Restoration

Well hello friends! I have missed you all, what a season it has been! My long stretch of silence on the blog can be attributed to the fact that during the time of quarantine and social isolation, my old laptop decided to stop working as well. Seriously?! It felt a little bit like...if everything else isn't enough, my computer dies too? But alas, I write to you now from a brand new computer and I am loving it! Can you tell from where you read? I'm sure it looks just a touch fancier and cleaner, no?

Anyhow, back on track. How have these last few months treated you? What a strange time it has been between remote schooling, remote "churching", virtual everything, and lots of social distancing. For us there have certainly been lots of ups and downs of emotions, but I am so thankful that our God is constant, faithful, and steady. I have continually had to come back to that truth as the anchor in the moments of the storm when the winds seemed to rise up...the steady truth that God is sovereign (all powerful) and God is good. He never fails, He has a plan and a purpose, none of this is a surprise to Him, He has all of my days in His hands, God has got this and God has me.

I had a conversation not too long ago with a friend who shared with me about something God was doing in her life. She told me that God had laid the word restoration on her heart. I loved that word. I immediately thought of restoring a piece of furniture. I even found an article to send to her. It talked about how you restore pieces that are valuable. The process of stripping, sanding, cleaning, refinishing, and sealing. It was beautiful for her. I loved that word for her. That in the season of stripping she could trust that it was intentional and it was because she was valuable. That when it felt like things were getting worse before they were getting better, she could trust that God was stripping off the old and sanding out the scars and scrapes so that He could restore, refinish, and reseal. That He was intentionally scraping and working, not to wound but to restore. To make things better than before. To make the end better than the beginning as it talks about in the book of Job. Isn't that a sweet message and word....for her.

But then something happened. I realized that this word was not for her alone. God was beginning a work of stripping in me as well. "Whoa whoa God, no, this word was not for me, it is for her!" I thought. And slowly but surely the stripping began. I often felt during the last few months that the word that best described how I was feeling was "exposed." God was removing some of the old varnish. He also had a plan for restoration in me, but restoration begins with a removing of the old. I think of this verse from 2 Corinthians 5:17, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold all things have become new." Old things were passing away, being stripped away, so that Christ could do a new work in me.

What were some of these things that God exposed in order that He might strip them away?

• the stability and comfort I found in my routine and my sense of "perceived normal" and the struggle I felt when my sense of normal was taken away

• the realization of how much of my joy was found in my circumstances going the way I wanted them to go

• the extent that my hope had been misplaced...and the lack of peace that came from not having my hope in the gospel, in Jesus, but in the here in now

• the way I fixed my eyes on things seen and things temporary over the unseen and eternal

• the way I looked for good news and hope of things improving through google and news reports, and definitely did not find them there

• the way I relied on myself and my own resources instead of God's and came up empty and impatient

• the way I prayed hard and diligently in the beginning, but then seemed to get prayer fatigue; my lack of endurance, persistence, longsuffering in prayer and life

• how much selfishness there was in me (and is) and how much time and energy and effort are pointed inward rather than outward and upward

• how impatient I can be in the waiting and in the process

• and on and on and on it goes

The exposure was ugly, the stripping uncomfortable. But I also trust that it is in kindness and love that God restores. He restores that which He deems valuable and worthwhile. It is a tender process in which He strips away the old that He might do a new thing, that He might make a new creation. Have you felt exposed, stripped, raw during this season? If so you are in good company. And you can trust that the stripping is not aimless, and it is not to destroy or to harm. It is careful, it is intentional, it is to restore and make new. It is because God deems you valuable, precious, and worthy of restoration. He sees that you are worth the effort!

This is one step of the process, and we could dig into this metaphor for the entire restoration process. But that is for another day, how He refinishes us with His righteousness and salvation, how He seals us with His Holy Spirit.

The point I want to get across today is this: It is because of God's lovingkindess that He works and moves in our lives. It is in mercy and grace that He removes that which is old, wrong, or destructive within us. Though the process is uncomfortable at times, one would not refinish a piece of furniture by merely painting over the old. God does it the right way, takes His time and considers us worth the effort. And for that we can be grateful and trust the hand of the Master Craftsman. He is at work in our lives to make us a new creation in Christ that we might greater reflect His glory for all to see.