Skip to main content

fixing a fridge

My friend had a fridge meltdown last week - literally. He called me to tell me that everything in his freezer had melted, there was water dripping over the food in his fridge, and the motor kept turning off and on erratically. Since he was on his way out for the evening, I told him I would come over the next day to see what was going on. I mentioned that if he kept the fridge door closed, his food should be alright until then.

I like fixing small things around the house and enjoy the challenge of making something right that was not working before, so sometimes my friends call me up when they have a problem. When I got off the phone, I researched fridge issues on the internet and found that this particular problem might be the result of dirty coils which were affecting the performance of the compressor. There was an easy solution. However, if this didn't work, he would have to ask his landlord for a new refrigerator, which might turn out to be a bit of an ordeal since the corporation he pays his rent to is not known for their attentiveness to their tenants' needs.

The next day, I packed up my supplies and did my impersonation of a refrigerator repair woman. His particular fridge looks like something straight out the 50's. It is an apartment size model and has a tiny freezer compartment within the fridge. The bottom shelf is missing and some of the storage compartments lack their original hardware. The freezer is small to begin with, and as time goes on, it becomes caked with frost and diminishes even further in size. Nevertheless, it is clean and reliable and does the job, at least it has until now.

I cleaned the coils and the compressor at the back of his fridge. Surprisingly, they weren't that dirty. After an hour or so of work, we laid hands on the appliance, said a quick prayer and plugged the fridge back in. The motor started, then immediately shut off. Oh well. Plan B. Contact the landlord and hope we get some action.

We went downstairs to the superintendent's apartment and to our surprise, he was at home. My friend explained the situation and the tall man said he would see if he had another fridge around somewhere and perhaps deliver it tomorrow. Well, that seemed too easy!

The next day when my friend returned home from work, a new fridge was standing in his kitchen. Well, new to him at least, and definitely newer than the last one. This new model was also apartment-sized and boasted all its original shelves PLUS a separate freezer compartment nearly double the size of the old one. It was an upgrade in every which way: colour, features, size, and looks! The broken fridge had been a blessing in disguise!

Sometimes I think I try too hard to fix up something that is not working. I tweak and clean and take it apart and push everything back into place and sometimes even replace a few parts to get a bit more life out of it. Duct tape will keep it together for a few more days. Another screw will keep it from falling apart. A good cleaning will prolong its life for a bit. Why am I so reluctant to let the old crap go? When its time is done, when I see the telltale signs that it is breathing its last breath, why do I insist on spending a lot of time and energy and sometimes resources on making it last just a bit longer? (I am not talking about human beings here, don't worry.)

When God comes into a situation, he makes everything new (Revelation 21:5). He doesn't fix up the old stuff in order to squeeze another month out of it. He replaces it with something way better, something that carries his life (which get better with time) instead of my death (which causes things to deteriorate over time). Let me not hesitate to trade in my broken junk for the the new stuff, the stuff that comes from Jesus and carries his vitality and character and lifeblood and not a whiff of the stench of decay. That's a trade that is always worth it.

This is my refrigerator with a fridge magnet from Australia.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Names of God

The Hebrew word "YHWH" (read from right to left) This past Sunday I gave a talk on the Names of God, the beginning of a series on this topic. This first talk was to be a gentle introduction so I thought it wouldn't take too many hours of preparation. Well, I quickly discovered that the research is almost bottomless; every time I thought I had a somewhat definitive list of names, I found another source which added a few more or gave a different twist on some of the names I had already come across. After several hours I was getting overwhelmed by the sheer amount of data (and that was only looking at the Hebrew Bible). I wondered how I could present this to people in an orderly and accessible fashion and within a reasonable time frame. Not everyone is up for a 3-hour lecture crammed full of detail on a Sunday morning. So I took a break and spent a bit of time meditating on this problem and asking the Spirit for guidance. And then I thought that being overwhelmed by Go

soul refrigerator

I went grocery shopping yesterday and came home with three bags of food. After I unpacked them all, this is what my fridge looked like: really empty. How does that happen? How can I feel so full and ready for any food emergency one moment, and after one quick glance, realise that I have nothing, really? Today is one of those days in my soul as well. I woke up with gratitude and fullness in my heart, ready to take on this day and all the wonderful opportunities that it presented. Then I caught a brief glance of some emptiness in my life and bam - my buoyancy was compromised. For the past few hours I have been treading water, trying to keep my head in a positive space, bobbing in and out of disappointment, and catching myself whining with pathetic indignity at the cement blocks of other people's stupidity that are tangled around my ankles. When I am staring at the empty refrigerator of my soul, these are my thoughts. Where do I go from here? Perhaps I should slam that refrigerator

comedic timing

Comic by Joel Micah Harris at xkcd.com One of my favourite jokes goes like this: Knock, knock. Who's there? Interrupting cow Interrupting cow w--- Moooooooo!! Timing is important in both drama and comedy. A well-paced story draws the audience in and helps it invest in the characters, while a tale too hastily told or too long drawn out will fail to engage anyone. Surprise - something which interrupts the expected - is a creative use of timing and integral to any good story. If someone is reading a novel and everything unfolds in a predictable manner, they will probably wonder why they bothered reading the book. And so it is in life. Having life be predictable all of the time is not as calming as it sounds. We love surprises, especially good surprises like birthday parties, gifts, marriage proposals, and finding something that we thought was lost. Surprises are an important part of humour. A good joke is funny because it goes to a place you didn't expect it to go. Sim