the lesson of a staple

I can pretty much tell you that having a paint brush in my hand can only mean one thing - I am going to be learning a lesson that has very little to do with painting.
I am not a good painter.
I am messy, I know it and I am OK with it.
These lessons began when I was in art school.
Back then, I felt creative and productive, these days it feels more like I am cleaning up someones crap.
Maybe it's my crap that needs cleaning up and it just so happens when I am painting I am finally still and can actually hear!
Either way, this isn't what I wanted to be doing, I had no grace for it.
It was going to take too long and I had a long "to-do" list.

Yet, the lesson was pretty straight forward - sin is like a staple.

With paint brush in hand, I stood in the porch feeling completely overwhelmed.
I started with this room because I could see this could be my favorite room in the house.
Maddie suggested we call it the "quite room".
A room just for reading, meaning, in no way shape or form was Parker allowed to come in and bug her.
Nice try Maddie!
For me, it was the room where God first started to bring restoration to our lives after returning from Haiti by replacing things we had to sell and/or give up when we moved.
He started with things that had been near and dear to my heart.
A few weeks prior to moving into our house He replaced our patio furniture, a.k.a. veranda furniture depending on what neighborhood you live in.
For three hundred dollars, a divine appointment and a fantastic garage sale, I had furniture I could have only dreamed of having.
It was not "just" furniture, it was a whole room full of furniture including lamps, tables, a topiary, silk plants and other nick knacks.

I just wanted to paint the stupid room and be done with it.
I was hot.
I was tired.
I had very little energy for the days and weeks of cleaning, painting and repairs that lay ahead in order to get the house ready.
I had done several walk through's surveying the condition of the house, I seemed to be walking in circles not knowing where to start.
I just wanted one finished room in the house and I wanted it quickly.
We had been living out of a suitcase for the past four months, vacation was over, we wouldn't be going back to Haiti, we needed to be settled.
Out of complete frustration I just started painting over what seemed to be five thousand staples that had been put in the window frames to keep plastic and fabric over the poor excuse for forty year old windows.
Why it was done this way was beyond me and it just made me crabby.
My goal was to get it off my list.
The quick fix wasn't working, the paint wasn't helping.
It still looked awful.
I put the paint brush down, went to get a screw driver and a needle nose pliers to get these stupid staples out.
One staple turned into ten, ten turned into a hundred very quickly.

It wasn't long before I could hear the Lord speaking to me about sin in our lives.
We believe our actions serve a purpose by making the best of a bad situation.
Our lives are like really bad windows that let the cold and heat in, we try "fixing it" our way.
Some sin leaves easily, while other sin is in so deep it takes some digging with special tools to get it out, leaving a deep scar.
Either way, it will take a coat of putty and the dreaded sand paper to fill in and smooth over the holes sin has left in our lives.
While we are being sanded, filled and painted we forget the Lord sent us his Son to do these things for us because of His love for us, and we end up looking like jerks in the process because we are in pain.
Suddenly what was once an empty, ugly space has the potential to be something beautiful.
The balm of Gilead has been applied to our wounds, we are walking in the desires of our hearts rather than looking and feeling like the walking wounded who are disqualified by their anger and actions that result from our sin.

Some will never know of our past, or what we used to look like.
As they sit with us, they are amazed at just how far we have come and would have never dreamed in a million years that these things could be true.
All along it was the Lord working in us, creating a room filled with beautiful things and divine appointments so that He can come and sit in the "quite room".