Inspiration Column - Adventist Medical Center

Store Bought Christmas

Calm Yourself
By Pam Strachan, chaplain, Pastoral Care

An English fisherman went into an inn at the end of a long, cold day and ordered a pot of tea. Bragging to friends about his big catch of fish, he stretched out his arm with a sweeping motion. In an instant he knocked the teapot off the table and it crashed against the wall. A dark stain splashed across the wallpaper.

The fisherman was frightened at what he had done and apologized profusely to the innkeeper. He tried to wipe off the tea but already it had made an ugly blotch. A man seated at the next table came up to him and said, "Calm yourself, sir." The stranger took out a coal pencil and began to sketch around the shape of the stain. In moments he created a picture of a majestic stag that looked as if it had been designed for that wall. Soon he was recognized as Sir Edmond Lancier, England's foremost painter of wildlife.

We have all created spills and still continue to knock over teapots that splash stains across the wallpaper of our hearts. Often we try endlessly to erase the stains only to be left with an ugly blotch that appears permanently embedded. If the stain of guilt and shame is haunting you for the mess created, I have good news for you, "calm yourself." Jesus the innkeeper is the master artist who specializes in painting over spills. In Ezekiel 36:26, he promised to give us a new heart with new and right desires, and place a new spirit in us. If you let him, he will pull out his red ink pen, sketch around the stain and transform the mess we created into a beautiful masterpiece.