Build A Bridge!

For there is one God, and there is only one mediator (bridge builder) between God and man. The man is Christ Jesus. 1 Timothy 2:5

Three short weeks ago, I settled in and watched the Country Music Awards. The highlight of the show for me was the performance by Naomi and Wynonna Judd of Love Can Build a Bridge. The words are so beautiful, and with the help of an outstanding choir, their first performance in twenty years was touching and so memorable.

One week later, it was announced that Naomi had died after a long battle with mental illness. The news was sobering and so sad, but in retrospect the words of the song, coupled with the look of deep sadness in her eyes that night, were very telling.

We live in a world where daily news is depressing enough without having a tendency toward the disease of depression and/or mental illness. Imagine how it must feel to listen to and see the horrors in the Ukraine, the political hatred, the stories of innocent people being killed, and even churches falling apart when a person is already in the depths of despair. It’s all too much some days.

It seems that Naomi Judd was a woman of great faith. She raised two daughters by herself for years after her divorce, went to nursing school, and eventually launched a successful singing and song writing career with her daughter. The words of the song they sang that night seem to be a plea for this world to build bridges together between “your world and mine” rather than ignore the need to come together.

There are many different kinds of bridges in this world. Some are wooden, some are stone, and some are made of steel. Some are large, some are small, but they all have basically the same function. They span a chasm and make it possible for people to get from one side to the other. They connect.

It is said that there are two types of people in this world: those who build bridges and those who burn them. Jesus was clearly a bridge builder. He built bridges to fishermen, lepers, prostitutes, tax collectors, adulterers’, not to mention the sick, hurting and hopeless.

Bridges can also be made of feelings and emotions shared when others are hurting. Building bridges to help others takes sacrifice on our part, it takes compassion, and it takes action. In order to build bridges, we have to reach out, and we have to be the one to do the reaching!! When is the last time we have reached out to build a bridge between others?

There is a poem by Will Allen Dromgoole entitled “The Bridge Builder”. It tells the story of an old man who came upon a chasm while walking one cold, gray evening. In order to cross the chasm, he had to wade through a “sullen tide”. Once the man had safely reached the other side, he turned around and built a bridge back the way he came. A fellow traveler asked the old man: “Why, when his journey was nearly over, would he build a bridge that he would never use?” The man explained that on his journey he had seen “a fair haired youth” who would be traveling the same way after him. The chasm which had been no problem for the old man might be a pitfall for the youth. The old man concluded, “He, too, must cross in the twilight dim: Good friend, I am building this bridge for him.”

In this world of today, we all need to be bridge builders. It’s our job to build a bridge to the lost, the disconnected, and the hurting. Just as a bridge is constructed because there is a need to get from Point A to Point B, we should be building bridges to connect those among us who need an encouraging hand.

Thank God Jesus cared enough to build bridges to us. It’s time to put down the matches, the lighter fluid, and stop burning bridges, rather start building bridges to each other. The clock is ticking on our chance to build bridges during our time here, so let the building begin!

Best wishes to all our graduates. Go and build a bridge.

I’d gladly walk across the desert, With no shoes upon my feet, To share with you the last bite, Of food I had to eat. I would swim out to save you, In your sea of broken dreams, When all your hopes are sinkin’, Let me show you what love means. Love can build a bridge; between your heart and mine. Love can build a bridge, Don’t you think it’s time? Don’t you think it’s time? When we stand together, it’s our finest hour. We can do anything, anything, Keep believin’ in the power. “Love Can Build a Bridge” by The Judds