Restoration

     Ever restore an old piece of furniture?  I have.  It was a lot of work.  And I loved it!  Several years ago my husband's grandfather's estate was being auctioned.  There was an antique secretary that was in pretty bad shape.  It had been painted over a couple of times and was a very strange shade of a reddish brownish something or the other.  The glass was broken in the door.  And someone who didn't recognize me thought the secretary was being taken out of the family and bid against me!  But I finally won the bid and owned great-grandma Lula Zula's (yes, that was her name) secretary. 
     Well that day was just the beginning of the adventure.  My husband had to drive a 5 hour round trip to bring my treasure home.  As rain was forecast for the whole day, he stopped at a grocery store near the dinky southeastern Oklahoma town where the secretary had been waiting to be picked up and bought a a few rolls of plastic wrap.  Carefully wrapping great-grandma Lula Zula's antique secretary over and over with plastic wrap, he made sure it was completely water proof before loading it into the back of PT the truck and headed for home.  When he arrived at home I couldn't believe all the work he had gone to just to bring home that sad looking prize. But he knew how much it meant to me so he worked extra hard to make me happy.
     After unwrapping the secretary, and unwrapping and unwrapping, I carefully inspected it.  I cleaned out the old pens, rubber bands, pencils and even a role of film (that I later had developed and found nothing but picture after picture of a young child that no one recognized) and wondered who might have used the things inside.  Did my hubby use those pencils to do his homework as a child?  Were those pens used to pay the bills of the large family who grew up in that house?  Anyway, I started cleaning the wood.  The drawers, the shelves, every piece of the entire thing.  And it was still a strange shade of reddish brownish something or the other with a broken glass in the door.
     So I researched.  I visited my favorite antique shop and asked questions.  Then the real work began.  Stripping away the layers of paint and varnish took some time.  It took patience.....something I used to not be very good at....and it took elbow grease.  It took opening the front and back door of the garage to have some air circulation so I didn't pass out.  It took time.  As I worked though, the beauty of the wood underneath all that disgusting paint and filth was starting to come thru.  It was so pretty!  I'm sure great-grandma Lula Zula thought so too, back in the day. 
     After the piece was refinished and the broken glass in the door replaced, we moved it into the house, filled it with other treasures and decorated it with pictures of ancestors, including Lula Zula.  I don't remember how long ago that was but I'm thinking it was about 10 years ago now.  And it still holds a place of honor in our home.
     Thinking about restoring that secretary leads me to another kind of restoration.  Restoration of relationships.  Marriage in particular.  Marriage is a covenant between a man and a woman, ordained by God and blessed by God.  It is an amazing adventure and a beautiful thing.  But sometimes it gets covered in reddish brownish something or the other and the glass in the door gets broken.  Is that time to throw it away?  Never!  It's time to clean out the drawers, keep what is usable inside but throw away the trash.  It's time to scrape off that reddish brownish gunk and reveal the beautiful wood underneath.  It is still there.  What a shame that some couples choose to discard the marriage, even being encouraged by well meaning people to do so, instead of revealing the beauty of where it all began and restoring the love that once ruled the day. 
     Imagine what would happen if churches and communities provided marriage restoration classes and support groups instead of divorce care groups.  Imagine how different our society would be if moms and dads stayed together and worked on things instead of dividing belongings, time with the kids, holidays.  Sound like an old movie maybe?  What it really is though, is God's plan. 
     Many times, before restoration can begin in a marriage, restoration has to be done between the spouses and God.  Each must have a restored relationship with the Lord first.  David knew that.  In Psalm 51, after David's adultery with Bathsheba had been exposed, he wrote, "Create in me a clean heart, O Lord my God.  And renew a right spirit within me.  Cast me not away from Thy presence oh Lord.  Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me.  Restore to me the joy of Thy salvation."  There it is. Restore!  Restoration!   David had lusted after another man's wife.  He committed adultery with her and she became pregnant.  He called her husband back from battle in hopes that he would spend time with his wife and they could hide the fact that she was pregnant with David's child.  That didn't work so David had him killed.  David married Bathsheba.  The baby was born.  The baby died.  David and Bathsheba were punished for their sins.  Then David repented.  He asked God to forgive him.  He asked God to restore his relationship with the Lord.  That is always God's desire, That is always God's desire for families.  That is always God's desire for marriages.  That is always God's desire for our relationship with Him.  God is all about restoration.  Always.