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It was back to my high school years from my English class that I learned the terminology of DIY (Do-It-Yourself) the first time. Years later, I had the opportunity to come to the States alone for study. I finally realize what DIY really means – I need to wash clothes by myself, cook my own meals, study by myself, deal a lot of things, by myself, etc…. Of course, you can argue that this is just a growing process and should be called “Training for Independence” 🙂 Well, not quite. The DIY became more challenging when it comes to the task of repairing my problematic and aged station wagon, in order to avoid some repair costs from my tight budget. It was a dirty DIY job but it is also a rewarding one, sometimes. When my wife joined me two years later, the DIY expanded to another spectrum – kitchen. She sometimes would crave for some of the delicacies from our home town without luck because we were located in a remote country side. At that time, she has to learn how to make them by herself either with friends’ help or from book of recipes. This is another type of DIY that we didn’t realize it before. 🙂

Later on, the area of DIY for home improvement came into light when we had our own place. There were always some spots in our home that require our attention – sometimes it was minor but other times it was a big project. I have been enjoying those DIYs. The excitement comes from the surprises I encountered – from missing a part to all kind of silly mistakes. They were valuable and it reveals how fallible a person that I’d be. Of course, there is a side effect on my DIY too – my finished work may not look as professional as it could be and therefore wife may complain once a while. Despite of this, I learned a lot though; especially thinking of Clint Eastwood’s quote in his movie, “A man has got to know his limitations”… ha, ha, ha…

The DIY mania is an integral part of American culture. You can get an idea from why “Home Depot” and “Lowes” stores were so welcome across the country. The goodness of the culture is it promotes business opportunities and man’s sense of achievement (成就感). I am kind of thinking this sense of achievement was embedded by the Creator of the universe – our God. Perhaps, it might imitate the sense of the word recorded in the book of Genesis, “神看著是好的(God saw that it was good)”  The biggest difference is we were NOT creating anything from scratch; we were trying to restore something to its good-as-new condition in our DIY repairs; or, we were trying to add / improve something in our DIY improvements by utilizing existing materials. Therefore, we were limited by what we have learned and our own understandings.

The danger of DIY, however, comes from indulging in one’s ability without realizing it. It creates a false impression of “See, I am good!”  The net is a prideful heart generated and it couldn’t listen to others’ suggestion. Therefore, a right balance between the sense of achievement and prideful heart is absolutely essential if you want to enjoy your DIY work.

In our spiritual journey, we need to have the habit of DIY too. We need to study God’s words and to spend time in prayer by ourselves with Him in order to develop a close relationship with Him. This in turn will give us a sense of achievement (fulfilling feel) with our Lord. On the other hand, we also need to know our limitations by co-working with our brothers and sisters in His family. This I call it a DIO (Do-It-Ourselves) work because our Lord wants us:

From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. 全身都靠他聯絡得合式、百節各按各職、照著各體的功用、彼此相助、便叫身體漸漸增長、在愛中建立自己。(Ephesians 4:16)

May we all have the DIY and DIO mentality throughout the year…..