August 22
I was working at a gas station for a short time when I was a teenager. On some days I busted flats in the back room. On other days I worked at a satellite station across town running the cash register. My boss let me work on my own pickup in the grease pit when the business was slow.
My Universal joints were slipping and needed replacing. I decided to take care of it myself instead of paying a local mechanic to do the job. The mechanic showed me how to do it. He told me to take special care when I put it back together. “No problem,” I said. After all I was 17, I knew everything.
I took the drive shaft off and tried to replace the joints. I learned two things that day. #1. I’m not a mechanic! #2. It is easier to take something a part than to put it back together.
I forced the pieces together, the pins came out of alignment—I walked home from work that day. I tried to figure a way to repair the joint but decided it couldn’t be done. The next day I walked back into the part store to order another set of joints.
There was no alternative, I had to start over. The mechanic had a knowing smirk on his face when I placed the order, it was humbling to me, but I had no choice.
Would you like to make a fresh start in your life? Allow God to clean the slate, you can start over with His help. It is humbling, but it is refreshing.
God wants to shape you into His image. You are in the hands of God like the clay in the hands of a potter. “But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.” Jeremiah 18:4
Jim L. Wilson, Fresh Start Devotionals (Fresno, CA: Willow City Press, 2009).
Starting Over
I was working at a gas station for a short time when I was a teenager. On some days I busted flats in the back room. On other days I worked at a satellite station across town running the cash register. My boss let me work on my own pickup in the grease pit when the business was slow.
My Universal joints were slipping and needed replacing. I decided to take care of it myself instead of paying a local mechanic to do the job. The mechanic showed me how to do it. He told me to take special care when I put it back together. “No problem,” I said. After all I was 17, I knew everything.
I took the drive shaft off and tried to replace the joints. I learned two things that day. #1. I’m not a mechanic! #2. It is easier to take something a part than to put it back together.
I forced the pieces together, the pins came out of alignment—I walked home from work that day. I tried to figure a way to repair the joint but decided it couldn’t be done. The next day I walked back into the part store to order another set of joints.
There was no alternative, I had to start over. The mechanic had a knowing smirk on his face when I placed the order, it was humbling to me, but I had no choice.
Would you like to make a fresh start in your life? Allow God to clean the slate, you can start over with His help. It is humbling, but it is refreshing.
God wants to shape you into His image. You are in the hands of God like the clay in the hands of a potter. “But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.” Jeremiah 18:4
Jim L. Wilson, Fresh Start Devotionals (Fresno, CA: Willow City Press, 2009).
Comments