Only Jesus: God Uses Mended People | Colossians 4:7-18
The residents of the Island of Misfit Toys are a group of characters from the television special Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. They are sentient toys who all have some strange quirk about them. Because of said quirks, these toys feel that there is no human child who could possibly want to play with them. As such, King Moonracer brings them to stay on the island until suitable owners can be found.
In the special, Rudolph, Hermey, and Yukon Cornelius first encounter the Misfit Toys upon accidentally landing on their island. The Misfit Toys explain their predicament to the trio through the song “The Most Wonderful Day of the Year”. In the special’s original broadcast, this was the toys’ only scene, with the only resolution to their subplot being that Santa Claus promises to find homes for them after Rudolph tells him about the island, and later says that the island would be his first stop on his annual run that year. When viewers complained about not seeing him keep that promise, the following year’s broadcast added a new scene to the ending, showing Santa arriving to pick up the Misfit Toys, which has remained in all subsequent releases of the special.
You may be sitting here wondering what in the world this must have to do the last section of the letter to the Colossians. Well, if you look at the nine men at the end of this passage, the stories their lives tell, and the Christ who has saved them, redeemed them and seen fit to use their broken lives for the sake of the church, then we all have to admit, we see ourselves in this passage – we are mended misfits. Paul was a raging religious fanatic who tortured and killed people and now was in prison for preaching a message of hope, Tychicus was a wealthy man who hung out at the prison; Onesimus was a runaway criminal who could not escape God; Luke was a doctor who gave up his practice to follow a man whose life he could not save but gave him life. Three Jewish guys who were serving time for preaching a crazy message.