November 2, 2024 | By Jay Ashbaucher
Life is good. There is a positive and enjoyable side of life, but it doesn’t stay that way all the time. The kind of world we live in won’t let it. I remember an old nursery rhyme which reminds us of that. As I recall, it goes like this, “Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men, couldn’t put Humpty together again.” I have needed help with the falls in my life. I’ve needed something to put me together again. I have found that others need the same.
On the “Humpty Dumpty” side of life, I have fallen at various times into fears and panic attacks that made me feel like my life was falling apart. I have also struggled with worries about the future. In these current times of a divided nation, lots of people worry about the future. Furthermore, I have struggled with sins in my life that create depressing guilt and shameful feelings of inadequacy, or of not being a good person. I have also struggled with alarming health issues and the need to accept suffering and possible death. By wrestling with these issues, and more, I have struggled with the content of my faith. Is it true? is it real? Does it work? There are doubts that creep into my mind, doubts that try to destroy my confidence in what I believe. Is there a God who can help me? Who am I? Who is God? Why is there so much suffering? What can enable me to overcome falling off the wall and breaking apart? We all need a solid center within us that will hold us together and give us a positive outlook, no matter what our circumstances.
I run into people everywhere who are hurting and struggling with issues that are threatening to make their lives fall apart. They are trapped in their imperfections, their environments, their addictions, and their unfortunate circumstances, and are trying to find their way out. I met a man in a train station who was on his way to a half-way house to overcome his drug and alcohol problem. I met a man who felt he was a worthless failure because he could not change things about himself that needed changing. He said he tried Jesus, but it did not work. I met a woman who was involved in prostitution and wanted to start a new life. I’ve met lots of people whose relationships or families are breaking apart, and they are hurting. And as I spoke with these people in a brief meeting, many whom I never saw again, I wished I would have had the time to help them understand all that has helped me put my life together again. But, no one experiences a quick-fix. It takes time and learning, and it may seem like our lives cannot be put back together again, but they can.
Plato (ca.427-347 BC) wrote his allegory of the cave to help people of his day realize that they did not have to stay trapped in a world of darkness. In brief, he tells of a group of people chained in a cave so that they could only see the wall in front of them. Behind them was a source of light and when objects passed by in front of the light, shadows of those objects appeared on the wall. Those shadows were the only reality the people knew. One day, one of those people escaped the chains and discovered that beyond the light was a doorway that led out of the cave and into the sunlight. The bright sun was blinding, but eventually his eyes adjusted and revealed all kinds of wonderful things never before seen or known. This is the way the world really was, and he could hardly wait to go back and tell his comrades what he had discovered and what they were missing. He went back into the cave and tried to convince them of a grand and marvelous world beyond what they knew. They accused their newly freed friend of falsehoods and they refused to listen, choosing to stay with the only reality they knew, their shadow world. Plato was concerned that people of his day were unwilling to be enlightened by wise thinking and he hoped this allegory would help them see that there was something more to be open to.
Our world is full of evil forces that work against us to cause all that is good to fall. I have discovered that the greatest weapon to put life together again is faith. A book called the Bible says that we can defeat this evil world and achieve victory through faith.” (1 John 5:4) But, faith in what? Faith in the person who said, “I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life” (John 8:12). There are three questions to answer for ourselves. Will I believe Jesus is the one who can restore my broken life? Will I commit to following Jesus? And if so, what does it mean to follow him, and how do I do it?
Jesus came into our world from a realm beyond this world (John 18:36). He attempted to help people see beyond their shadows, but in the end, He was falsely accused and crucified as a common criminal. Like Plato, Jesus wanted people to see that there was more to life than they were open and willing to see. They loved the darkness rather than the light and they did not want the light to expose who they really were (John 3:19-20). People do not want their lives to be run by others. They want to control their own lives. They do not realize that they are being controlled by their own self-imposed limitations. Jesus came to free us and give us a new kind of life, but most are not open to see how that works. In the book called the Bible, we read that early followers of Jesus tried to help people get beyond their shadow worlds and see the marvelous things that God had for those who were open, but few bothered to listen and understand.
I once visited one of my granddaughter’s high school basketball practice sessions and the coach was showing an instructional video. His purpose was to let the girls see a visual of how plays were supposed to be run, in hopes that by seeing how it was supposed to be, they would be able to run it better in the game. The Bible is God’s play-book to help us see life as God sees it. Once we see God’s kind of life and how to get it, we can move toward becoming and doing what life is all about. Our fallen and broken life can be put together again.
