I’m currently renovating my bedroom, and what I was hoping would take a few days has turned into what will probably be a few weeks. I started sanding down the stucco on my ceiling, wishing to finish it in one day, but it’s turned into a four day process.
Isn’t that like life sometimes? We jump into something assuming it’ll pass quickly and we can move on to bigger and better things (like painting the walls), but it turns out that it is a far bigger time commitment or that there are a lot more steps involved?
Five years ago I renovated my old bedroom and had to go through the same process of scraping down the plastered on stucco pattern. I spent day after day in my room chipping away at it. I can’t help but feel that that is what it’s like for God when He’s working on us.
Over the past several months, I’ve grown in inexplicable ways. God has taught me so much, and I’m now beginning to walk into a season of restoration in my own life. God is stripping off the old scabs on my heart, filling in the holes from my past and replacing them with new, life-bringing Truth and putting a fresh coat of paint on it all so that I might catch the eye of an onlooker. That someone could look at my life and see God at work, see His amazing grace being poured over me as he renovates my heart.
I’ve been recognizing that when we desire change and growth, it often becomes a much bigger project that what we originally anticipated. We think, or dream, that it will be an overnight process. That we can have some good prayer at night and in the morning we will be a new person. How often are we disappointed when that isn’t the case?
God’s work in us takes time. It is a process with countless steps, because we never reach the point of perfection. Just like a house, there are always things that can be improved and upgraded. Our hearts are full of so much baggage, wounds and sin that it takes our entire lives to become God’s restored people. Romans 12:1 is a great example of this. We are to continue pursuing perfection because the end goal of Heaven with Jesus is well worth the hard work and time.
I have loved working on my room, as intense as it has been, because as I’ve been working on the appearance of my room, God has been working on the state of my heart. He has been teaching me so much and giving me a much needed getaway. It’s given me a place to cry to Him, worship Him and listen to His truth.
I’m so thankful that God gives us these analogies to help us grow. He teaches us each in such unique ways to grab our attention.
What is in you that needs restored? Where are you willing to let God work, no matter how long or daunting the task, because God’s work in you is never finished.
Have a blessed day,
-Sadie