Grace & Time
I have been pondering the question— “Can your life really change in a year?”
Like— actually & drastically change for the better?
This morning as I left our room after making the bed, I stopped and turned around. It struck me how beautiful our bedroom was in the soft morning light.
I had to snap a picture.
Then I had to scroll through my pictures to remember what this room looked like one year ago when we moved in.
The room is still in progress. We haven’t finished repairing and restoring the original vintage door, there’s still caulking and painting to do, the main bedroom door needs to be hung— but the space is almost unrecognizable from what it was before.
Sometimes when I’m quiet I feel the house speak—
“Look at the changes I’ve gone through in a year. Look at the light and warmth, cleanliness and peace here. Can you believe how different things look now?”
If a bare wood skeleton of a house clothed in drywall and beautified with paint can have such a dramatic transformation— I feel that even bigger things are possible for a living soul built from the most complex and beautiful harmony of flesh, bone, and intelligence.
In October, during a very painful, confusing, and uncertain time of my life my mom simply said, “What if a year from now you’re living you’re best life?”
“What if everything works out?”
“What next year you don’t even recognize the life you are living now?”
“What if things turn out better than you expect?”
What if a year from now you turn around and say (like a little neglected house) “Can you believe how different things look now?”
I don’t know how it all works but I do know that our efforts however small and inconsistent do add up over time. And yes, consistency will get you there faster (and with better results), but God can also work with inconsistency.
It’s like magic.
Except it’s not magic. Its Christ’s grace. I think Christ’s grace touches everything & covers all things— people and houses. Ive seen it in motion. Somehow it works through our DIY, borderline sketchy, very imperfect efforts to restore a house and makes the end result better than we deserve.
I think it covers our lives more than we realize. For me, I find grace in time.
After loss, time felt cruel. It felt cruel to have to keep living with so much heaviness and grief. It felt unbearable to bury my child and keep living. Time felt like punishment— like a jail sentence. If I could’ve prayed myself dead after Kalea’s death, I wouldn’t be here. I lay in bed those first few weeks and prayed for it. Wished for it. Begged for it.
But I didn’t die so I kept living.
And yet, at some point, time started to feel like a gift again. It felt like a gift to go forward in life having experienced so much loss and heaviness. It felt like a gift to know so intimately about death and still be living. And it felt like a gift that my life isn’t over yet and that there’s still more to do.
If it’s a house, if it’s a goal, if it’s your life, just keep going. 💛 a year can change everything.