BEFORE AND AFTER
That first Easter it was the weeping that caught me completely by surprise. Apparently, tears are not concerned with indiscretion. They simply streamed down my rounded cheeks at the most curious time, locking eyes with complete strangers, sitting across my desk from clients I knew well. I prided myself on being so professional. But there I was, gulping back something that felt like a beautiful and tender humanity revealed.
Looking back, I think it was the total lack of embarrassment that was telling, my body's organic confirmation of my decision to live a life of faith.
Before that Easter, I thought I understood the gravity of what had transpired—
Six trials. The betrayal of a treasured friend. The pleading with His Father. The mocking crown of biting thorns. The whipping until He bled.
But the day after that first Easter, it was as if a part of me had either finally come to life…or was put to death.
To write this brings the same physiological response as holding back tears—The stiffness in my neck. The burning in my chest. Pain, it seems, is what the body goes through when something held, is meant to be released.
All those years of keeping everything close, the enemy cells disguised as composure, covertly having their way within. I am gutted by the revelation, the magnitude of all we put our own bodies through, the anguish for no reason and of our own design.
In contrast I reflect on this suffering with a purpose.
Sometimes the only way to build up, is to strip away. How extraordinary to realize that through all the years of renovating neglected homes, it was a part of me that was forsaken, despite a life that seemed so full.
As I scroll through 280 million posts at #beforeandafter, I am struck that we are obsessed with memorializing the reshaping of our homes and bodies…but what of the renewing of our minds?
Perhaps there is no image to depict the agony that the soul experiences on its way to After.
And then I remember all those day-after-Easter-tears streaming down my face.
Renovating homes…and lives… is messy business—
I have stood in its debris and breathed in the stench of decay and dust,
I have picked the tiny splinters from my fingers,
nursed the weeping blisters in the palms of my hands.
There is no way to After without going through.
There is no renovation worthy of admiration without first resurrecting you.
It seems the Befores that mesmerize and inspire are the ones most homely, most disregarded, most in need. I crave the flaws, chase after them as if they are my mischievous children. There, tucked inside the blemishes and scars, is a mission we share with our Creator.
That is, To Create.
Isn't it extraordinary that [our] imperfection was cured by a kind of unearthly, “other” beauty that we can never fully grasp?
Before. Then After. No transformation I imagine or design can ever come close. But I am compelled to try.
Now, if anyone is enfolded into Christ, he has become an entirely new person. All that is related to the old order has vanished. Behold, everything is fresh and new.
2 Corinthians 5:17 TBT