Beauty from Ashes

Written by Dianna Skief, Fellowship Bible Church Celebrate Recovery Devotional Team, 9/25/19
I was searching on the internet one morning for some nice GIF’s to include in a text to say “I love you” to a special someone in my life. I was surprised and horrified when some of the images that came up were very inappropriate and of explicit sexual content. I wanted to stop looking for that good, special image because what I had to wade through to find it was so dirty and made me feel dirty too! Quickly I decided it was not worth continuing the search on the internet and turned it off.

This experience made me think of how God is willing to go trudging through the muck of this world to come looking for us, His treasures. He doesn’t choose to turn away, even if He finds us covered in dirt and sludge from this fallen world.
He searches, and digs, until He finds what He knows is precious. Then He lifts us up and begins to slowly and carefully remove the grime from our hearts and lives, and He continues to take the time to clean us up and polish us until we’re shining bright.

I am so grateful God doesn’t just look at this world, and at me quite frankly, turn His head in disgust, & walk away!
Psalms 149:4 says “For the Lord takes pleasure in His people; He will beautify the afflicted ones with salvation.”

I am so grateful God took the time to look beneath my sin-covered soul, pick me up, and begin the processes of beautifying every part of me so I can shine for Him.

The images I saw on the internet weren’t good for me to view. I couldn’t handle the bad thoughts they triggered. I needed to turn away from those images because they were effecting me in a negative way.
God, however, is strong enough to handle what has been tainted by sin. He is pure and holy and nothing can change Him or effect His character. His power is greater than the sin that stains us, and He uses it to cleanse us completely. It may take time for Him to fully remove the effects of sin from our lives, but when He’s done, we will shine in the light of His Son.

2 Corinthians 4:6-7 says “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.”

Let's pray:  Thank you God, for being willing to search through the waste heaps of this world, to find me, Your treasure, stuck and buried among the refuse. Thank you for pulling me out of the filthy rubbish and taking the time to scrub me clean and polish my heart so that it shines for You. I am truly grateful!  Amen


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