Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!
2Cor 5:17
Today I was asked to tell an old story. This friend of mine is compiling stories from the lives of women she knows. She is going to do something cool and fun and new with all of the words that her friends string together to tell about their lives. I told her mine. It had been a long, long time since I had told the whole story and I had forgotten many twists and turns in my own tale. It was like I was watching an old favorite movie in my mind and every once in a while I would think, “Oh, yeah! I forgot that happened! That was my favorite part!!”. There were other parts that I still wish I could take out of the final cut, but that is not a power I possess, so I told her about those anyways. My friend is really nice and hopefully won’t think I am crazy- even though I gave her full reason to think just that.
Unfortunately, miracles happen when you are in need of them, not when everything in life is coming up roses. We would never know the value of comedy if we didn’t first know tragedy. Wonderful is only made more, well, wonderful, when compared with horrible. How could we appreciate beauty if there wasn’t also something ugly? It seems the hard places in life make space for heaven in our hearts. A place where every tear is wiped away can only be appreciated fully if you have shed a few buckets of your own already.
My day was full today with dragging three rambunctious boys and a fussy toddler all over town and being completely frazzled with the task of simply keeping everyone together and out of harms way. By five o’clock I was feeling the weight and stress of all my little people. After Morgan got home all six of us took dinner to another family with small children. Tragically, the father in the family passed away a few weeks ago very suddenly. The wife was so kind to us while we were there. She asked about us and our children and we chatted for a while. Then we left and I felt all the unfairness of our situations. I was going home with my husband and hers was gone. My children will see their daddy tomorrow and hers won’t. I learned something about gratitude tonight, and a lot about humility and the distance between it and my daily selfish thoughts.
Michelle
I think this is a great post! Such great points Carrie, thanks for sharing :)I've been thinking a lot lately about how God is the great Author of our lives and how creative He is. And how He uses the negative turns in the story to make it a better story. You said it perfectly!