God sees the potential - Monday, December 7 (Advent 2020)
Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
Philippians 1:6
A little over two years ago, we bought our first home together. It was a four-bedroom, fixer-upper, but in our minds, it was a beautiful mansion with so much potential. We had space, we had a home, we had a dream. Right away, we began pouring our love into our home. We moved everything in, began decorating and making it our own. We slowly began renovating, painting, taking out the old and putting in the new. One project led to another, some slower than others, some revealing more work needed, and some coming together beautifully. We were making some progress. Our home was beginning to look like we had always pictured, it gave us so much hope.
We had even begun renovating our unfinished basement and had just finished one entire room when we walked downstairs to our entire basement flooded in sewage. We had worked so hard and now everything had to be torn out. We felt hopeless like we had done all this work for nothing. We poured our hearts into something that seemed unworthy.
After getting over the initial heartbreak, we rolled up our sleeves and began again. We did not see the blessing in all of this in the beginning. But, this was a work of our own hands, we did not have enough money to hire someone, but it was our labor of love. By the end of that winter, we had a beautifully finished basement that almost doubled the square footage of our home.
My point is, in ministry, we work with people who, in a lot of ways, can be compared to our home. God sees the potential; we trust him and help to begin the restoring and renovating process. There are hiccups along the way, minor repairs, easy patches, big tear downs, projects that seem to last for a long time, and projects that come together miraculously. You really feel like progress is being made and then WHAM, sewage backs up and you take several steps back. You wonder why you even started, but you roll up your sleeves and you (figuratively) start shoveling out the poop, wondering if you were even making progress to begin with. Months later, you are still at it and look up and realize: Wow God, you saw this masterpiece the entire time! You just asked us to be faithful. We give you the glory, God, because we didn’t see it. We saw work, steps backward, an impossible outcome but You saw the finished project.
Thank you, Lord, for your mercy and for Your vision of the finished product. Please continue to give us the strength and tools to trust you. In Jesus’ name, Amen.