broken {hinge}

Have you ever seen a door - of any kind - with a broken hinge? With more than one broken hinge? Car doors, front doors, patio doors, French doors, cabinets, cupboards, refrigerators, freezers, garage doors, take your pick. Until that hinge is repaired, it just doesn't work correctly does it? The door swings back and forth, sure. But us it secure? Is it keeping it's contents safe? Is it protecting what's behind it from the elements, whatever they might be, from weather to toddlers?

What if what was behind the door was priceless, and one singular door-opening event caused a hinge to break, leading to a cascading series of events that caused tremendous damage time and time again to the priceless contents? What if the haphazard swinging on that broken hinge was just accepted, resigning the door to a fate of disrepair, destined to be a shoddy sentinel of the precious treasure it is nevertheless responsible for guarding?

What if that door was on our heart, and the treasure is our joy, hope, and love? What if we were brave enough to prayerfully seek out the event (or events, if you're like me!) that broke us, caused us to trade the truth in for a lie, and ultimately led us down a painful path of poor choices and self-loathing? What if when we found it, we gave it to Jesus to repair, restore, and redeem? What would that look like? What would WE look like? To ourselves, and to the world?

To be continued....