I Was Wrong But It’s Not Irreversible – Part 2

In my last post( read here) I wrote that doing something wrong is not irreversible. I had been doing up the straps on my knee brace in the wrong order for about twenty-nine years.

was wrong

The brace is still a saviour for me when it comes to sports – especially hockey – but for the last several months my knee has not been feeling very good. It’s been sore and sometimes a little swollen. 

But since I discovered the proper order to tighten the straps on my brace, it has made a huge difference. 

For the last while, I needed at least a day after I played for my knee to feel good enough for me to consider playing hockey again. Now my knee no longer feels sore, unstable, and tender for a period of time.

Not only have I corrected the wrong I had been committing for nearly thirty years, but in correcting that wrong I have seen an improvement in my knee’s stability. 

It is never too late to consider correcting something you have, for a long time, been doing wrong. 

When we elect a government, that year after year puts the country into a deeper and deeper debt position with seemingly uncontrolled spending, it is still correctable. 

We’ve seen it in the past. Where a government has been in power for years and an election has brought a new party into power, that change has brought the country back into fiscal responsibility. 

It’s also true with your conscience. 

We all have one. It’s that little inner sensation that tells us when we are doing something wrong or doing something right. 

Time after time we can go against our conscience in doing wrong and, after a while, we won’t have any sensation regarding that wrong. We will become numb to it; it won’t even register in our conscience any more. 

This can go on for years – just like all the years I was doing up my brace in the wrong order. 

But it is not irreversible.

If we admit we’ve done wrong – even though we don’t have a sensation about it from years and years of doing it – we can still correct it.

And when we start to correct the wrong, the amazing thing is that the sensation starts to slowly come back. Our conscience has never left us; it just grows quiet when we silence it. It can come back, be renewed, and be healthy again. 

I have a friend who smoked for years and years. He never thought anything of it, never considered anyone around him who didn’t smoke. 

Finally, after decades of smoking, he quit. Now he can’t stand the smell of cigarettes; he can’t bear being in a space where others are smoking. He thinks it’s insensitive of them to smoke with others present. His sensitivity came back. 

A long history of doing wrong is never irreversible.

Here’s the thing: You may have turned your back on God for years. Maybe you’ve never considered Him, never cared for Him. Don’t think your years of neglect and possible abusiveness towards God is irreversible. No, you can decide to reverse your wrongs by believing in Christ to save you from all the wrongs you’ve done for however many years you’ve been doing them. The Bible says you are then a new creation. It’s reversible. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question:  What have you previously been thinking is irreversible for you? Leave your comments and questions below.

I Was Wrong But It’s Not Irreversible – Part 1

Don’t ever think doing something wrong for a long time is irreversible.

was wrong

When you do something wrong for long enough, one has a sense that it will be permanent.

It’s probably true with some things that if you set a pattern, and that pattern is in place for a long time, it will not be broken. So if the pattern is wrong, that’s just what it will be.

Recently I was checking the knee brace I’ve worn for almost three decades. I wear it when I play sports, and particularly sports that require some side to side movement. 

I don’t wear my brace when I ride my bike or play golf, but I do for most other active sports – it gets lots of use.

Since I’ve had this brace for years, and my knee has been bugging me for several months now (I’ve written about that here), I decided to do some checking. Maybe it was time for a new brace. 

I looked up on the internet the company that makes my brace and found some instructional videos on their website. I clicked on one that was specific for my particular brace. 

The video was about how to properly put on the brace. I almost clicked it off because I certainly knew how to put mine on. But since it was such a short video, I watched the whole thing. 

What I discovered was that I’ve been putting on my brace the wrong way for almost 30 years! 

Now the brace is sophisticated – it’s custom made to my knee – but it’s not hard to put on.  

… But I’ve been doing it wrong all these years.

I’ve been doing it wrong in the order I do up the straps. There are only four straps but they need to be secured properly and in the right order. 

I was stunned that I had been doing them up incorrectly all this time. 

The next day at hockey I followed the order from the video. I secured the strap under my knee and then the strap at the bottom of my calf. Then I moved to the strap just above my knee but didn’t secure it quite as tight as I normally would have. I finished with the strap around my thigh, done up a little looser. 

Wow, what a difference! My brace felt so much better while I played and it seemed to stay in place without moving down my leg. 

It was amazing.

Who would have thought that, for all these years, I have gotten away with doing up my brace incorrectly? Yet the brace didn’t break and it still provided some support to my knee. 

I would not have been able to play hockey or baseball or volleyball without it. I would not have been able to ski without wearing that brace … but I’ve been using it incorrectly this whole time. 

I have more to share on this in my next post, but …

Here’s the thing: It’s not that surprising that we can be doing something wrong for a long time and not really have any repercussions. This happens with some sin. We can live in a sin for a long time without seemingly suffering any ill effects from it – no repercussions, no judgements. But there will be a judgement day. As long as you are breathing, you have time to right your wrong.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What have you been doing wrong for a long time that you should change? Leave your comments and questions below.

I’ll Be Smarter This Time

I’m going to be smarter this time. I’m not going to start back to playing sports until I’m fully healed.

Someone mentioned to me recently that I should act my age. I thought I was … but maybe when it comes to sports I still think like I did when I was in my 40’s.

I shouldn’t be treating my body that way. 

Zedano Chara, of the Boston Bruins, is playing in the NHL playoffs with a broken jaw. But, hey, he’s only 42. I did that kind of stuff when I was 42 as well. But I shouldn’t be thinking I can still do that stuff now at my age. 

I have lived with a torn ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) in my left knee for about 35 years.  

I still play sports because I have a custom-made brace that has worked amazingly for me. In fact, I’m on my second brace. I had my knee scoped 27 years ago and have had my second brace about as long as my first one. 

It may need to be replaced soon. … I’ve been thinking more about that since my knee has been bothering me this last month. 

I’ve notice over the last few years that after a game of hockey my knee feels a little unstable. So now I don’t play two days in a row. 

It got sore several weeks ago and I’ve kind of been both resting it and playing through it – going mountain biking.

Soon afterwards I was going over my sermon before I preached and noticed that, after standing still, my knee wouldn’t bend easily. I was walking on the platform like Frankenstein. 

To not scare any of my congregants away, I drove home and put on my brace. My knee felt more secure and I moved better. I did that for two weeks. 

This past Sunday I didn’t need my brace. I thought my knee was pretty much better and it was … not 100% but mostly better. 

Well, I played hockey on Tuesday and the next day was wearing my brace to work. The knee was swollen and sore again. 

Back in my 40’s I could have gotten away with playing. But I can’t any more. 

I need to be a little smarter and, for me, that means I need to be a little more patient and wait until it feels completely better – not just mostly.

When we were kids and would scrape our knees, our mom would give our knees a kiss and say, “It’s all better now.” 

Somehow, though there was still some pain, and the red lines of the scrape were still visible, we believed our mom. Her words were comforting enough to get us out playing again. 

But for me, now, I need to be smarter with my body and give the healing process a little more time. 

Here’s the thing: Sometimes I think that God must wonder if I will ever get smarter with Him. I go to Him with the same confessions, same requests, same needs. It’s like I’m not getting any smarter. I fall to the same temptations, the same inner pressures, when what I should be doing at this stage in my life is depending on the Holy Spirit’s power more. That’s what being smarter with God is all about.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: How could you depend on the Holy Spirit more this week? Leave your comments below.