When You Slide Into the Ditch--Is There Grace?

This morning dawned bright and clean with all the fresh, beautiful snow.

Suddenly the brown bareness and bits of mess here and there are covered up, just as God's blanket of grace covers our life's mess-ups and makes "something beautiful of my life."

The crescent moon was peeking through the branches of the austree.

We saw that the vehicle that had slid into the ditch last night was still there. We watched as a pickup came and winched it out later.

 The tow truck, snow plow, and other vehicles were by now gone from the other spot where they had still been working last night about midnight when both  Jonathan and I were up to use the you-know-which room, and to check the fire.

Cars in ditches and insurance notices coming in the mail to let you know that your child's accident a couple months ago is going to up your insurance by a few hundred dollars

is a good time to remember that God's grace is not all about sparing us trouble in this life.

Last week John Piper posted about how sometimes God's grace is supplied within the circle of grace denied.

He told about how on a beastly hot July day in Tennessee, the water pump on his car stopped working, stranding them twenty miles from any town.

That morning he had prayed that the car would work well and that they would arrive safely (a prayer we have a habit of praying as well). Now "the grace of trouble-free travel had been denied," and no one was stopping as they stood by the car. Then his son suggested that they pray, which they did, and after which a pickup pulled over to help.
 

It turned out to be a mechanic who took John Piper into town for parts and helped fix the car.
And during the ride, John shared the gospel with the mechanic!
 

 "Now the remarkable thing about that answer to our prayer," John Piper wrote, "is that it came inside the circle of a prayer denied. We asked for a trouble-free trip. God gave us trouble. But in the midst of a grace denied, we got a grace supplied. And I am learning to trust God’s wisdom in giving the grace that is best for me and for unbelieving mechanics and for the watching faith of eleven-year-old boys."

"We should not be surprised that God gives us wonderful graces in the midst of suffering that we had asked him to spare us. He knows best how to apportion his grace for our good and for his glory."

--John Piper

So we ask for grace for our day--for the hours of supervising chores and helping with schoolwork,

for teaching Spanish and checking lessons, and helping Timmy who wants to learn guitar, even though I have no idea whatsoever how to play guitar. But if cousin Ezra learned on his own by looking at how to finger the chords, then perhaps Timmy can do it, too, and so I play piano with him while he strums, trying out a new chord along with the old ones he already knew.

I give the children an hour and half first thing this morning to sled and play in the snow before it  melts and before school, and then they come in and enjoy hot chocolate, and actually behave well during school time today (unlike yesterday--no further comment!)

And I write a card to someone who felt they had slipped spiritually, after a daughter called on the phone in distress after hearing about it.
(So thankful neither you nor I ever slipped or went wrong spiritually. Let's pat ourselves on the back and put our noses a little higher into the air.)

 I have no stones to throw--no woodpecker beak to peck with, looking for bugs and hammering hard.

Only a hand to reach out and a heart that cares and wants to help.
I respect honesty and humility any day over hypocrisy, self-righteousness, spiritual pride, and perfectionism.

You haven't slipped or sinned in the last 40 years--or, excuse me, since you were so safely and wondrously sanctified?
You haven't slid into a ditch of any sort to the right hand or the left?

Congratulations!
Accept my low, low curtsey to the three or four of you who meet on a Sunday to prop each other up in your critical sinlessness!

The rest of us will continue to avail ourselves when necessary of the snowfall of God's grace covering up the blemishes and the messes and the mistakes and the problems that fill our humanity.
We don't have to sin in thought, word and deed every day.
We can live above sin by God's grace. 
But if and when we do sin, slip, slide into a ditch and can't get out on our own,
there is a Tow Truck and a Winch and an All-Powerful Snow Plow,
and there is a throne of Grace to which we can run in time of need.