New

It is a new day; new mercies, new opportunity to live and love for Jesus, fresh and clean. 

It feels like a breath of fresh air after the dank and stale of yesterday. As much as I restate and restate the importance of defining the goodness or badness of day, not by individual good or bad events but as a whole, I think I can say, pretty certainly that yesterday was bad. It was one of those days when bouncing back wasn’t in the cards.

Refining comes with its fair share of discomfort. Harsh words reveal pockets of bitterness, selfishness, ugliness--like fire reveals the dross in silver.

Oh, I don’t mean to say that I’m some precious metal…no, I’m full of impurity and desperate for the transformation that my God, well-versed in His perfect alchemy, can afford me.

Knowing, I’m told, is half the battle. So now I know. These pockets, dormant for a time, needed the fire, the pressure to be exposed and curetted. 

All of this sounds vague…I mean it to be vague. Details are trumped by the truth that I am imperfect, a sinner in great need of the Grace that only Jesus can offer. In my imperfection, I can hurt, maim, and brutalize with that double-edged sword to which we wives fall prey too often. "I’m sorry" doesn’t seem enough but it begins forgiveness and any person made in the image of a Holy God is worth “I’m sorry," especially the one to whom I've bound myself.

We ask “why” when bad things happen. There are three possibilities: consequence of our own sin, hardship of living in a fallen world, or the work of our Adversary. The key is discerning which of these best fits our situation. It is an easy cop-out to blame all on the third option. Many, many times—let’s be honest; we’re down to brass tacks here—the first quite often has a huge lead on the others. 

But God in His goodness, when we belong to Him, doesn’t leave our side even when we screw up. The consequences of my obliterating tongue yesterday, reached into the corners of the day, tainting it. But in His goodness, He showed me that the words were born from a festering pool of bitterness, resentment, hidden wounds uncleaned. So He exposed them to me through the course of a bad day. They needed cleaned and today, are bandaged by His extravagant Grace. I can admit they still need rehabilitation. He will bring that in good time. 

Picture credit: http://stepsusan.blogspot.com

I sit here in the freshness of new, grateful for Grace and Jesus in my life; for His refining and healing work in me. Where I was not sure yesterday how to keep clinging to my confession or how to move forward in my life, today, He reminds me. 

I’m far from poster child--so, so far. But I am beloved child; forgiven child. I can rest in that.