Broken Windows

Galatians 6:3-10

Phrases that spoke to me today:
• God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap
• let each one test his own work
• let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap
• as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone

Applying the Word to My Life:
Paul isn't describing a rule that bends for good intentions or bad luck. Whatever gets sown gets reaped - flesh for flesh, Spirit for Spirit. God does not let that connection get severed. It's worth asking why, and I've found the clearest answer in what happens when people manage to sever that connection themselves.

Contracts are a good place to see this, because unlike real life, you can write down exactly what you want someone to do and attach whatever consequence you like to it - it's almost like a lab where you can clearly see the connections. Early in my career I worked on a manufacturing contract where the payment schedule was firm - deadlines arrived right on time, invoice after invoice - but nothing tied those payments to any real timeline for when the material would actually get made, let alone delivered. Production was never urgent, because payment showed up either way. We ended up reworking the whole contract, because a structure like that rewards exactly the opposite of what you actually want.

The same thing happens in ordinary life, uglier and faster, where nobody designed it on purpose. A few years ago I was in San Francisco, and one street over from where I was staying, a guy was selling a huge pile of brand-new merchandise on the sidewalk for almost nothing - proof enough that theft wasn't being prosecuted there. Stores nearby were closing, or trucking their inventory out every night just to keep it from disappearing. On our last morning there, my friend and I walked into a restaurant for breakfast. Before we could sit down, someone told us our rental car's window had just been smashed. My bag, with a few days of laundry and toiletries, was gone.

My first real thought wasn't anger. It was curiosity about whoever did it. Getting a bag out of a locked car that fast takes real skill - the kind that comes from a lot of practice. If they'd put that same discipline into almost anything legal, they'd have been good at it, genuinely. Something in their life led them somewhere else instead, and the missing consequences made that path easier to keep walking.

That's the answer to the question. Every choice is that same fork: self or God, and the consequences are the signs marking which way we actually went. Take the signs away - the way that contract did, the way that street did - and nothing changes course. If choosing God and choosing ourselves ended in the same place, the fork wouldn't really be a fork at all.

This can be uncomfortable to sit with - at least it is for me. It would be a lot easier to believe we're always right on track, that what we get away with is actually free, that unanswered harm just quietly disappears. But the discomfort isn't the enemy here. It might be the clearest sign of all.

My Response for Today:
Today I'll pay attention to one thing I'm sowing that feels consequence-free, and be honest about where it's actually headed.