Pump you up

It’s a common joke that I make about myself that I’m not terribly handy around the house. I can change lightbulbs with the best of them and can occasionally take on a plumbing job, but, unfortunately, it doesn’t come naturally. Last weekend, the water pumped out from our sump pump froze in the discharge pipe outside our house. That caused our backup pump to let us know that something was wrong. All this caused much consternation on my part in trying to figure out what was wrong with our regular pump and our back-up and it wasn’t solved until the plumber came on Monday. But one good thing came out of this mini-emergency. I learned something. I now have a better handle on the whole sump pump process and the actual sump isn’t a mystery any more to me.

The sump is kind of scary, to be honest. It’s in the corner of our basement and it has a black cover on it. When you take the cover off, all you can see is dark and water, which, in my mind, is a frightening combination. I imagined a bottomless pit with all kinds of mysterious things lurking at the bottom. But this "emergency" meant I had to unhook the backup and take it in to check the battery and see if it was broken. That meant looking into the sump. When I shone the flashlight down there, I realized that the sump is only a couple feet deep and at the bottom was just water. Your run-of-the-mill home owner probably knows this, but it was a revelation to me. No longer is the sump mysterious. I know what the dark hides. And all it took was shining some light into it. Kind of reminds me of Jesus: “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).