Work of grace – Marilyn R. Gardner

It snowed yesterday. Huge flakes came down and painted the world white and fluffy. It was that perfect sort of snow. The light, pretty, I can see each separate flake kind of snow.

The fact that I just wrote the word ‘pretty’ in the same sentence as ‘snow’? This is evidence of Grace. My attitude toward yesterday’s snow is evidence of Grace.

When we left Massachusetts to move to Phoenix in 2003, I wiped the snow off my boots and vowed I would never see a snowflake again. Snow represented all that is cold and hurtful. It represented a place that didn’t like me. It represented alienation and pain and crisis after crisis. And I stepped off the plane in Phoenix into sun and expansive blue desert sky and all that was behind me.

And then five years ago we moved back in the middle of December. Back to four feet of snow. Back to the cold.

We moved back and I was terrified. Terrified that I would once again feel alienated in a cold Northeast world.

So yesterday, as I walked slowly to the subway with frequent stops to catch the beauty of the snow, was evidence of His Grace. This transformation — this would never have happened without some deep soul-work, like a surgeon with a sharp scalpel cuts into the skin and carefully removes the diseased tissue. It is, without doubt, the work of God in me – and the evidence may seem silly, but to me it’s miraculous. I stop and I take pictures of snow. I smile as the snowflakes hit my nose and make my scarf wet. I don’t hate where I live.

This is evidence of Grace. My delight in the snow all around is evidence of God-given Grace.

Where do you see evidence of Grace?

“When he arrived and saw evidence of the Grace of God, he was glad and encouraged them all to remain true to the Lord with all their hearts”. Acts 11:23