God, an Etch-A-Sketch, and Reasons I Hate My Brother

Before the days of electronic travelling bliss such as dvd players and the Nintendo DS, we had old faithful—captain Etch-a-Sketch. What a machine-o-wonder this was. Come to think of it, Etchy has to be the grandfather of the iPad. You could make anything as long as you didn’t have to disconnect a line. Some kids drew self portraits or replicas of the Taj Mahal. I was never quite that artistic.

English: The Taj Mahal, complete with ripples ...

My friends’ creations always looked like this.

The classic red-and-white Etch A Sketch model

Mine looked like this.

My biggest achievement was filling the entire screen with black lines. It wasn’t all that complicated, but it would occupy at least an hour or so on any given trip, and it was an achievement to be proud of. Outside of that, I usually stuck to writing things in cursive—you remember, that way of writing we used to learn that connected all the letters into one big scribble. How crazy were we to think THAT would last?

My little brother was a typical little brother. He hated anything I ever created. I used to spend hours building intricate Lego mechanisms. I would hide them, and he would hunt them down like a bloodhound on the trail. Once he sniffed them out, he would throw them down the stairs with supernatural force. He did this for two reasons 1) he liked to break stuff, and 2) he liked to break MY stuff. My Etch-a-Sketch creations were no exception. He would rip the red tablet from my hands and then shake it like the world was ending until his hair stood up and his face got red. Then he would smile wryly at me as he handed it back and tried to catch his breath for round two.

Mikey on the right, just before destroying something of mine, no doubt.

But that was part of the beauty of Etchy. To completely erase the entire screen, no matter how cluttered it became, all you had to do was shake it. In fact, sometimes this was the most fun part of the process. And this reminds me a bit of God. (Here we go again. Are you sitting down? Do yo have some tissue handy? If you answered “Yes” to both, you may now proceed.)

As we age, things get written and drawn into our lives. We experience loss, and sorrow is etched. We experience betrayal, and mistrust is etched. We experience heartache, and pain is etched. Before you know it, the screen is full of painful, hurtful, and troubling experiences. Such experiences can cause us to doubt, mistrust, and hurt. But thankfully, sometimes just a few shakes can erase it all. And God knows this.

So, I think God shakes us from time-to-time to clear our screens. He allows us to go through difficult circumstances, and as we learn to trust him during such times, the shaking of our lives removes all the stuff that was etched in by our bad experiences. So I’ve come to be thankful for my times of shaking, because I’ve realized that I often need my screen cleared.

When God does the shaking, it always helps.

When my brother does it, it just hurts.

To balance out my true feelings for my brother, you should also read this:
The Day We Chased Nessie Up Mt. Everest
Or for a more serious read about faith being shaken, try this:
When Faith Gets Messy

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