SAND PAPER

Who among us doesn't have fond memories of a sandbox or playing in sand at a lake or ocean beach? I sure do, and so do my children and grandchildren. Because the ocean, especially, provides such a tempting writing surface close to the water's edge, you've probably (like me) taken a stick and written messages in the just-exposed, packed sand. How many people in love have written their names that way, joined with a big heart? Oh, young love. Of course, the next tide would erase all that away.

Our back-yard toy-filled “turtle” sandbox has no room for messages in the sand. But it recently reminded me of a quote by the great English preacher Charles H. Spurgeon (1834-1892), the renowned Baptist preacher whose printed sermons still teach and inspire. He said: We are too prone to engrave our trials in marble and write our blessings in sand.

This resonated with me as I pray for folks who repeatedly seek new sympathetic ears for their tales of woe. It's as though that particular life message is engraved into their souls. One mark of Christian maturity is accepting the reality that life isn't perfect. Our life scripts aren't like the movies, where everything turns out okay in the end. “Perfect” isn't earth's language. In His infinite wisdom, sometimes God leaves us in less-than-perfect circumstances to deepen our character and hone our faith. Yet in the midst of it He offers hope.

The book of Isaiah anticipated the fall of the prophet's homeland to a pagan conqueror, Babylon, in about 700 BC. To add insult to injury, there followed a mass Jewish prisoner migration to that land. Isaiah warned it could happen, and it did. But among his stern prophecies were also verses of hope. Because they reflect the character of a loving, forgiving God, they still speak:

Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland....(Isaiah 43:18-19).

Even though removed from “The Holy Land,” the slice of earth where God planned for them to live and thrive, He reminded them that He would never forget them:

See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are ever before me. (Isaiah 49:16)

It brings me great comfort to know that whatever my circumstances—and especially the unwelcome or uncomfortable ones--God is still in control. I'm as close to Him as something inscribed on His hands. He's not confined by current circumstances, but has a redemptive vision for whatever negatives come into my life.

Even better, those things metaphorically “inscribed on His Hands” are permanent, not like the sands erased clean by the tides. They are even better than any sin-tainted scheme we may have come up for living without depending on Him. Or to rework what Spurgeon said so well: we should be willing to inscribe our blessings in heaven's marble, and trace our trials in sand, to be erased by His nail-pierced Hand of love.