How do I restore a broken relationship? Dr. Guy Richard gives practical advice on how to restore broken relationships and live in the light of humility and forgiveness.
The key to restoring a broken relationship is for one of the members of the relationship, if not both—preferably both—to be living in the bathroom instead of in the living room. Let me explain that a little bit in terms of what I mean.
Living in the Bathroom Instead of The Living Room
Many years ago, I lived in Jackson, Mississippi for a number of years, and we had an old house built in the 1950s. And in this house in the living room, there was not an overhead light. Instead, all there was was a light switch that was controlling one of the outlets, and you’d have to plug a lamp into that outlet. And when you turned on the light switch, that lamp would come on. And what that meant was the lighting in the living room was incredibly dim. It was enough to see at night where you didn’t bump into anything, but it was incredibly dim in terms of just what you would be able to make out. And I would pass a mirror there in our living room, and I looked into the mirror. And every time I look in the mirror, the lighting was dark enough where I looked tanned as though I’d been in the sun for days and you couldn’t see any blemishes at all in my face. I looked good, my complexion was clear, and it would always make me feel good.
The closer we are to Jesus, the closer we are to the light, the more defects we ought to see in ourselves, not the fewer.And then in my bathroom, it was this 1950s bathroom with pink tile and pink tile on the floor, pink tubs, pink toilet and all the rest. And this lighting fixture on the wall had a bank of lights on all three sides of the mirror, and the mirror itself had lighting on the inside as well. And when I looked into that mirror to shave in the mornings, it was as though I looked pale as a ghost. And you could see every blemish in my skin and it was depressing.
Living Close to the Light
But after a while I began thinking about that. And so often I think the Christian life—that’s a great picture of the Christian life because Jesus is said to be the light of the world. And as I reflected on that whole analogy, the closer we are to Jesus, the closer we are to the light, the more defects we ought to see in ourselves, not the fewer. I think the further we are from the light, the farther we are from the light, the [fewer] defects we’ll see. So if we are living close to Christ, if we’re living close—walking closely with him, we ought to be aware of the sin that is in us, and not only aware of the sin that is in us, but then, therefore, also aware of how much we’ve been forgiven. And the farther we are from the light—the more we’re living in the living room instead of in the bathroom—the better we think we look because we’re not seeing any defects. And so forgiveness means relatively little to us in those moments.
When we’ve been forgiven much, we forgive much.And I think any time we think about restoring a broken relationship, that kind of of humility and that kind of an understanding approach, to be walking closely with the Lord so that we we understand how much we’ve been forgiven. And when we’ve been forgiven much, we forgive much. When we’ve been forgiven much, we love much. And that, I think, is the necessary ingredient for us to be able to humble ourselves and to forgive when someone has hurt us, or to reach out and lovingly and gently confront the one who has hurt us and ask for that forgiveness to be restored.
