Permanent Grace

We had a surprise snow squall today -- 5 extra inches. Steve and another gentleman from our neighborhood spent two hours shoveling the snow off of the entrance hill to our subdivision. They cleared the hill for the over 100 people living in our neighborhood.

It will probably snow again, but that didn't stop them.

My mother-in-law, Judy, used to always have Windex and paper towels. If you visited her, before you drove away, she would go out and clean the windshields of your car.

Your windows would get dirty again, but she did it anyway.

We buy greeting cards for people even though they will probably throw them away after reading them (if you know me, ask me about this).

Why do we do these kind of things? Why buy cards? Why did Judy clean windows? Why did Steve clean the hill? Because the grace is not the card, the grace is not the clean window and the grace is not the clean hill.

The grace is in knowing that someone cared enough about you to spend the time finding the "right" card that says what they want you to know. The grace is in knowing that someone else cares about the other people in the neighborhood enough to invest 2 hours in giving them a semi-clean, much safer place to drive their cars. The grace is in the knowledge that someone loves you enough to want you to be able see well through your car windshields.

The grace is in the love offered. And that grace has a permanent effect that snow or dirt can never touch. The grace and the love are transforming.

Image: More ice pictures.