Ecclesiastes 3:1,3 (KJV)
 
"To everything there is a season… a time to break down, and a time to build up . . ."

Reflection by Kenneth L. Samuel
                                                                              
New Year’s is the perfect time to plan and to execute building projects. Whether we’re building better health through diet and exercise, or building better relationships through listening and compromise, or building a better democracy through voter education and registration, there is always a certain excitement that characterizes our building endeavors.  Building always makes us think ahead to the possibilities and opportunities of tomorrow.

But before we can adequately build for the future, we cannot neglect the need to break down the barriers to our progress in the present.  The break down is always the prerequisite to the build up.
 
At construction sites, have you ever noticed how much time is spent on the demolition and removal of the old structure before the construction of the new building can even begin?  My first year in seminary was especially traumatic for me.  By the end of my first semester I thought I had made a serious mistake by enrolling.  Then a wise friend counseled me not to drop out.  He said that I would have to get through the deconstruction of my embedded theology before the construction of my deliberate theology could begin.  In a real sense, all education requires the uprooting and the break down of previous assumptions before any informed ideas and information can be put in place.

Have you ever tried to build a new relationship with a spouse or a partner or a friend without adequately addressing and breaking down the hurtful actions and presumptuous thoughts that previously characterized the relationship?  Have you ever tried to initiate a new awareness of yourself without deconstructing and clearing away your previous self-perceptions of inadequacy or unworthiness?  If you have, you’ve discovered that without sufficient break down, the new building is unstable and tenuous, at best.  Before our building starts, our break downs must begin.

Prayer

Dear God, at this special time of new beginnings, give us sufficient resolve and strength for the challenging work of the breaking down before we build anew.  Amen.

About the Author Kenneth L. Samuel is Pastor of Victory for the World Church, Stone Mountain, Georgia.