Dear Readers,
As usual, my blog post is long overdue. Regardless, here’s something I’ve been chewing on recently:
For the past…maybe 20 years, (and sometimes to some of the recipients’ chagrin), I’ve been in the habit of crafting most of my Christmas gifts. I love to craft all manner of things, and I’m reminded of this when I start dreaming up Christmas gift ideas in July and poking around JoAnn Fabric & Michaels looking for the best sales.
Ok, straying from the point.
Sometimes I make similar creations, but each gift is somehow unique, because it has the receiver in mind, and because, try as I might, no two handmade crafts are ever exactly alike. Generally, I pour hours and hours into each gift, not because I feel obliged to do that, but because I enjoy doing it, and I take pleasure out of seeing and being a part of the process and beholding the finished product.
Confession time: I tend to get very distracted in the middle of one project, and I have this bad habit of leaving it when I get frustrated, and moving onto the next, more exciting, easier, or more glamorous project. I’ve even been known to abandon some projects altogether. (The pitiful looking fabric store bags sitting with threads and papers hanging out of them are proof of this sad truth).
As I was in one of these “abandon-ship-until-further-notice” sort of moods the other night, I started thinking: I’m so glad God doesn’t treat me like I treat my craft projects! (Ok, yes, funny analogy, but bear with me: to me this fits better than all those sports analogies that always fly right over my head!) As I look at my own life and see myself still struggling with some of the same things I’ve struggled with for years, it would make sense if God just wanted to give up, to move on to someone more yielding, someone more exciting, someone with better potential.
Amazingly, God doesn’t do that with any of His children, because, think about it…if He did that with even one child, wouldn’t we each be concerned that we might be that one exception who God just decided to give up on? I know I would be. Instead, as the Master Craftsman and Creator, He delights in the process of creating each of us individually and uniquely in His likeness, and delights in knowing exactly how beautiful the finished product will be. Every. Single. Time. No exceptions. “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.” – Philippians 1:6
So that means when the fabric is so tough that it breaks the sewing machine needle time and time again, he doesn’t throw the fabric into the depths of the closet to start on something better. Nor is he too lazy or too cheap to go out and buy a new needle. In fact, God spends immeasurably more on each of his creations than we could even dream: He purchases each of us through the death of his Son. Through Jesus, he makes us over again, new and beautiful. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” – II Corinthians 5:17 And he delights in us, His creation!
That’s pretty comforting for me when I see how stubborn I am. It’s also pretty convicting when I realize I treat my students not all that differently from my crafting: smooth sailing as long as the work is easy, but come trouble… Please keep praying that I continue to love these sweet students even as Christ loves me, and that I keep pursuing them even when it costs so much, knowing that God purchased me with the ultimate gift!
(P.S. Thanks for pushing through the crafting analogies with me, even where they fall a little short. Also, last night, I went out and bought a few new sewing machine needles :-P )
