They said, “It takes quite a guy to see the things he’s seen and to be the way he is.” 

In a way, that was true. Nobody would pay to see some of the things he’d seen – except for maybe on a movie screen with a happy ending thrown in.

They said he was the kind of guy they were glad to know – “a good guy”,

In a way, that was true. After all, he’d done okay in life if that’s what you call living honest, raising a family, leaving a legacy.

But, when it came down to brass tacks, he knew they were missing the point. It wasn’t about him being “quite a guy” or anything about him being “good”. 

It was about grace. A grace that had sought him and that he had sought. God’s grace.

But they didn’t see it.

How often do we miss the grace in our lives? Maybe we don’t see it because we don’t see it in the rocky places – we miss the cactus blooms among the wilderness. Maybe we either attribute it to something else or choose to be blind to it like the aforementioned observers. 

Instead of being like them, may we be like Lace Harper in Come Rain or Come Shine… 

“And now, all this – the wedding, the farm, everyone being together like family. A lot of times it seems like a dream, but I know what it is. It’s grace. Totally.” [1]

Yes, Lace Harper is a bride-to-be with a bouquet of joy, but that same bride-to-be is the girl who watched her mother die, stayed as far away as she could from her abusive father, struggled with the emotions of being adopted, studied to be an artist yet struggled to find a job because of “the economy”, found out that she would never have her children of her own…. Perhaps if anyone has a reason to miss grace, she does. Yet she sees dreams-come-true as other than the product of wishing on a star. She sees grace. 

Ok. So she’s a fictitious character. I’ve learned a lot from people who live only within the covers of a book, haven’t you? 

O Lord, give us eyes to see the gifts and dreams-come-true in our lives as Your work. May we not be blind. Come Rain or Come Shine, may we see grace.

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[1] Come Rain or Come Shine: A Mitford Novel by Jan Karon, narrated by John McDonough (Penguin Audio, 2015) CD 2, track 4, 3:04.