You’re Not Alone in the Rubble

Eddie’s ears rang with the sound of the collapse. He was elbow deep in mud, dust, concrete, broken glass. His knuckles bled. Grabbing stones. Lifting them out of the rubble.

He heard a faint cry in the distance and something inside him came alive. Something inside him turned. That feeling of injustice. That pull toward action. It ignited him.

He dug faster. He felt like he wasn’t making progress. It was dark. The dust hadn’t settled.

But as it did, he looked west to the setting sun. And his eyes filled with hope.

Because he saw silhouettes against the sunset. Dozens of people. With their hands in the dirt. With their hands in the rubble. Digging alongside him. Toward the same voices buried beneath the collapse.

He wasn’t alone.

That’s you. In your mission. Right now.

Maybe you’re digging toward a distant goal and nobody else seems to care. Maybe you’re in an organization where the mission resonates with you, but the constraints are real. Maybe you see injustice everywhere you look. Broken systems. People overlooked. Resources stretched thin. And something inside you says: this isn’t right. I have to do something about this.

But you look around and wonder. Am I the only one who sees this? Am I the only one who feels this?

Here’s what I want you to know.

You’re not.

But first, ask yourself. What voices do you hear? What signs in your organization, in your corner of the world, are calling you to get your hands dirty? What injustice. What broken thing. What cry in the distance. What are you hearing right now? And are you responding to it today?

If you are, look to your left. Look to your right. You’re probably not alone. There are other people hearing the same voices. Other people laboring in the same rubble. You just need to find them. Connect with them. Build alongside them.

You might be thinking: I’m not trained for this. I’m not equipped. This isn’t my job. I’m not a firefighter. I’m not a rescue worker. This isn’t my responsibility.

But the rubble in front of you is your responsibility. You can’t set the entire world right. You can set your corner of it. Your team. Your department. Your organization. Your corner of the world.

And you don’t need a title or a budget to start.

What good actually looks like

The good Heartwood is most proud of isn’t a project or a platform. It’s the people.

We’ve tried to create an environment where people do dignified work for a dignified wage. We’ve paid people more than they asked for, because we saw their value when they undervalued themselves. We’ve been transparent about feedback. Praise and critical truth. Because people deserve all the information they need to make good decisions.

We’ve held our people loosely. We’ve told them: if a better opportunity comes along, take it. I want you to win. We’ve given some away through that process. We’ve built loyalty with others. They know we care about them as people. Not just as workers.

That’s what I mean by setting your corner right.

But here’s an honest observation. I’ve seen organizations with beautiful missions do terrible things on the inside. I’ve seen the good ones trying to set their corner right while the culture around them breaks people. I’ve also seen people in organizations not known for doing good work show up with integrity. Create safe spaces. Treat people with dignity.

It’s like Goofus and Gallant from Highlights magazine. Remember? Goofus did the wrong thing in the obvious way. Gallant did the right thing.

Real life is more complicated.

You can be Gallant in a Goofus organization. You can be Goofus hiding inside a Gallant one. The organization doesn’t determine your goodness. You do.

There’s ancient wisdom about this. Jesus talked about whitewashed tombs. Beautiful on the outside. Full of dead bones on the inside. He talked about washing the cup on the outside while leaving the inside filthy.

And James, Jesus’s brother, cut through the religious performance. Faith without works is dead, he said. Don’t tell someone to be blessed and go on your way. Get in the ditch. Do the work.

The inside and the outside have to match.

I was recently talking with someone building a product for church leaders. The product is trying to answer a question that’s been haunting them. How do we actually measure the impact of the good we’re doing?

It’s a real question. And it points to something deeper.

Is the good we’re claiming to do actually real?

Here’s the tension. If you’re running a nonprofit or leading a church, you’re measuring impact. You’re tracking metrics. You need data for your donors. You need to show results. That’s not wrong. That’s stewardship.

But here’s the danger.

Optimize for the metrics first, and you might hit your targets while missing the actual person in the rubble. Chase the numbers instead of the mission, and you start gaming the system instead of doing the work. And worse: if you’re doing it all while breaking people on the inside, what have you accomplished?

The answer isn’t to ignore the metrics. The answer is to focus on doing good work with integrity. Real integrity. All the way through.

Do that, and the numbers will follow. Your handprints and your footprints will create measurable impact naturally. You don’t need a signature on the work. The evidence of who you are and what you stand for will be written all over it. Through the lives you touch. Through the good you accomplish.

The table is big enough

My friend Jeff Hampton said something I’ve never forgotten. The table is big enough that we can all eat.

That’s true in the work of doing good. There’s enough mission to accomplish. There’s enough funding to go around. If we stop white-knuckling it. If we stop saying, this is my corner and I need credit for it.

The people doing the best work aren’t the ones who need their names written on it. They’re the ones whose handprints and footprints are all over it. Because they showed up. And did the work.

Here’s the hard part.

If we’re going to do good, we have to be good as we do good.

Territorial. Afraid. Squeezing instead of serving. Those postures undo the very good we’re trying to do. The way we treat people. The way we hold resources. The way we make space. Those things are part of the gospel we’re living out.

So here’s my question.

This week, what’s one thing you’re going to do differently? One conversation you’re going to have? One way you’re going to set your corner right?

Are you going to pay someone more than they asked for?

Are you going to be radically transparent about something?

Are you going to tell someone: I see you. I value you. I want you to win.

Are you going to loosen your grip on something you’ve been white-knuckling?

You don’t have to change the whole world. You just have to change your corner of it.

And when you do, you’ll look around and realize you’re not digging alone. There are others with bloody knuckles right beside you. Working toward the same voices. The same good. The same vision of justice and dignity and healing.

The table is big enough. We can all eat.

But someone has to start reaching across it.

Will you?