Restoration is a gift

♥Restoration is a gift.

“I guess I didn’t realize my mom had given me a gift,” I said to daughter-Amerey as we headed to an antique mall.

“Mom, you gave me the gift too! All of us girls have the gift!”

I have never lived in brand new turn-key house, at least one that I didn’t see projects that needed completed. That is not to say that I haven’t lived in a nice house with a roof, windows, walls and all the necessary items. I even lived in base housing where all the walls were white. Everything was functional, not beautiful. But I had a Mom who loved beautiful things. She loved restoring furniture and homes. After my step-father retired from the military, we bought an old farmhouse, trekking from Denver, Colorado to small town in WV to find it. That old farmhouse boasted a pepto bismal pink mantel and many, many, many layers of wall paper.

After school would find mom stripping layers of paint off of hundred year old wood and some of us girls right next to her. What a thrill it was for her to watch that paint remover bubble up, scrape the putty knife and see that glorious wood. Years before the farmhouse, Mom was always antiquing. Finding an old buffet and chopping the legs off, then refinishing it to suit her style. Our stereo sat on that buffet for years. Now it sits at the end of my bed.

She gave me the gift restoration. As a girl, I didn’t appreciate the gift. To see a stack of baseboards waiting for me at the end of a long school day was not always a welcome sight, but it gave me something to do.

 

So, I picked up the habit. I renovate. I think my girls have the habit to. Right now, I have a corner hutch waiting for me to put a few coats of polyurethane on it.  I antiqued it granny smith apple green.

But, Mom didn’t just renovate furniture. She made something beautiful out of something someone intended to discard. She believed in restoration.

And Mom also gave me the gift of seeing a broken person as someone valuable.She believed in the restoration of people too. You see, God is the great renovator. He believes in restoration. He walks through the world flea market and finds discarded treasures and he restores them.He combs the world-wide orphanage and looks for the abandoned, rejected and lost. And he gives them the gift of restoration.

He refreshes and restores my life (my self); He leads me in the paths of righteousness [uprightness and right standing with Him—not for my earning it, but] for His name’s sake.-Psalm 23:3

If you feel broken, discarded, unwanted, not the best flea market find, know this friend- Jesus sees you as a valuable find. To Him you are a treasure. He can see past the pepto bismal pink paint and He can see you restored to the glory that is already in you. It is there. The glory of you is just hidden under your guilt, your shame and your self-loathing. He doesn’t give you value. You already have it. He paid the highest price for you while you were on the discard table in the back of the flea market. He ran straight for you. Then He paid in cash with His life. Jesus believes in restoration and He wants you sitting at the refurbished family table. He saved a special place just for you, the antique, walnut, refinished chair! ♥♥♥