Restoration & Renovations

One of my favourite things to watch growing up were home renovation shows. I know. Kind of lame. My favourite show on the channel to watch were the ones where one host would try to find the perfect new home for a family to move into, and the other host would try to transform and restore their current home into the perfect living space through deep home renovations.

I began to notice something interesting the more invested I got in the shows. Each time, the families would come into the process desperate for newness; desperate to get out of their current situation and into something brand new. However, I began to notice that more often than not, the family, in the end, would choose to stay in their newly restored home rather than choosing the brand new option to move into. I was always curious about why these families, from many different walks of life all over the country, would make the same choice over and over again. 

This theme of renovation and more specifically, restoration, came up in my prayer time recently. As I sat it in, this little memory of home renovation shows came up and helped me to articulate what God was speaking to me.

So often in our lives we desire a blank slate. A fresh start. Something brand new. I’ve often felt this way, the urge to just “pick up, leave and move across the country” to experience a brand new way of life. 

While desiring newness is good, I think there is something disordered about looking at newness in such a radical way. We see the solution so often as “out there”; as something external or exterior, when often, I think that desire points to something interior, something internal that is restless.

That rather than the solution being a brand new job, a brand new city, a brand new set of friends, a brand new parish or even a brand new heart, Jesus wants to bring restoration to our lives and our hearts as they are. 

I’ll be honest. That’s a really uncomfortable option. Let’s compare it to my home renovation show again.

While picking up and moving objectively seems like a stressful project (and truly it is), for most families in the shows I watched, the prospect of just packing up and unloading into a brand new space seems much easier than the alternative. Packing up one's home, cleaning up the junk and then living in that space while the home is torn down and built back up again seems, simply put, messy. It is much easier and more appealing to simply move into a new space, new walls and new life then have to deal with the mess and live through a home renovation. 

The same is true in our hearts and lives. It seems so much more uncomfortable to let Jesus work renovations in our lives. Because it means I have to expose the internal. It's not just enough to vacuum, dust and sweep. I need to move furniture, clean out cupboards, open that closet that I haven’t opened in a while. You get the idea.

Jesus has done these deep, deep renovations in my heart over the last two years. I imagine in time He will continue to do more. 

But each and every time, when the renovations are reaching completion, when the dust is settling and the mess has been cleared, I can take a deep breath and look around and feel at peace. 

Because our hearts are precious to the Lord. He crafted our hearts and knit us together in His own image.

Only the Creator is capable of restoring his Creation.

Only the Master Builder is able to restore His perfect design.

Only Jesus can restore our hearts.

I don’t want to run. I don’t want to hide. I have run away and hid for far too long. You probably have too.

The newness you desire can only be found when we present Jesus with all we are, just as we are.

When we open the door of our hearts and say “Here is the mess. Here is the clutter. There is nothing hidden. Jesus, I need you. I need restoration.”

And just watch what Jesus will do. 

I promise you, restoration is worth the wait. 

Restoration is worth the mess.

Restoration is worth it.