Messy Beautiful Love Read Online Free PDF

to lead you in wisdom and teach you to walk in compassion.
    Take every opportunity to understand the heart of your husband, and start looking at him in the light of God’s glorious grace.

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    Be Patient and Kind When the Going Gets Tough
    O NCE M ICHAEL WAS ABLE TO SETTLE HIS business into a shop downtown, the dynamics of our family changed. Five miscarriages and three births later, we went from a family of three to a family of six. I was a stay-at-home mom taking care of the kids, and he was off to work every morning, briefcase in hand.
    For the first few weeks, I enjoyed the separation of home and work. Things finally seemed to be falling into place for us. I was ready to settle into a normal life when I realized thatthings weren’t normal at all. Michael was working far more hours than I wanted him to.
    He woke up about five o’clock every morning. After he read the Bible, showered, and had breakfast, he was off to work with our only car, not to return until around nine or ten at night. Some days he’d get off work early to spend an evening with us. But by then he was so exhausted that he couldn’t stand on his feet.
    His work schedule was Sunday to Thursday. On Fridays and Saturdays he was supposed to be off so he could be with the family, but unfortunately, so many of those days he had to go to work because machines were down or staff didn’t show up. Long days took their toll on him, and his face showed it.
    I could go on and on complaining about how Michael wasn’t there for me during that season of our life together. If I gave him the podium, he could certainly think of a few things to say about me, but he wouldn’t. He’s gracious that way.
    Going on and on about his faults wouldn’t serve any purpose, but that’s what I did. I took count of his faults and kept track of each one. I had forgotten what 1 Corinthians says about love: “It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs” (13:5 NIV ).
    Record keeping damages our hearts and feeds the root of bitterness within us, while love heals the wound. When we love someone we “beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things” (1 Cor. 13:7). In otherwords, when we love someone, we believe in him. We look past the messy to find the misunderstood intentions inside him.
    During this difficult time the piano came into our lives. Our children were still quite young, and like most parents, we thought that music might do them some good. If they were going to be anything like my husband, they’d be playing in no time.
    We started talking about it. Mostly we talked about the fact that we couldn’t afford anything bigger than a toddler’s toy—not unless we lived on bread and bologna for the next year. As much as I like bologna, we decided to wait on the Lord for supply.
    The funny thing with supply is that God doesn’t always meet our level of expectation, does He? Sometimes it’s a no, and other times He’ll exceed it beyond anything we could have imagined for ourselves. But one thing I know for sure: He always has our best interest at heart.
    When my sister told me that a friend was giving away the family’s upright piano, I was eager to take a look at it. But free wasn’t all that appealing when I saw its condition. The paint job—if you could call it that—was a thick layer of black-brown with extra-large splotches of who knows what here and there. Not to mention that it was terribly out of tune. I had expected to see something more along the lines of the handsome piano with which I grew up. In any event we thanked her friend with a smile, and three hours later my husband and a few strongmen hauled it into our living room, where they placed it across from the sofa.
    It sat there, virtually untouched, until I was ready to take it on. I don’t know what drove me to do it, but one spring morning I woke up, took one look at the dark stain, and decided to