Anyone who has done family pictures know the preparation alone can be an ordeal. At least for mom.
Choosing the right outfits so each family member coordinates and making sure everyone has the right shoes and accessories can be a major stress. Then throw in the possible need for haircuts and manicures means alot of planning and running around for one short session! On picture day all items must be double-checked to make sure they are cleaned and ironed. And, from experience I know it might be best to keep the boys inside so no one ends up with a black eye or busted lip right before photo shoot time!
For our recent pictures though, amazingly, all the pre-photo prep happened without a hitch. But, still we had a problem. For us the problem occurred over dinner, just before the time we needed to get dressed. I would’ve never predicted such a casual conversation would turn south so quickly. But it did and had I not already paid the deposit I might have cancelled because of the threat of puffy, red eyes and angry scowls taking over. I’m so glad I didn’t.
I love our pictures and God used the time we were forced to stand together smiling and pretending we liked each other to actually work love back in to our hearts. By the time the photo shoot concluded, we were genuinely laughing and decided to watch a movie together. Almost unbelievably, the night ended with us hanging out together in the living room and joking about what happened over dinner!
You must be wondering, “What in the world was served up with dinner?!” Well, a great topic for a future post… but I think the real story from the night is what happens when grace and forgiveness run rampantly!
In our families, in our marriages, between siblings and in all other relationships, no matter how hard we try we will still say things that sting and do things to one another that are hurtful. But what we do when we hurt another, or are the one hurt, is what matters. In other words, sin prevention is not what we need to focus on because it is inevitable sinners living amongst sinners are going to sin. What we need to strive for is living redemptively in the sin.
- Living redemptively means seeking forgiveness and freely giving grace.
- Living redemptively is not something we naturally do on our own.
- Living redemptively requires seeing how much we need forgiveness and grace.
- Living redemptively takes knowing the One who extravagantly doles out forgivenss and grace on us.
When the perfect picture of Jesus’s righteous life lived for us takes hold of us, the gospel begins to take hold of every aspect of our lives. It’s not that we stop sinning, but through hearing more of His worth and work we become more transformed to his likeness in the way we begin to extend forgiveness and grace.
That perfect picture of Christ working its way into our hearts is what happened on our picture night. What was bad was used for such good as what started out as pretending became transforming! So though we are far from perfect, seeing how He was perfect for us is what we must fix our eyes on.
Growing in grace together,
