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My Aching Back and Why White-Out Doesn't Always Work


On a recent trip to our local home improvement store, I was helping my husband pick out boards. We are remodeling our 1960s-era kitchen, and he is cutting and staining cabinet doors. So, I was being a little picky.

The first board had strap marks across it. The second board had a big knot hole in the center. And the third board wrenched my back.

Ouch. I could feel my muscle twinge when I twisted just the wrong way. The board wasn't that heavy - just awkward. But I felt it. I knew I was in trouble.

Two days later, I'm taking a prescription tablet of cyclobenzaprine and Advil, and wishing I wasn't so old. I'm also wishing I could take back that one moment. Why didn't I settle for board #2?

Then yesterday, we went to pick up a piece of vintage treasure from a seller on Craigslist. $25. A bargain. I'm still a bit leary of meeting unknown sellers - and we were meeting at the storage facility which was fairly deserted. Just in case, I took my wallet out of my purse and hid it under my car seat. But it turned out just fine. The deal was made. $25 was a steal. And then we backed up our car to leave. I heard a whoosh of air.

We had backed up over a bolt. My husband was not happy. Luckily, the car made it safely home, and today Milt was able to repair the hole. But I wished that I could reverse time for just a moment. I wanted to rewind and have a do-over.

Have you ever felt like that?

What if you hadn't done that one last thing that wrecked havoc with your life?

When I was in college, they had these fancy new typewriters that let you back up and "automatically" erase with built in white-out tape. So cool. They let me undo my typing errors so almost no one could see.

But life isn't like that, is it? We have no back up ability. We can't rewind. We can't white it out. What's done is done. No crying over spilled milk, so they say.

So as I sit here - my back aching and looking at my Kia Soul with the bolt hole now patched, I realize that life goes on. We are a bit beat up, a little scarred, but we're still chugging. Moving forward - sometimes with a limp.

The only do-over that really works is God. How thankful I am that I believe in a God who forgives, who wipes my slate clean, who lets me heal and be purified even when I mess up -big time. Scripture tells us that even though are sins are scarlet, we will be made white as snow (Isaiah 1:18) And having tried to get stains out of carpet, I love that metaphor.

We will be made clean. Good as new. Better than a rewind because it can't be undone or merely covered up. Now, in this life, we will have slips and falls and missteps. Then, with God's help, we will  be purified, complete, perfected, healed.

I like the sound of that. Especially today.

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