Getting to the Heart of Things

By: Marcy Barthelette

The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful, a puzzle that no one can figure out. But I, God, search the heart and examine the mind. I get to the heart of the human…Jeremiah 17: 9-10a   

The arrival of spring ushered in another new season, the season of garage sales, and that seriously infected Ken with the itch to shop. His recent forays around town and return visits to some of his favorite flea markets have netted him a substantial stash of new (old) tools and the garage workbench is covered in rusty, nasty parts of every size and shape. They are in varying stages of repair and disrepair, many

wrapped in vinegar towels to dissolve years of rusty neglect. He’s constantly applying penetrating oil to soften the rust on a bolt or screw and then toiling over his vise to loosen and remove it from the body of whatever tool he’s working on. Or, with painstaking care, he’s brushing a piece of brass or steel with a soft rotating wire brush to remove the traces of rust still clinging to them after the vinegar bath. I can attest to his persistence because I find tiny wire bristles all over the garage and house, often with my bare feet.

Besides the metal parts that must be cleaned and brushed, there are also wooden pieces that require the removal of grime and finishescarelessly applied throughout the tool’s life. This must be done only to a level that will maintain the integrity and patina of the piece. He has an uncanny knack for knowing when to quit, even when I don’t agree with his decision. Hours of sanding precede the application of a final finish, usually tung oil, but sometimes other finishes are preferred.

I am constantly amazed that some of the pieces I would view as absolute junk are exactly what Ken is searching for. He looks beyond their obvious flaws and sees a thing of beauty and I’ve learned not to question his judgment. Well, not too much anyway. Some of them seem outrageously impossible even for him to redeem. The thing is, he knows he can get to the heart of the piece and find something worth saving. Our throw-away society doesn’t have the patience or the will to repair. Everyone seems intent on always having the newest, shiniest thing on the market, in the commercial, or on the internet. But there is much to be said for restoration.

Think where we’d be if God passed by the trash heap where someone has just tossed us, and He did nothing. And trust me, we do get thrown on the trash heap in countless ways. The boss hands us the proverbial pink slip or maybe he fires us through an email. A spouse decides a newer model might be nice. A friend abandons us in a time of need. The kids seem to forget they have a thing called parents. Someone does a little trash-talking that damages our reputation and that can be done anonymously on social media. Sometimes we do things that render us deserving of being thrown on that trash heap and sometimes we just get in the path when somebody starts slinging mud. However it happens, it hurts.

But you know what, God doesn’t leave us on that trash heap because he sees each of us as valuable, he knows there’s a bright and shiny heart somewhere buried beneath all the grime of anger, hatefulness, self-pity, and pain. He can make us just like new again and, just like Ken’s tools, the restored model is often much improved.

Not everyone has a heart for restoring old things, but we can certainly be more resourceful in maintaining what we have. And that applies to our hearts as well. When we try our best to live God’s will, He won’t need to rescue us from the trash heap quite so often and when we show His love to those around us, they may make fewer trips to the heap as well and than our world could be a lot brighter just like those shiny old tools that grace our home.

Create in me a clean heart, O God. Renew a loyal spirit within me. Psalm 51:10


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