The Permanent Solution

 This time of year in Kansas, driving on the roads can be an adventure. We can have wet, icy or snow covered roads. These conditions can hide imperfections in the road. As I was driving yesterday, the roads for the most part were dry and clear. That doesn't mean that you don't pay attention to the details in the road. The road I was on was in good shape and the ride was pretty smooth. At the time I didn’t notice how smooth the ride was. But (yes there is a but), then I came to a 5 mile or so stretch that I took notice of the road. The road had been patched (or needed a patch) and you could feel and hear each one as you went over it. I even slowed to under the speed limit to make it less noticeable. This lead me to a thought.

My first thought was why didn’t they just tear out the old road and replace it? It would have cost more (probably) but the road would have been much smoother. From this thought I went further. Isn’t this how we handle the problems of our lives and the world? If we just change how we’re going about our lives we can make things better. If we patch this or that, it will fix things. That is how mankind thinks. We think we can control the outcome and change things. It may be that we need to get our guy elected to office and that will fix things. The problem is that we need to go deeper to actually fix the problem. The patch on the road (or the right guy or gal in office) is a temporary fix.

Since the problem is much deeper than that we need a more permanent solution. We need to tear the road out completely and start over. This is how God works. He wants to get to the heart of the issue and transform us from the inside. We may think our good works are going to solve the problem. The problem lies within us. Our hearts are deceitful. Jesus said no one is good except for the Father. Only He has a solution-He is the solution. We live in a broken world and the only solution is Jesus Christ.


Rend your heart
and not your garments.
Return to the Lord your God,
for he is gracious and compassionate,
slow to anger and abounding in love,
and he relents from sending calamity.

Joel 2:13


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