Renovating is Hard

Have you ever bought a "fixer upper?"​

It's a great idea.  Buy cheap, then fix everything.  Modernize, customize, and end up with a great product you love.  And hopefully your fixer-upper has a much higher value than what you bought.

But as we all know, there are inevitably problems behind the walls, unseen, until things are ripped open.  A house's true history and it's real problems are often hidden under layers of plaster and paint.  To fix it and really make it livable is often a bigger project than it seemed when you started.

Faith is the same way.  C.S. Lewis describes it this way in Mere Christianity:
"Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself." 

It is hard and often painful to change our patterns and attitudes.  Humility is a difficult renovation.  Pride is painful to release as it is often rooted in fear.  Loving and serving does not come easily in our 'me first' culture.  Positivity takes a huge overhaul of our attitude. Generosity is built with painful, heavy, foundational adjustments to our understanding of God's provision in our money. These seemingly simple things we talk about every single week at Big Life C.C. are actually dramatic renovations of our broken souls.  Don't mistake them for fluff.  It's hard work to rewire our hearts into a palace for the Lord.

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