Add to the Beauty

Well, the laptop is currently under the weather. Pray for it's speedy recovery...in the meatime, my old desktop friend will help me out while I empty my overflowing mind and heart today. I want to share with you yet another song that has touched my soul profoundly:

Add To The Beauty
by Sara Groves and Matt Bronleewe

We come with beautiful secrets
We come with purposes written on our hearts, written on our souls
We come to every new morning
With possibilities only we can hold, that only we can hold

Redemption comes in strange place, small spaces
Calling out the best of who we are

And I want to add to the beauty, to tell a better story
I want to shine with the light that's burning up inside

It comes in small inspirations
It brings redemption to life and work, to our lives and our work
It comes in loving community
It comes in helping a soul find it's worth

Redemption comes in strange places, small spaces
Calling out the best of who we are

This is grace, an invitation to be beautiful
This is grace, an invitation

Isn't that glorious? The Revolution girls are meeting on Thursday nights to go through the book "Captivating" by John & Stasi Eldredge. Last night was our first meeting. I am so excited to embark on this journey with such incredible women! Their beauty blinds me sometimes as God gives me a glimpse of who they really are inside - the woman they try so hard sometimes to keep a secret!

We played this song to end the study because I thought it summed up perfectly what we were talking about. Each and every person on this planet comes to this life with beautiful secrets and purposes written on their hearts and souls. I think this is especially hard for women sometimes. We struggle with who we are and why we're here and if we're worth anything at all except to give and serve and work and nurture and take everything on our shoulders. But God made us in a special way so that we can take on a lot and so that we can serve and nurture and work. It's just that we forget to take care of the most important part of ourselves...our hearts. We forget that we have an inner need to be romanced by God, to be a part of something bigger than ourselves, to fill a space no one else can, and last but not least to have beauty.

Each time I hear this song, I am overwhelmed by the passion that it stirs in me - I want so much to add to the beauty of this world, of this kingdom God is building, of life. I want to tell a better story than the one that has been told to me - than the one I've told up to now. I want to shine with a light so brilliant and so radiant - a light that is absolutely consuming me! I want to find redemption in the forgotton places of my life - I want those places to bring out the best in me. I want to take God up on His awesome invitation of grace - a chance to be beautiful! I have never been what anyone would call beautiful. I never will be. I can mostly accept that - I don't like it much, but hey, you have to just work with what you've got, ya know? But God extends an invitation through His grace to be just that - beautiful! I'm going to jump at it - how about you?

How about we jump together?

Let's find this beauty in the everyday small inspirations, in our lives, in our work. Let's find it in community with each other, in helping each other find our worth in Christ. Let's remind each other that we are the crown of creation - not just an afterthought. We are here to fill a spot so vital and so important that no one else can do it but us!

Maybe you don't see any beauty around you right now - that's ok - I understand. Father God, I pray that You would reveal the incredible beauty in each person who reads this blog. I pray that You would, through Your Holy Spirit, pursue and woo each one with a relentlessness they can't deny. Romance us, oh Lover of our Souls! Whisper the beautiful secrets You have placed in our hearts. We love You, Jesus - the Source of all true beauty. Amen.