Because it's all in spite of us anyway …

It was quite the weekend around here (this picture is how I feel inside!). It’s late Sunday night and I haven’t had time to process enough to write, but suffice it to say God showed His amazing grace in spite of me. In the midst of feeling the lowest and most unworthy of His blessing and power, He poured out both in abundance. I’m overwhelmed by His goodness and reminded of this story. I pray it encourages you too:

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I had just received the email from my agent: She had sent over the book proposal to a certain publisher and they were interested. It sounded promising. Chances were they were just receiving it and perusing, perhaps googling my name to figure out who this no-name blueberry-girl was. I clicked down to my next email, from a reader: “Your site hasn’t been working all day…”

What? I click over to here to see. Nothing.

What?! The site is down? I email Jeff. He’s busy, in a meeting. Though I know it’s ridiculous, I feel panicky. We finally have a lead with a publisher and now in the very same hour my site is gone? What on earth?

I begin to pray. And pray. Keep clicking. Still not working. Finally I practice what I preach and go into my bedroom and lower down on my face. Flat.

And remember who He is and who I am.

As clear as an audible voice I hear,

“Everything I have done, I have done in spite of you.”

Three clear pictures come to mind. It’s true:

When I was a Senior in high school I had an interview for the full-ride Ford Foundation Scholarship. Though I was an organized person, I forgot about the interview. The day of I was tooling around the house, when I suddenly realized with horror that my interview was scheduled for that very moment. I threw on clothes, cried my way through the hour drive into downtown Portland, drove the wrong way down a one-way street, and ran in a dead sprint down the sidewalk in high heels. The scholarship committee had waited an hour past the time they were supposed to leave for the day.  I had spent zero time preparing and apologized a hundred times for being late. In spite of my failure, God gracious gave me the scholarship which paid for my entire undergrad and seminary education. Amazing grace.

When I was 22 and God had broken my heart, I had forgotten about Jeff and was convinced no man would ever love me so why try. I was down, discouraged, depressed. I certainly wasn’t doing anything to “get” a guy, in fact if I were a guy I certainly wouldn’t have wanted me! And it was at that lowest point, when I felt ugly, unwanted, and unloved, and God swooped in brought Jeff to me. At the exact moment I felt most unworthy, He showered me with my husband’s love. Amazing grace.

When we were selling our dream home, and I had worked so hard for almost a year trying to sell it, there came the weekend when I hosted a girl’s retreat, and left the house a mess. Jeff had been home with kids and had scurried out the door for church with the house in complete disarray. After 90+ showings of the house being perfect, it was this day that our house sold. It was this day, when our house was most imperfect, that the perfect buyer came and made us an offer. In spite of our mess, our weakness, our imperfections. Amazing grace. 

Isn’t that the beauty of the gospel? God loves to do His work in spite of us. On the day we feel most unworthy, in the midst of a situation we’ve thoroughly botched, when failure is the only emotion we feel, in a way that leaves no shadow of a doubt that He is God and we are not, that all glory and honor belong to Him, who works all things according to the counsel of His will, for the glory of His name.

Everything He has done, He has done despite us.

Rest in that today, dear friends. He does it all despite us.

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(Thanks for reading.}