Isn’t it amazing the vast differences in every human being? Every person contains the incredible beauty, crazy talent, brilliant minds, and all the other array of nuances that make up an individuals authentic personhood.
I happened to be taking a walk recently with my children and dogs in Redding to finally enjoy a day of sunshine after weeks of rain. We like to go to the river trail near the beautiful Sundial Bridge. This place has several types of gardens as you walk along the path. Almost at the very end it contains this whimsical children’s garden. It has little play things for small children to play on or in, it also has this beautiful mosaic art piece that serves as a seating area and has a cute little mosaic fountain. When we approached the garden a sign was posted that said, “Closed for renovation”. The fountain has plastic wrapped around it and it was empty of water. I thought, ‘why does it say closed, because it doesn’t contain a door that you can lock and there was no rope around to keep us out’? I made my way over the mosaic bench and sat down while the girls went exploring.
As my evening progressed, I couldn’t stop thinking about that garden. “Closed for Renovation” kept coming to me. I couldn’t help but think that it sometimes seems that God puts a sign up and says, “Closed for Renovation”. I know, it’s funny, but it’s true. How many times have you had God say, “Ok, enough of that. It’s time to make some changes”. As He begins to chip away, prune, saw, hammer, clean, and finally buff you to a shine, you’re thinking the whole time…OMG He’s killing me and I’m not going to survive.
When a mosaic is formed, it is made from tiny pieces of glass that have been broken and shattered. The beauty with this is that usually, this glass came from something originally created that was beautiful. Then it gets broken into small pieces and slowly but surely the artist begins to create another beautiful masterpiece with all the small broken pieces of glass. The amazing thing about being broken is that it all ends up into pieces that are different sizes and shapes. All these stunning pieces of colored glass are then taken by the artist and placed into particular arrangements. It’s hard to see what the artist sees until it is complete and you see the stunning masterpiece that has been brought from vision to existence.
May I suggest to you that God may sometimes set aside a time or a season where you are “Closed for Renovation”. In this time, He wants to take who you are and He says, “I see you to be even more beautiful than you are now”. Then He begins to take you apart…disassemble you…dismantle you and then starts to prepare the platform of your heart once again. He slowly and lovingly begins to arrange the beautiful broken pieces that use to make up who you were. These pieces are so beautifully arranged and set into place by The Creator of the Universe. When He is done, He washes you, dries you and buffs the shine a bit and then the new masterpiece is ready to be revealed. You finally awake, look in the mirror and are in awe of the absolutely stunning and creative beauty that came from all your broken pieces. God loves to take our broken-ness and turn into something beautiful.
God doesn’t reveal our ugly to the world. He only reveals our beauty because He Is Beauty!
Freely Authentic 