustrating it is when a thing is broken and a man knows not how to fix it. How frustrating it is when neither YouTube nor Google have the answers. We must swim alone in this sea of brokenness as we blindly grasp for the answers.

From one generation to the next we have taught our children that fixing a thing is sometimes too costly and far too demanding of our time. We have taught them that discarding the broken is often times more beneficial to us than taking the time to salvage and to mend. We have failed in teaching our children to embrace the broken. The broken is ugly, the broken is useless and unnecessary, the broken is of no value to us, the broken is a waste of time. Replace…Replace…Replace is our motto.

How unfortunate it is that we have allowed this mentality to creep into our homes and our churches while never realizing the full impact of its consequences. Man creates as in the likeness of his own Creator. The value of man’s creations pales in comparison to the value of HIS. The result is that we can without consequence discard and start again. Oh, but the greatest of all creation was man himself. Our creator painted for himself such an exquisite masterpiece so full of vibrancy and color. With wonder in HIS own eyes he looks longingly into his creation while paying attention to every intimate detail, to every brushstroke and to every shade…he looks with penetrating and wonder filled eyes into the depths of every man’s soul to examine it’s beauty.

We say to ourselves “if he only knew the truth,” the masterpiece He created has been corrupted. The colors have all now faded to black, the brushstrokes and the shade are no longer distinguishable…we are ruined and destined for the same fate that befalls every broken thing…That once priceless piece of art that the master once looked upon as his most prized possession will forever be discarded, laid aside in order that He may start again. Our thoughts will take us to that dreadful place where the only visitor we have is the past, the what ifs and the could have beens. We wonder does he ever think of us? Does He remember me? The wonderful times we shared together? Does he remember how as a child we would crawl up into the security of his bosom and rest our weary heads upon his shoulders, shoulders that have already borne the weight of so much, yet somehow still retained enough strength to bear the weight of our sorrows as well…Does he remember?

…and this is the glory of the Gospel…it is the greatest scandal in the history of mankind. The love of God manifested upon the Cross of Calvary where his only son…his perfect son would soon be crushed for our iniquity. God how can it be that you have been broken that we may be healed? This is not how it is supposed to work. It goes against the natural order of things…we should have been discarded, tossed away and counted as worthless. Instead we have been healed, mended, repaired and put back into service. Why? How?

Christians let us remember the broken…let us always remember the broken, and let us do our part to mimic the masters love for his creation. If we are going to fix, we first must love. I have learned much about brokenness in the life of my adopted son. I likewise have learned much about me and even more so about the master. But what I have learned the most is that he loves to fix the broken and rather than discard and walk away he instead invites the broken and beckons them to come sit at his table and sup with him. How contrary is this to our modern world…embracing the broken. I have learned that most beautiful of all things is the broken thing repaired. Now I have been granted access to sit at the front and witness as a little broken boy puts his life in the masters hands, and I will watch in wonder as he puts this little boy back together again.