My daughters surprised me this week by coming to visit for my birthday despite the pandemic. (Don’t worry, we took all the required pre-cautions). One of my daughters and her children I had not physically seen in over a year. Our only communication had been through FaceTime. Seeing all of my children and grandchildren was a wonderful surprise and I was so happy!

While my girls were with us I asked them was there a special dish that I cook for them. They resoundingly replied “beans and cornbread.” It’s a southern thing. Now that they are grown, they seldom ever get to eat it.

I put the purple hull peas on to cook and noticed I had some leftover cornbread in the refrigerator. I didn’t want to serve the family leftover cornbread, but at the same time I didn’t want to waste the cornbread I already had. There were some left over biscuits from breakfast and some leftover baked chicken so, I decided to make chicken and dressing.  It turned out great! I made Mexican Cornbread to go with the peas. We had a great dinner.

Later that night I thought how God can take what we consider leftovers of a wasted life, or scrapes from a damaged life and He can turn that life into a wonderful blessing. I know because He has done it for me.

Friend, God can take whatever you have and turn it into a marvelous blessing. Give it to him.

Something beautiful, something good
All my confusion He understood
All I had to offer Him was brokenness and strife
But he made something beautiful of my life

If there ever were dreams
That were lofty and noble
They were my dreams at the start
And hope for life’s best were the hopes
That I harbor down deep in my heart
But my dreams turned to ashes
And my castles all crumbled, my fortune turned to loss
So I wrapped it all in the rags of life
And laid it at the cross.

Bill Gaither author of the lyrics of Something Beautiful.