“…all things are become new.” II Cor. 5:17b

The clothespins were starting to fall out of the ripped side of my old blue bag. It was made of that stuff somewhere between paper and fabric, so there was no mending that! Certain that it would not endure another trip to the clothesline, I began pilfering around for a solution, without having to buy another one;  or more likely, wait through several trips to the town of forgotten errands. Rummaging around in my craft supplies, I spied a piece of heavy canvas, so old that I don’t recall what its origin was. The great nieces had used it for a drop cloth once, but it just never felt right to discard it. So, I’d shuffled it around 100 times, more or less.

• One old coat hanger and my wire cutters provided a stabilizer for the back side, where I placed:
•        two grommets from my sewing box, left from a project of three years ago;
•        removed the actual hanger from the old bag to fit through the grommets;
•        used an old spool of brown thread for contrast stitching,

and it’s a new clothespin bag!

Why, you ask, would I care about a clothespin bag? Because for me, and my family, there is nothing that compares with the scent of sheets and pillowcases hung out to dry on the clothesline in the fresh spring air. So that’s the why of that.  As to why I didn’t just go grab another no-trouble replacement at Wal-Mart? There’s a little bit of a DIY’er in me and a lot of cheap, too. So if I can make it out of old parts, and not incur more expense than buying one, why not?

I’m so glad the Lord didn’t just toss me out, but set out to remake, renew, and refurbish me instead. My soul was torn, and my spirit was falling out. The devil was wearing me thin.  But the love of the Father made my soul whole. The Holy Spirit speaks peace to our dismantled spirits through the Word of God. And Jesus Christ sacrificed all the needed materials to make us new.  “This people I have formed for myself; they shall declare my praise” Isaiah 43:21

When God’s people, Israel, had been cast far off, scattered among foreign people and lands, God’s prophet Ezekiel relayed to them that God would restore His people. “Then I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within them, and take the stony heart out of their flesh, and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in My statutes and keep My judgements and do them, and they shall be My people, and I will be their God.” Ezekiel 11:19-20.

Today God’s spiritual Israel, His people, “know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands eternal in the heavens.”  (II Corinthians 5:1, speaking of the resurrection) There is also a renewing in this life that can be a daily blessing. When we as wives, mothers, sisters and friends let each other down, betray our own hearts’ desires and do what we wish we would not; and worse, when we let down the Christ Who gave us the perfect example, we are being the torn ragged old cloths that time and temptation produce. But we have One who loves us much more than we can understand, and He has provided a way to mend and makeover those who go to Him. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” (verse 17)

Thank you Father God for taking my heart’s old tattered cloth and replacing it with the sturdy fabric of faith; for giving me new purpose every day, spurred on by your Spirit and the zeal of fellow Christians. Thank you for a day of rest and worship, preparing me for my Monday makeover. “Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day.” (II Cor. 4:16)