Have you watched this BBC TV program?
It’s set in several buildings or barns in a rural setting and the main idea is that people bring an item into the shop and the experts there try to repair or restore it. These programmes are an hour long but the works itself is carried out over a much longer time, I should imagine in some cases many months of painstaking labour.
All these things people bring to the experts have some sentimental value, or are treasured possessions to the owners… it may be something that their grand parents owned and has been passed down to them so these things are part of family history.
What sort of things come into the repair shop?
Everything from toys and bicycles, to items of furniture, clocks, leather goods and glass; they’ve seen just about everything. No matter what the job is, the experts in the repair shop put all their energy and skills into these restorations. It’s because they recognise the beauty of these things and appreciate them, that they seem to put love into what they do to try and make things new again.
Some of these programmes stay in your mind more than others, here are just a few of the items I’ve watched them tackle…
A jukebox, which was very dear to the owner as it had records that he remembered from his early years when he had met his wife. Even one they danced to on their wedding night.
A leather armchair was brought along which had originated from a farm house in France, from the first word war, which had been saved from the occupying German army.
There was a stained glass window from the front door of a house which had been damaged accidentally by the family who lived there, and they wanted to see if it could be restored to its former glory.
Some of these things are easier to repair/restore than others, which have to be completely stripped down to nuts, bolts, gears and springs, especially clocks but all require to be completely rebuilt/renewed.
The owner of the aforementioned armchair wanted to try and preserve the original leather rather than it be recovered with new stuff and this presented quite a challenge to the experts but they did it.
Why am I going on about a TV programme in this way?
I hadn’t really thought about it at the time that I watched these programmes but later it did occur to me that this is the way that God is with us, when we come to him with broken hearts and lives damaged by sin.
If we are sincere and genuinely want God to forgive our sins, give us a new start, and change us then we must be ready and we have to understand that he may have to strip us right back to the ‘nuts and bolts’, which can be a painful experience at times. It can also be a very drawn out process , which cannot be fitted into an hour long TV program or something which fits into a human time frame.
Just like the man with the armchair wanting to preserve the original leather, God still wants us to be the original person that we were be but also to be changed from within by the power of the Holy Spirit. People should still recognise us but also notice from our words and behaviour that we are different. We have become, once again children of God who love him and each other.
Before any of this can happen we have to go into the repair shop, we have to talk to God and ask him to restore us, and then allow him to do his work in our lives so we can become the people he intended us to be.
The experts in the repair shop have developed their expertise by working with these materials, wood, metal, glass and fabrics for many years but they are not the creators of these things. God is the creator of everything including humans and he says they are very good(Gen. 1:31).
God wants to make us back to the people we should be, the people he created us to be and this is an ongoing process. Some say this will not be entirely completed until we stand before Jesus in heaven.
In the situation we are currently in, lockdown, we will have more time to think, everything is different from our busy day to day lives and we have time to stop and think. Let’s use this time to talk to God and listen to him, and if we need to lets go into the repair shop and become new people, or come and be restored.
Amen.