Then Elijah said to all the people, “Come near to me.” And all the people came near to him. And he repaired the altar of the Lord that had been thrown down. (I Kings 18:30 ESV)
Broken Things and Faith
The invention of duct tape was amazing, particularly because duct tape flies in the face of modernity. Today, our civilization buys new, replaces, and upgrades. But duct tape repairs, reuses, and fixes.
My first bicycle was given to me by my parents when I was 9. It was a second-hand Schwinn. Before it became mine, it had already been repainted, rewelded, and straightened out. And for me, that process continued. I learned how to use a wrench on that banana seat. I learned how to clean rust off the wheels with elbow grease and extra-fine sandpaper. I learned how to patch tires, inflate tires, and reseal tires.
While many of my friends got new bikes each year, I grew to know and to love my broken and repaired bike.
I think God was preparing me to understand how He loves His broken and repaired people.
Elijah is about to perform the miracle of his age. The story is familiar… the Baal-priests being shown to be fools. The stone Baal altar being burned. The faith of Elijah bearing the fruit of God’s display of Himself that ended in a much-needed rainstorm.
But to me, the story begins with Elijah repairing God’s altar on Mt. Carmel. Elijah could have built a new altar (it seems the old altar had been pulled down many years before.) But instead, Elijah fixed the broken thing.
And God smiled.
Repairing the broken things in the lives of His people is what He loves to do. When we are made new in Christ, He does not recreate a completely new creature. He builds on the foundation of our broken past. He somehow loves who we were, even as He molds us into the image of His Son, our Savior. He reweaves our messed-up tapestry. He repairs our broken hearts… and we remember how broken we were so that we can have faith in today’s breakings.
Our potter, rather than cast our broken shards into the trash, reworks us… our past… our memories… our personalities… our character… into new beauty. Jeremiah describes it this way, “And the vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter’s hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to do.” (Jeremiah 18:4 ESV)
I am broken. Are you? Remember that God does not turn His back on the broken. He had Elijah fix the broken altar and used it with joy to fulfill His grand purpose. Have faith that He will do it again, with you.
Take the faith God grants you.