Coffee Stains: The Beauty of Inward Renewal

Recently I’ve become a small fan of Facebook. My kids are all on it and it‘s fun to read their updates and have a little idea of what‘s going on in their lives.

An added bonus is that I’ve bumped into some of my high-school classmates. It seems funny to see these “18 year old’s” now. They’ve been running around inside my head for over 40 years, kicking footballs, cutting up in class, and instigating all sorts of adventures, young and full of life, each one of them. Only, these pictures on Facebook only resemble them–the ladies excepted of course. The male branch of my memories has abandoned the flush beauty of youth for bigger bellies, wrinkles and grey hair/white hair/or no hair. Part of me wants to yell out, “Yes! I‘m not the only one.” But another part of me wonders where all this is going. This is not heading in a more beautiful direction unless I find a beauty shop somewhere that lives up to its‘ name. Though the old body doesn’t seem to be getting prettier and my school-girl figure gets rounder, there is one area of my life in which I can get better looking all the way to the end of this earthly life.

“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” ( 2 Cor. 4:16-18, NIV)

If I get hungrier to know the Lord Jesus, and I devour his word and spend time with him in prayer, if I serve and obey him with all my heart, I start to look more and more like him. How do I get hungrier? By eating! Sounds crazy but the more I engage my spiritual tastebuds, the more I develop a taste for the things of God. And I‘ll get better and better looking all the way to the end of this earthly life. As for my body, I‘ll keep doing my best but I feel like I‘m bailing water out of the Titanic. You young people are laughing. Come see me in twenty years and if I can still see, I‘ll laugh at you.

Hmmm …

“Just pray for a tough hide and a tender heart.” Ruth Graham