I Ran Over Myself

Broken’s not good. I ran over myself once. It was 1979 and we had a van that
had to be started by crawling underneath and shorting out the starter contacts
with a screwdriver. Long story, but I ended up with the van breaking 5 of my
ribs and with significant pain. It only hurt when I breathed.

"Broke" comes from the
Greek word Brokaleo, which means,
literally, "to snap into 2 pieces." I’m making that up, of course. I
have no idea of the etymology of the word, why don’t you Google it yourself? Do
I have to do all the work around here?

Broken people, snapped in 2
pieces, all around us. It only hurts them when they breathe. Other than that,
they’re okay.

Remember that story, "The
Good Mexican?" That’s what He would have said today instead of Samaritan.
I would have been the priest and you would have been the Levite and only the
Mexican would have stopped to help heal the broken stranger.

Something is almost dead in us
when we don’t see the brokenness anymore. And certainly dead when we don’t
care.

I suppose the plaster casts that
hide the brokenness, casts that look like Hummers and 64" HDTVs, make it
harder to detect the brokenness underneath. These are cool casts, but they’re still
casts, they’re still broken underneath.

Leading people to the Healer
starts with seeing under their cast, seeing their brokenness. And caring.
End