when Jesus was showing off, part 2

Tonight, I'm continuing on a theme from the previous post about how this week has been altering my attitude. Let me explain more by telling the story about an innocent thrifting trip AJ and I had at Goodwill today, and how Jesus used it to, again, show off His crazy love for me.

If you would be so kind, note the shiny, orange family of cookware posing for a picture at the front of our stove. These caught my eye as I was casually scoping out the housewares section, and I flipped them over to check their quality.


Well, they're good, very good quality. Le Creuset. Three lofty Le Creuset pieces resting on the shelves of an ordinary Goodwill. There's a Dutch (or should I say French) oven with a lid, a small saucepan with a spout, and a nice little skillet that begs for some butter to be melted in it. The skillet alone, on the Le Creuset website costs $75 new. The Dutch oven, over $200. We paid $70 for all three pieces.

Andrew bought them for me for my Christmas & birthday (Dec 26) present because after we happened upon this extraordinary discovery, he wanted to really bless me.

I'm still amazed at this find. I'm not used to having really nice things, and I don't expect to get them. So when something like this happens, I'm caught off guard. It feels like a miracle.

(Today I'm linking up to her library adventures, sharing the find.)


Tonight I told AJ how this week has been so much better than I could have hoped. With the band recording the album this week, requiring his absence in the evenings, I expected a lot of loneliness, feeling overwhelmed with the baby, not having the car, the rainy weather & simply missing my husband. But it's been great. Just as the girls prayed on Tuesday, I have been able to be creative (there are still lots of ideas ruminating in my cranium, waiting for action), to have quality time with friends, to have little reprieving pockets of good time with AJ, I've been able to simply enjoy my almost 1 year old son, and I've seen expressions of God's grace poured out on me this week. Like finding Le Creuset cookware that I'd never imagined I'd get to own.

Jesus showing off again.

I told AJ I almost expected to be resentful about the time he'd be away during the recording. It'd be so easy to gripe "He's off doing the band thing while I'm stuck here..." but that hasn't been the issue at all. Looking back at the last several days, I see God's kindness toward me each day has been instrumental in forming a new attitude in me. There's been joy in knowing Andrew's hard work, his faithfulness at pursuing a dream is going to be rewarded soon with an album. It's been a long time coming, and I told him he can rest assured I'm sending him off to record with my blessing, rooting him on from home.

It's not about the luxury of being able to cook with fancy pans. I'm simply aware of the undeserved love Jesus has sent my way & how this week it's doing it's beautifying work in me. He is good.