By Reba Phelps
Before I had children of my own, I vividly remember my Uncle Mickey telling all of his nieces not to let a television raise their children. That stern warning still echoes in the “should have listened” part of my mind to this very day. It was probably the best advise that I never took. I sincerely tried as long as I could not to introduce them to the amazing black entertainment box in the living room. The exact moment I gave in escapes me. If I had to pinpoint it I would assume it was around the terrible twos of the first child, not the second one.
Before I knew it, both girls had their very own black box in their bedrooms. My youngest child could not even go to sleep at night without the soothing bright lights of a television. Trying to outwit her addiction I told her she could have her TV but I chose the channel. I always chose the Jewelry or Home and Garden channel.
What six year old could stay awake for either of these? I soon ate those words.
Once my daughter began to give me decorating advice and insisting that we buy a house to flip… I quickly discovered she outwitted her mother. This girl was wide awake for Fixer Upper and Flip or Flop and enjoyed every minute of it. Not only was she enjoying the shows she was gleaning tips to share with her family and friends.
She wanted shiplap all over the house and even wrote fan letters to the stars of the show asking them to fix up our boring house. She even tried to plan her own field trip to the Magnolia Silos in Texas. Every single time we would pass a dilapidated home she would acknowledge that it would be a good candidate for the show. She was now trying to recruit talent for her favorite TV duo.
This beloved show soon became something we watched together. If you can’t beat them, join them. It was simply astounding to watch people work with their bare hands and morph a junked out, old, left for ruins home into a mini showcase that would soon be the envy of the entire neighborhood or even town. The pure talent of someone using their craft to rescue property from despair will always be a magnificent sight to behold.
There was nothing they could not turn into a masterpiece. I would be telling a lie if I told you I never day dreamed about someone remodeling our boring house.
Some people just have a true talent for fixing every single thing that crosses their path. Whether it be a home project or even people, they can fix it all. Some people are just fixers at heart and will carry your burdens until there is a solution. It is so easy to get caught up in the fixing of other’s problems that you forget it is not our place to fix anyone. One the hardest things for me to realize was that somethings merely cannot be fixed with human hands. Sometimes, even people can become so broken and beyond repair that only there is truly only place to turn with a project of this magnitude.
This doesn’t stop my stubborn self from trying though….With guidance from above, I am slowly but surely learning my limits.
This is exactly why we need a Savior. We are not meant to carry burdens beyond the cross. Even when someone is remodeling a home it is natural for the owners to check the project often for progress. When we assign a project to him we should not check on progress because it is being handled in God’s timing.
He will never leave us, never forsake us, and is capable of way more than we think is humanly possible. He is the one true, “Fixer Upper” and never makes mistakes with his handy work.
“And looking upon them Jesus said to them, ‘With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible’”
Mathew 19:26