“Oh, and Jen,” she says, “I feel like God wants  me to share something with you, that you need some Good News….”

The news she shares is private, and it is Good News.

Her family has traversed tragedy, and trust was born. There are no predictors about this next chapter, but there is faith.

However large the risk, the worse risk would be not to trust, to bear down, to not lift up their eyes to believe that God is God — even when this path has hurt … so … bad. Through death, they dig into a deeper surrender, the kind that lays down on the bed sheets and trusts that all Creation is kept in a good God’s hand.

A few weeks ago, another friend calls and says she is so not happy with her body, so wanting change for the better. We talk diets and health modeled — the way real models do — in front of our daughters.

The next week, she’s on the hunt for real beauty that comes out of her mouth instead of from what goes in it. She want her words to her husband to be peppered with respect and not salt in his wounds. We talk about imperfections and how we all have them — and grace: how to honor the King who lives inside of the king in our homes, even if he’s not being …  kingly.  

Blundering through marriage when it gets hard bumps us into grace. Failing fosters forgiveness. Disrespect dares us to hoard honor, and losing the reign on our words forces us to wrangle in self-control. 

We clean the inside of our cups so the outside can be clean. Body image comes down to real beauty, and real beauty comes down to behavior, and we know it deep down.

Another friend is in quiet angst … will her husband ever get that job and relieve her of the strain? Will they ever gel again like they did when they were young, now with worries, and foregone conclusions that he’s gone most of the time, sometimes even when he’s in the room?

This lonesome place leads her to her knees. The grace she finds is the grace she gives. The compassion becomes the caring, and the wondering becomes the waiting. The load makes her such a light we all want to to hear her laugh, to brush up against her beauty.

Since she is faithful to One, God gives her the faithless. From loneliness comes love, and it bubbles out of her like a brook I want to sit by.

My life has been its own kind of hard lately. The fear has made me flush out anxiety, the unknown has made me courageous. The pain has produced the  perseverance it’s going to take to stay the course on this narrow road. The hard moments have born more hope that I can put in letters. Through loss, I’ve become grateful for every gift I’ve been given. 

Best yet, the battle has left me confident in God.

So, friend …

Tragedy bears Trust.

Bitterness unearths beauty.

Loneliness leads to love.

and

Crises create Confidence.

And that’s how hard times make us (truly) beautiful.

^{*photos courtesy Lauren McKinnon and Harold Navarro.}