It’s been a morning already. Bad attitudes, unwillingness to work, moodiness. And it’s not just the kids! I’m about to send them all out into the snow for a while! Partly so they can get pent up energy out and partly so the house is quiet for a few minutes.

We generally don’t have a very loud house, even with 13 people in it. We’re quiet people, for the most part. But every once in a while the kids are all riled up for some reason and there is talking in every room, screaming in a few, and music somewhere. I am an introvert…let that soak in. I need quiet to recharge and the Lord gave me 11 kids plus an extrovert husband. Many of my kids are extroverts too. On top of that, many people in my house are auditory processors. Yeah…they have to talk everything out…out loud…to me. Of course, I’m an internal processor.

God likes to stretch us, doesn’t He?

This morning we woke up to a winter wonderland, truly! I have rarely seen such a beautiful snowfall. Every branch of the trees were covered with inches of snow, all of it resting precariously and perfectly. One slight breeze would have knocked it all down, yet it clung there in the stillness of the morning. We couldn’t resist peering out from every window, see the different trees blanketed in their own special way. Even now, as I glance out the window at the trees, the beauty has been marred by wind and is no longer as perfect.

At breakfast the kids were marveling at how everything was so smoothly covered in snow, as if all the unevenness and harsh lines of lawn, sidewalk, drive, steps, and trees were pulled taut and straight, like ironing out the wrinkles on a long stored garment. Jacob said, “It’s like a nothing world out there. There’s nothing, just white and smooth.”

It struck me, this is what God means when he says, “though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow”. (Isaiah1:18) All the harsh creases and stark lines of sin are smoothed. We are pulled taut until the wrinkles are gone and the only thing left is a ‘nothing world’. We are made new.

A splendid snowfall like the one today, is a gentle reminder that our bad attitudes, our moodiness, our unwillingness to work can all be covered in a perfect, beautiful blanket of white. A white that smooths the harshness, that fills in the holes and imperfections. And while the beautiful dropping of snow only lasts a few hours at best, the blanket of white Jesus covers us in lasts forever. And, it’s new every morning. We don’t get to wake up once or twice a winter to an amazingly wonderful blanket of snow. We get to wake up every morning to a perfect, new, abundant mercy, poured out lavishly from our loving Father.

So, just like playing outside will readjust attitudes in our house, God’s mercy and washing will readjust our attitudes in our hearts. May you be washed white as snow by our good good Father!