Something Beautiful from Something Ugly

During summer vacation in the early years of our marriage Mary and I went on a guided tour of a large cave in Montana – the Lewis Clark Caverns. You walk through these winding and really narrow passageways, admiring the wonders that God has created from stalagmites, stalactites, and underground rivers. When we entered this one large chamber, the guide directed his light to this high vaulted ceiling. You can probably guess what animals we saw hanging out up there - bats, lots of bats. The guide told us that the early explorers of this cave had found large quantities of what she called "bat guano." If you don't know what that is, never mind. It's gross, that's what it is. But they made lots of money selling that stuff. I thought, "What good could bat dung possibly be?" Surprise - they make gunpowder out of it! And even more surprisingly, they can turn that gross stuff into makeup - like mascara and lipstick! Makes me think twice about kissing my wife!

Well, that got me thinking about "Something Beautiful From Something Ugly." It's amazing how people can turn something seemingly useless and ugly into something useful and even beautiful. It's much more amazing how God does that with our lives! In fact, He's wanting to do that for you - to make something beautiful and useful of the ugliest things that have happened in your life.

One way He does that is described in God's Word- 2 Corinthians 1:3-4: "The Father of compassion and the God of all comfort... comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God."

I don't know what kind of "troubles" you've been through - it could be anything from sickness, to abuse, to addiction, to grief - but whatever the trouble, I know it's made you need the Lord more than ever before. And so you experienced His compassion, His comfort, His strength, and His support in deeply personal ways.

Now, in a sense, God wants you to be for other hurting people what He has been for you. That's how He takes the worst things that ever happened to you and makes them into something beautiful. Amy was in our daughter Sara’s class throughout school. She was the daughter of the vice-principal of Frontier Collegiate Institute in Cranberry Portage, MB. She seemed to have everything going for her - good looks, smarts. But inside she was a lonely, hurting girl. She came to camp and accepted Christ. She faithfully attended church. I had her in my Sunday School class for a couple of years. She went overseas to attend a Bible School in New Zealand and there found the love of her life.

Mary & I were invited to attend her after-wedding in Saskatchewan. She shared with me how lonely her growing up years had been - she had considered suicide many times in her early adolescent years. Instead, she gave her life to Christ. She said if it hadn't been for camp and church she didn't think she would have survived and she thanked me for being an encouragement to her during those years. Today she and her husband are still in New Zealand - with two lovely children and teaching in a Bible Institute impacting other young lives. She and her husband have a ministry to people. She knows how to help lonely people because she had been lonely. She knows that Jesus can make something beautiful out of your life.

Sharon, another friend, was sexually abused by an uncle in her youth. When she brought that awful garbage to Jesus, He began to heal her emotionally and spiritually. She went on to have a vital ministry at Winkler Bible Institute for many years and was a popular speaker at Simonhouse Bible Camp Youth retreats. Today she has a teaching and counseling ministry in B.C. and happily married to Kevin who is involved in pastoral ministry. Her history of abuse became her strange credentials for caring for abuse victims.

My friend Brent has a tremendous ministry to young people from the inner city. For many years he directed Pembina Valley Bible Camp in southern Manitoba and today directs Brightwood Ranch Camp at Evansburg, AB a ministry of Hope Mission out of Edmonton. What makes him so effective is his tender and compassionate attitude toward kids, especially those from the inner city. You know why? He says it's because he remembers the hurt he experienced as a child in a terribly dysfunctional home living in the inner city of Winnipeg. God has recycled his wounds into a life-changing compassion. He is happily married with 4 exuberant children.

God wants to do that for you - if you'll bring Him all that pain, all those wounds, all those memories of the dark times of life. He wants to take all that ugly stuff - stuff that looks like its useless - and He wants to turn it into a treasure - into something very beautiful - a tender, compassionate, helping heart in you. Because of what Christ can do with the waste of our lives, the ones who have been hurt the most turn out to be some of the greatest healers in the world.

Treasures of Darkness

It’s interesting to me that although Christmas and New Years are often deemed as celebrative points in life it is also that period of the year in which people sometimes experience times of greatest despair. Instead of a sense of joy and light, darkness and anguish threaten to envelope the soul.

How do you respond when circumstances and situations bring you into a dark period in your life? Wes, a friend of mine was diagnosed with a brain tumour in late summer. The initial news came as a shock to him and his family. Fear and uncertainty were their constant companions. Dinah, his wife decided to journal and blog their journey in this period of darkness. Both Wes and Dinah have a solid faith in the sovereignty and love of God. As I have followed her blog during Wes’ surgery and subsequent radiation and chemo treatment, I see a resiliency of faith, hope and courage. This in the midst of the gloom that threatens to shroud the reality of God’s love and care. I see an enlarged faith and increased strength to face life head-on no matter what the outcome will be.

Another one of our friends experienced the devastation of their 21 year old son’s suicide in October. As we met with them over the New Year we heard an incredible story of pain, anguish - a period of deep darkness and despair combined with resilient hope, courage and renewed confidence and trust in God’s sovereignty. They told of us of lessons they were learning which they could have learned in no other way. My wife and I understand much of that since we have been down that same road almost 8 years ago when we lost our dear 22 yr old son to suicide following a devastating bout with schizophrenia.

As I reflect on these experiences of pain and darkness in the rough places of life I recall a passage from the prophet Isaiah. In Isaiah 45:3: “I will give you the treasures of darkness, riches stored in the secret places, so that you may know that I am the Lord, the God of Israel, who summons you by name.”

There is something to be gained in the dark periods of our life journey. If we trust in the God who has promised to care for us then He will also reveal “treasures” and “riches” in the least expected places. Author Gerald Sitzer in his book A Grace Disguised: How the soul grows through loss shares how the most difficult experiences of life can actually shape our soul. Like garbage thrown into the compost actually becomes the very thing that enriches the soil, so our periods of darkness can yield treasures that enrich our soul.

It is a strong faith in God and the sense of His presence that gives enabling strength. Both of our friends have stated that they don’t know how they could go through their experience without a faith in God. In the midst of their pain and darkness they are seeing new “treasures” that can’t be gleaned anywhere else. And they are experiencing God’s promise that He will “go before them and make the rough places smooth.” Isaiah 45:2

So what “treasures” have you discovered in your dark place?