Finally getting around to it…

What happens when a decade of little worries pile on year after year? Like leaves falling from the huge oak trees of difficulty in our lives, the unsaid words or emotional wounds left to decay the roof of our souls. How risky is it to climb up on the roof and began the cleaning process? Can it be done alone? Or is there someone there to hold the ladder of hope while one climbs onto the severe pitch of the roof?

Pushing the debris off the roof is only the beginning. Some of the leaves will make good mulch, some will need to be thrown away. Once all the debris is down off the roof, and is in plain site, it is really quite overwhelming. This is not a quick job. Keeping one’s roof clean is not a one time event either.

This weekend I spent two days working on this very project with a very close friend. He will never know how much help he was to me. For almost 10 years my family and I have lived in this house and not once have I ever cleaned the roof. Not only did my friend help, but he did most of the work. He was on the roof; I was on the ground. He dealt with the slippery slope of the roof, and I dealt with what was pushed off. I remember looking up at him on the roof and saying this is what real discipleship looks like. It is one person helping another person work through the difficult issues of life. It is the most basic form of real community. It is taking your ordinary everyday life, your eating, sleeping, and cleaning out your junk, then offering it completely to the One who gives the very breath of Life in hopes for a longer and healthier life.