“I wish it had not happened in my life time,” said Frodo. “So do I, ” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live in such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to do is decide what to do with the time given to us. And already Frodo our time is looking black. The enemy is fast becoming strong.” The Fellowship of the Rings JRR Tolkien.
As beams of sunlight shone brightly through the holes in the tin roof, I thought this house is absolutely disgusting. The house was no larger than my bedroom. A ripped bed sheet hung in the middle of the room separating the bedroom and the living room. The doors were a wide open space allowing chickens, goats, dogs and pretty much any animal to roam freely in the house. In the small back yard, I could see a trash pile burning behind the clothes line. I seriously doubted if words such as mop, broom or trash can were words included in the families vocabulary. The living room furniture consisted of three plastic chairs and a fold up table in the corner. One small eight by ten collage of family pictures hung in the center of a non-painted wall with visible areas of water damage. I was hot, sweaty and wishing I was sitting closer to the fan. As we hugged goodbye to the shoe-less children, Shanda turned to me and said the furthest thought from my mind.
” I would love to decorate that house. It is so beautiful!” What, beautiful? It’s a dump. I thought to myself.
I love Jesus, and I love that God’s heart for humanity is evident details of life. It humbles me when I get to catch God’s heart in something as mundane as a perception of a house. While I walked into a house and thought it was dirty, black and just gross, Shanda walked into the same house. Yet, she saw beauty. Doesn’t God’s love for humanity look a little bit similar? Shanda’s perspective caused me to think. It has caused me to think a lot. God sees our brokeness, but He calls us beautiful. In our humanity we are down right disgusting. On our own accord, we are sinful. Our lives ,when taken in our own hands, are a wreck. However, Jesus looks at his broken children, and before any restoration occurs, he sees beauty. He sees the end, and the end is glorious. He sees us fully restored to the men and women He created before the fall in Eden. He sees hope in the hopeless. He declares us righteous in the midst of sinfulness. He hears the unheard. He touches the untouchable, and He loves the unloveable. He sees beauty in ashes.
Isaiah 61
the oil of gladess instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
a planting of the Lord for the display of His splendor
They will rebuild ancient ruins
and restore places long devastated;
vs. 10 I delight greatly in the Lord:
my soul rejoices in my God.
For me has clothed me with garments of salvation
and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness.”
