Devastated – Can I ever be restored?
It’s summer here in Utah and it’s warm. Often to get away from the heat we head to the mountains to cool off and spend a little time at a lake unwinding. Recently drove through an area that had had a devastating fire last fall. The fire burned for weeks destroying nearly an entire mountainside. As we drove up the mountain into the burned area, I was reminded how bad the fire had been. You could see the burned trees still standing, charred and black. Under them no foliage had yet begun to grow back. But what stuck out to me more than the damage done by the fire was the abundance of green around the area. It was such a surprise! The fire had not destroyed everything. You could see areas that looked as though the fire had jumped over it to the next section of trees and bushes. Those green areas were thriving and lush. There were many trees that looked burned up one half of the tree and the other side of the tree was alive and green. It was a surreal juxtaposition. Death and life together. Both life and devastation in the same areas. It was unmistakable that this forest had been damaged in the fire. Devastation had come BUT it was not destroyed beyond repair. In fact, this forest still growing new trees, bushes, grasses and flowers.
My first thoughts about the forest were ones about judgement. Do I judge someone who at first glance doesn’t look perfect or behave the way I think they should? Just like this forest I could look only at the burned parts and see a total mess, ugliness. Or I could see new life growing from a damaged place. How many people do we see on a daily basis that we judge or cast disparaging looks? What if those people had a devastation in the recent past and all we are seeing is the damage? What if I took a minute to see the beauty too?
My second thought, as we continued up the mountain, was about those who experienced the devastation. How often do we experience some tragedy or crushing circumstance in our lives and believe we are now hopeless? We have been crushed and destroyed. Nothing good can come from those events. This is what we say of ourselves in those seasons. But my friend, this is not the truth. Nature proved that to me the day up the mountain. I have also seen this in my life, and more than that God’s word proves that over and over.
Isaiah 43:18-19 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 wilderness and streams in the wasteland. NIV The reminder from this verse is that the growth is happening, sometimes small but it is growing. The second thing I love in this verse, the ability for life giving water where they hadn’t been water previously. God is the one who makes it happen even when there hadn’t been a way before.
2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! NIV See how Paul talks about how in Christ, we have new life. This new life is not qualified by what had happened previously or what will happen after. It is a declaration. We have new life in Christ! The old life is gone.
In Christ, our lives do not have to be death and devastation. In Christ, we can allow Him to bring life to the parts of our lives that seem to hurt to repair. Just like the forest burned by fire our lives can be a witness that life can come even after devastation. In years to come, driving through that area, the damage from the fire will be harder to see. Life will take over more and more until we will forget there was a fire there. But whether now or in the future, we know that although devastation hurts, it’s not final. Life restoration is possible
