Recycled

Recycled

A  pot simmers on low, side items for tonight’s thrown together meal ,dishes being put away so a dish full of the weekends coffee mugs, glasses, and outdated, fridge cleaned out Rubbermaid, can go in the dishwasher, and  I work to make room for clean glasses. Sighing, I look at a beautiful, hand crafted coffee mug, I purchased last year and after only one relaxed morning cup of joe, an unsteady shelf collapse, broke it. It’s sat, taking up space, with mended cracks, unusable, since before Christmas and tonight, I removed it from the shelf and placed it in the recycle bin. Walking back to an outstretched dishwasher, the chorus from this morning’s praise song played over in my head….. I come broken, to be mended……  over and over I hear this song, until I listened to Savior speak……. This is what I do, He spoke, I recycle you, into something new.

Revelation 21:5

Then He who sat on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” And He said to me, “Write, for these words are true and faithful.”

Instructed to pull the cup from the recycle bin, I begin to study it and it wasn’t long before tears fell, as I bowed my head and said, I don’t know that I can transcribe the power behind the message.

The cup, though broken, is still a cup. A crack filled with glue is near the handle, but the beautiful design of the potter is still in place. The handle, once completely broken off, is glued backed together,  with pieces forever lost, jagged edges run sharp, but the handle holds strong, though the outline is no longer smooth and a deep rivet leaves space between the thumb rest and the curve of the handle. The inside shows signs of cracking, but the swirling the potters hands made while spinning the cup into shape are still lovely. When turning the cup over, the artist signature is there. This my friends, is when my breath caught and I was lost in a sea of tears. The song from this morning worship blaring, and my head bowed, I cried out to Savior and thanked Him for turning my brokenness into testimony.

His signature has always been there….and my friend, when I came to know Jesus, I came broken. I was an angry young woman that wanted nothing to do with a God that could have healed my dying mother, but did not. Broken, with cracks, rough edges, rivets where pieces of me were forever lost and His signature was there and on that day, He Recycled me. He changed me into a new person. He took all the life choices that had broken what the Potter spun, and turned those cracks into testimonies.

Father, show them they are but clay, spun together by the Potter, and broken by the world, but they can be made new, recycled by the blood of Jesus Christ. Come broken, to be mended, by the blood of Jesus Christ, Just as you are, oh Father, this is my prayer. Just as, we are……. Amen.