Lens

The leaves sparkled with icy crystal's as the crisp cold Michigan air laid down it's frosty covering in the night. As I walked out this morning heading to work I couldn't help but notice the freshness, and cleanliness as the air raced up through my sinus' and my lungs seized the life giving oxygen. This is one of the many small things I am grateful for this morning as I wake back to my first day in the States in a week. But the same sun that greeted me this morning is the same one that has greeted me some 2000 miles away each day this past week. My eyes drink in the beauty around me as I look at the canvas of the landscape that is uniquely Northern Michigan. I have often said I struggle taking in the beauty that is Haiti, my eye for details see the savagery that has happened to this tropical landscape, they see what is to be as opposed to what now is, and my heart weeps for what is. It gives me some perspective of what God sees when sin has devastated the landscape of the lives He has created, and created to be this beautiful tropic of radiance and beauty that gets raped by the destructive power of sin and corruption. But something new is happening for me in Haiti, I am beginning to see what can be again, the tapestry of what is has had a filter placed by the heart of God in my heart, so that I can see through the lens of His eye what grace is doing. And its a marvelous thing to behold. We all want things in our lives fixed instantly, the only thing promised to be fixed instantly by God is the cleansing of our heart, the rest is often a process of beauty restored across days, and months, and years. Like any restoration process, at certain times we can begin to see the end product emerging. This happened for me this trip, restoration is happening in hearts, in community, and in the country. Little things here and there. This is what's on my mind as I immerse myself again in my own culture this morning, and thought I would share. As I head for work, I'm grateful for a job, for a life calling, and for the life-giving grace of God that has not diminished one fraction in its power to redeem all that has been lost, is being lost, or is being restored! Blessings today!