Isaiah 61 has so much treasure-truths, rich with descriptive imagery that presents such full pictures of God’s wondrous grace and redeeming love. One of which has been on my mind and heart over the past couple of weeks. This idea of being crowned with beauty, instead of ashes. I also see God bringing forth beauty out of ashes, just as He breathes new life into what was dead and rotting.
What a glorious and wonderful promise and hope, yes? Who doesn’t want beauty? Even just superficially speaking, the whole world is mad with the desire to pursue and obtain and perfect and preserve it at whatever cost. Clearly, it’s an appealing offer, as it is immeasurably more valuable than just physical beauty. This is His beauty.
But, as these past several weeks – or if I’m being really honest, past few months – have been reminding me, before I get to the beauty part, I get to be ashes. After all, what does fire do? How much more will the Refiner’s fire burn and destroy? But rather than ending in crumbles of ashes, it is a beginning of new breath bursting forth and radiating beauty. That He will be glorified and boldly displayed as the Beautiful One, the Creator of Life, the Holy King of Kings. Now that is an end worth pursuing.
The journey there? Being incinerated into a pile of fire crumbs? That part is not-so-fun. But even that is a part of it – my self-entitlement, my pride, my love of comfort revealed in my complaints and sinful rebellion and stubborn silence. Impurities bubbling up to be destroyed and removed, what only He can do.
What an incredible and daunting step of faith it requires for me to not shut down and run away, daily. A kind of faith that I do not possess. But one that He, miraculously, provides for me, in just the necessary moments. (Can we say thank You, Jesus! <3)
Right now, I am so full of myself, me, my own. I am praying that as He continues to walk me through the furnace, now and tomorrow and during the World Race and after, I will be more and more emptied of me, and instead, be filled with more and more of Jesus, living out His heart, life, love, and mission – in all ways, in all times, in all places. That I will truly be crowned with the beauty of Christ and of the cross, rather than the ashes of my own vanity and pride and insecurities and fears and self-righteousness.
“I delight greatly in the Lord; my soul rejoices in my God. For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of his righteousness, as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. For as the soil makes the sprout come up and a garden causes seeds to grow, so the Sovereign Lord will make righteousness and praise spring up before all nations.” || Isaiah 61:10-11
