The other day my daughter’s iPad went completely black. It had been working perfectly fine the night before as she watched her favorite show, so when it suddenly wouldn’t turn on, she panicked. Everything looked fine from the outside — the screen wasn’t cracked, the buttons were intact — but something on the inside wasn’t connecting.
As I watched her cry, I couldn’t help but think about how relationships can feel the same way. Everything can seem normal and stable, and then suddenly, without warning, it goes dark. What do you do when something that once felt full of life and light suddenly stops working?
My first thought was simple: maybe she didn’t charge it all the way. Maybe it wasn’t properly connected to the power source. And right there, the Holy Spirit whispered to me — just like her iPad, we too must stay properly plugged in to our power source.
If we go too long without connection — without prayer, without time in God’s presence — we start to lose power. We stop functioning the way we were designed to. We might still look okay on the outside, but inside, we’re drained, disconnected, and spiritually dead.
As she sat there, my daughter cried and said, “Mommy, I think I broke it.” I could hear the guilt in her voice. She was struggling to forgive herself, assuming it was worse than it was. She thought it was beyond repair, or that it might cost too much to fix.
And how many times do we do the same thing? When something in our relationships breaks — a friendship, a marriage, a family bond — we automatically assume it’s over. We carry guilt, shame, or blame, instead of hope. We think, It’s too late. I can’t fix this.
But just like with her iPad, sometimes it’s not as bad as we think. Sometimes we just need to go back to the root — to examine what caused the disconnect, to forgive ourselves, and to invite God to repair what’s been broken.
I didn’t get angry with her. That, for me, was growth. I’ve learned that relationships need grace to make mistakes and space to heal. We have to allow each other the freedom to grow and the grace to fail.
As I sat there, I opened Google and started searching for solutions. My mind was racing through every possible worst-case scenario. What if it can’t be fixed? What if everything is lost? What if I have to start all over again?
And that’s exactly how we spiral when relationships go dark. We fear the worst before we even seek God’s wisdom. But instead of getting stuck in my head, I decided to take the iPad back to the manufacturer — the one who made it.
That’s what God wants us to do. When things break, He wants us to bring them back to Him — the original designer, the one who knows exactly how to restore what’s malfunctioning.
At our Apple appointment, the technician took one look and said, “It just needs a reset.” We hadn’t been turning it off completely, and over time, it shut down on its own.
And that hit me again — sometimes we just need to reset.
Not everything that’s gone dark is dead. Some things just need to rest. God is saying, you’re not starting from scratch when you turn it back on this time. You’re just restarting with fresh power, renewed purpose, and a stronger connection.
So today, don’t be afraid to reset. Unplug. Rest. And reconnect — to God, to your purpose, and to the relationships He’s entrusted to you.