Focus: Let's Fix the Broken

Text: Jh.6:12

"When they were filled, he said unto his disciples, GATHER UP THE FRAGMENTS that remain, that nothing be LOST."

W. B. Yeats, an Irish poet, wrote a piece entitled, Second Coming, and popularized by Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart. W. B. Yeat said:

"Turning and turning in the widening gyre.

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the center cannot hold,

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere,

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst,

Are full of passionate intensity."

We live in a world where things have fallen apart. Anarchy has been on the rise since antiquity. And I am convinced that it is the chaos in us that has given birth to a chaotic world.

We lead fragmented lives in a fragmented world, and one problem of fragmentation is that it leads to disintegration.

The Lord Jesus tells His disciples to gather together the fragments and gives them the reason for it, which is: "that nothing be lost." The word 'lost' means ruin or disintegration, and that is what we should avoid.

Like the broken loaves, our world is in a broken state. Man is broken. Things are broken and keep breaking every now and then.

Everywhere you look, you see broken hearts, broken lives, broken things, broken dreams, broken relationships, broken homes and marriages, and broken hopes. Everything looks broken.

In the garden of Eden life went from sweet to sour, and as a result, man's relationships with God, Himself, others, and nature were broken. That's brokenness in all areas!

Now disciples are needed, who will come into the mending business. Gender menders. Menders of broken lives and fixers of what's broken.

Nehemiah wept for the broken walls of Jerusalem and labored to fix it. Jesus looked up and sighed over a broken man in need of mending, and He restored him.

Now it's our turn and time! I pray you hear the voice of Jesus calling you into the mending ministry. Broken hearts and lives can be healed. We can help fix the broken. Let's impact our world with God's SHALOM.

by Bishop Moses E. Peter