The Mutilation of the Hard Boiled Egg

We are big egg people around here. Lucy, our in house health food nut, prefers two hard boiled eggs every morning, (egg whites only please :). Cooking and peeling a hard boiled egg is most definitely an art. The amount of time they boil, how they are cooled, and the first peel requires getting under the "skin". For the most part I thought I had perfected the hard boiled egg....until yesterday.

Three of the four eggs cooked and peeled like magic, and then the fourth egg. *ugh* It was a disaster, from the moment my finger slid under the shell, the whole blooming egg rebelled. The more I tried to gently peel back the shell the more it fought my touch and unraveled on me. Then I got a little more forceful, and.... total fail. I wish I would have snapped a picture because I proceeded to mutilate the darn egg. You could see parts of the yolk (isn't that funny word, say it three times and giggle a little) sticking out. The egg white had jagged edges and looked more like the moons surface than a smooth baby's butt. Finally, I threw it down the disposal and flipped the switch.

How frustrating to work on a rebellious egg.

Have you ever had a rebellious egg kind of day, week, season in your life?

Is the Lord trying to work on you, smooth out the jagged edges of your egg white, and you refuse to humble yourself under His gentle, or maybe not so gentle, touch and prompting. Is He trying to peel back the hard shell of your heart to only to have you unravel in His hands? In order to to peel the shell of a hard boiled egg you must first crack it on a hard surface. Every felt like your spirit, or will, or plan has been cracked, even shattered? I have. Many times.

I am so grateful that the Great Redeemer doesn't throw my life down the disposal and flip the switch. ;)

I am so relieved that my God is in the business of restoration and healing.

He ultimately desires to refine us to make us more like Himself.

To refine means to:

Remove impurities or unwanted elements from Improve (something) by making small changes, in particular make more subtle and accurate.

I don't know about you, but I have some impurities and unwanted elements in my life that need to be thrown down the disposal. But He doesn't stop there, I love that God desires to improve us by making small changes to us. I am so glad He doesn't leave us alone. That He doesn't leave us as we are. That He doesn't mutilate us when we resist and rebel.

Today, I am filled with a new hope, a hope that inspires me to long to be refined by my sweet Savior's touch.

Sometimes we are refined by shattered dreams, sometimes we are refined by fire, sometimes we are refined by discipline, sometimes we are refined by joy, sometimes we are refined by betrayal, sometimes we are refined by grief and loss. Sometimes we are refined in the belly of the whale, in the rocking chair of the nursery, in the solitude of the bedroom, in the babe laid in the manger, in the chaos of the minivan, in the drought of a trip in the desert for 40 years, in the renewal of the rain ...... or in the middle of a February day standing all alone by your mother's grave.

Refinement can be found in the extraordinary and in the ordinary!

Here is to the great refinement of mutilated hard boiled eggs, like you and like me!
Happy weekend!

~Sara