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Sin creates a mess. Sometimes that mess is of our own doing. Sometimes that mess has been dumped on us by others, perhaps even viciously enacted against us. Sometimes we see no reason for the mess, and the questions taunt our spirit, and shake a fist in the face of our faith. I had had a weekend of contemplating the messes of my own life – some of my own doing, some that had been dumped on me. That kind of contemplation is never pretty and it stirs the feelings we thought had long ago been resolved. God gave me a beautiful gift though as I awakened on my Monday morning. Akin to rising to a sun-kissed dawn or to hearing the hushed tones of hymns of praise, the words brought an intense calm to my spirit. God is bigger than our messes. I literally wept with gratitude. Such a knowledge takes all the difficulties and heartaches of life – and even my own sin – and gives them a purpose and One who loves us through them all. I was reminded that I can truly say thank you to God for the things He has allowed in my life, although I may well say thank you through the tears that are still there.
One of the themes of Scripture that is so very precious to me is the fact that God delights in bringing beauty from the ashes. We see it in the story of Joseph, the victim who became a ruler. Hannah and Elizabeth both grieved their barrenness, until God gave each of them a child who impacted their worlds in incredulous ways. Paul engaged in the wholesale slaughter of early believers until God changed his heart and his direction and empowered a man of brokenness and humility. Hosea pursued a prostitute to portray God’s steadfast love for a wayward people. As another prostitute exchanged her worthlessness and her defilement for forgiveness, she lavishly expressed her love to Jesus and exposed the self-righteousness that surrounded her. The blind, the lame, the leprous, and those whose sanity had been destroyed by demons, could not be silenced when Jesus touched the ashes of their lives. And I see the theme of Scripture echoing through the centuries to bring beauty from the ashes of broken lives still today.
I know many beautiful women that some would once have discarded and would have given them little, if any, value. Those women can tell vivid stories of the messes sin can create, but they can also tell you of a God who never stops loving and pursuing. They know the reality that God is bigger than our messes, and that God sees the preciousness of a life that has been battered, and that God delights in cleaning off the "yuck" and allowing us to be beautiful representations of His grace.
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