Tip of My Iceberg

Who knew you could get so excited about a length of cotton?

“You got new towels! Finally!”

John was ecstatic. It had been a long time since we’d bought towels for ourselves. Having a revolving door to our home and the chance to host people when they come to town (everyone loves Florida), we use our towels quite a bit. Lots of washing. Plus six kids having used and abused them, they all look a little threadbare and ripped.

The towels we’ve been using the last five years weren’t even ours. Emily, a friend of one of our daughters, and her cat lived with us for a year. She left several things here when she moved out. (Not the cat.) Including a pair of fuchsia-colored towels. Age–indeterminate.

We didn’t discover them for quite some time. Found a box with unnecessary odds and ends. Including these towels.

I’d meant to mail them. She really didn’t want them.

So grows our eclectic linen closet.

Our towel issue is quite pathetic. I’m not one to buy towels just because what we have is well used. They function quite nicely. You can dry off with an ugly, ripped towel as easily as a pretty one.

They must shrink over time. Poor John kept having less and less towel to dry and wrap himself. I broke down and bought two new ones. Considerably larger than anything we own at present. Gunmetal grey.

I was quite pleased with these. They had that new softness that disappears after a few washings. No pulled threads, holes or bleached patches.

Much to my dismay, that wasn’t true. As I hung them up, there were threads sticking out that I assumed were extras. Strands that fell on the material.

They were attached. When pulled, they made little holes.

My new towels weren’t perfect.

At least I got them on sale.

My imperfect towels. I keep thinking that new and unused in this life means perfect. No blemish, no problem.

Who am I kidding?

The bigger, better, blingier of this world will always disappoint. Something new will come on the market and thrill even more. It’s why tech companies make out like bandits–you have to get a new phone, pad, laptop every couple of years just to keep up with whatever the next “must have” is. Does anyone think such companies would come out with a model that could be easily and cheaply updatable, no matter how new the technology?

Won’t happen.

There is nothing this side of heaven that’s perfect.

Our best efforts can’t make life work the way we want it. Our great motives, our need for free speech and freedom, our demands for equality fall on deaf ears because those things look different to different people.

Perfection? It can only be found in Jesus. What did He do with that perfection?

He bought our freedom.

No one else could ever do that for me.

My towels are good enough. For now. They, too, will become worn out.

My freedom and hope in Jesus?

An eternal guarantee. Nothing better or blingier will ever be as good.