God can put you pack together. Today.
I loved English lessons at school. Even at fifteen, when a poem of mine, Plastic Tomorrow, was passed around other classes by my teachers, what really hooked me was learning how to read properly.
Pulling texts apart. Asking what was actually being said. To whom. Not who. By whom. Where. Why. Nursery rhymes included. Not as harmless singalongs, but as stories quietly shaping how we see the world long before we know better.
One such case was Humpty Dumpty. I cannot remember what conclusions we reached back then. But now, as a Christian, it seems worth revisiting.
Life is not Humpty Dumpty. An old children’s rhyme tells the story of a figure who falls and cannot be put back together. Once you fall, that is it. Shattered. Irreversible. It’s like a crime scene – All the king’s horses and all the king’s men gathered around a mess they cannot mend, standing like workmen looking at a pothole casually, looking important while being useless. But Scripture refuses that verdict.
Let’s swipe up to Isaiah 53:5, “He was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.” That is not bible app sentiment. That is cost. A heavy cost.
Humpty sat on a wall. Then he fell. That is all the rhyme actually gives us. No backstory. No moral analysis, no finger wagging or raised eyebrow.
And notably, no mention of an egg.
The egg came later, courtesy of the illustrator. We tend to read it back into the text, because images stick harder than words.
We do the same with people.
The rhyme never tells us why he fell. Was he pushed? Did he jump? Did he misjudge the height, the risk, the edge beneath his feet? We love those questions because they let us assign blame. Him or her. Careless. Reckless. Naïve. Deserved it!? If we can explain the fall, we can keep it at a distance. Explanations make us feel perceptive, but they rarely make anyone whole.
Scripture looks away, is not interested in that game. Isaiah does not ask how we fell. He tells us why restoration hurts. Wholeness does not come from being carefully reassembled, piece by piece. It comes through being carried by another who bears the heavy, oppressive weight we cannot.
Why the king’s horses? Power. Speed. Prestige. Muscle. Why the king’s men? Authority. Organisation. Systems. Titles. Committees. Maybe they rushed in like my friend, Paramedic Mike Lee would have done. Maybe they stood around, hands on hips, offering strong but conflicting opinions, debating like football fans after a match. Either way, absolutely nothing changed. Power cannot mend a shattered soul. Structure cannot resurrect a broken heart. The things that look impressive are often helpless in the face of grief.
Then there is the label. The egg was never in the text! It was added later, after the fall, to help us picture the damage. Labels work the same way. Addict. Failure. Divorced. Burnt out. Prophet gone quiet. Labels flatten people into objects, and objects are easier to discard. Labels are hard to erase. Again, scripture refuses that move. It insists you are a person, not a category. Known. Seen. Loved, treasured. Worth the price paid.
And always remember, there was a price – a shocking price. Isaiah makes that unavoidable. Healing came through deep wounds. Peace came through chastisement. Wholeness came through crushing. Not ours. His. God did not glue us back together and call it grace. He gave himself and called it redemption.
Life is not Humpty Dumpty. You are not beyond repair. You will not be made whole by horses, men, power, or pity. You know that. The remedy is that you are healed by the one who stepped into our terrible fall, who fully knew the cost, who chose the cross, and who did not stay in the grave. Who was Humpty Dumpty in the happier context where things turned out differently?
Have a look in the reflection on your mobile phone.