Links

“Have you looked at these four by four posts recently?”  The question struck me as odd, yet both posts have a clear bow.  “Is anyone here an engineer or architect?”  Again the question was pointed and direct, yet silence answered.  “Does anyone remember the leaking skylights of fifteen years ago?”  Unfortunately there were two of us who did.  As we remembered I realized I was sitting on a potential failure that could strike at anytime.  I had no idea who to alert.
 
The link between standing tall, bearing the weight of the floors above, and failure is obvious.  The relationship between too much weight and failure is equally clear.  Connecting the dots, a bearing support post with a bend in it, isn’t hard to make.  Yet nobody did anything with the knowledge from our conversation, including me.
 
“‘The Day will come,’ says God-of-the-Angel-Armies, ‘when that nail will come loose and fall out, break loose from that solid wall—and everything hanging on it will go with it.’  That's what will happen. God says so.”  (Isaiah 22.25) 
 
I wonder what will happen.  Will someone take action?  Will the realization of the failure be slow or sudden?  Is anyone paying attention?
 
Right now there is no end to this story.  The insight is only days old.  I’m not sure who to talk with, yet I am committed to talking with someone.  I wonder if my action will, if I muster the courage, have any consequence.
 
The puzzle doesn’t end here.  How much do we see of ourselves in the mirror?  Will we act on what we see of simply walk on in blissful denial and ignorance?  Will we connect the dots, make the link?
 
Personally I find the weak links in my life difficult.  It does help to remember a basic fact; God knows me intimately and yet calls me his child.  God understands my weaknesses, anticipates my failures, and yet longs to be one with me.  God reaches out, in tears and with full knowledge, of my failures.  These links, in your life and mine, change everything.