When life suddenly changes, I dig deep and introvert. Hard. During the time I’m alone, I’m called to work with my hands and make old things new. To refresh and revitalize. To turn dirty things into clean things. To scrub and sand. To patch and repair. Then, to paint and touch up until I finally sit back covered in dirt and grime while my newly painted walls shine.

My heart and my body choose to do what God instilled in me from birth and what my parents fostered while growing up. I am a worker. A busy bee. Someone who can put their head down and heal by using my hands to create new.

Recently, I had the grand idea to repaint the condo I live in – “for fun.” The condo was built around 1980, and has been renovated, but the ceilings might not have ever been touched. They are popcorn ceilings – yellowed with age and grime, discolored in splotches, broken and exposed in small places.

I walked into Lowes and was hit with the sweet smell of home improvement. After selecting some neutral colors, I went home to paint my bathroom in a couple of hours. I have painted plenty and know small spaces have the most edging, but when you get to the walls the process is quick. I could finish in an evening – “easy.”

One swoop of the white roller on the ceiling and the little popcorns jumped off the ceiling and into my roller. “It’s only that one spot,” I said to myself as I began a second pass. Contrary to my initial thought, the second swoop was worse than my first. The entire ceiling was crumbling underneath the pressure of the roller and the bathroom’s moisture.

 

I could not continue painting as planned, and had to step back and look at the mess. The bare ceiling. The patches of brown drywall paper staring back at me. What in the world to do? I consulted a painter friend and he helped me with some answers – popcorn ceiling patch or scraping were the two answers. I wanted to go for the patch method because it was easy and fast, but after purchasing the patch goo and trying to re-paint it was a disaster. For the second time.

My only choice was to completely re-do and scrape the ceiling down to the brown paper of the drywall. To reduce the bathroom ceiling down to bare bones, and start building it back up. First, with plaster. Then with sanding, primer, and paint in that order. What turned out to be an evening of fun has turned into a lengthy project with one goal – to finish and make the ceiling look better than when I started.

Long projects throughout my life parallel refinement and learning in my relationship with God. He is using popcorn ceilings and painting in my life to “hem me in – behind and before. You have laid your hand upon me.” (Psalms 139:5) To strip me down to my core and show me deep, passionate, intimate love. God’s love. God made me to have a unique love for working with my hands – to renew and restore. And, everyday I see hope and faithfulness fill me as I continue to refine and renew my house.

And in the hard process, I can and will give thanks.

Right now, I’ve successfully painted two bedrooms – but my bathroom is still bare of beauty. The ceiling still hangs in disrepair and plaster is all over the walls un-sanded. My heart and head says to keep running forward, but the task at hand is harder than a night project. It’s my whole life.

If you are reading this, keep running and don’t be afraid of popcorn ceilings. They might take you longer to make beautiful than smooth ceilings prepped and ready for painting, but the process will produce results unimaginably different than when you started.