Second Chances

My husband and I recently had our basement finished. After living in our house for 2 years, we decided to have it finished and move my parents in so they would not be living “alone” any longer. In the midst of our working on the basement, my parents realized that they would still be alone, even if they moved in. My husband, Dave, travels for business and is usually gone five days a week, 50 weeks out of the year. I work a full time job and am quite frequently away several evenings a week. We stopped work on the basement until we could decide what to do. Ultimately, we decided to give the basement a second chance – third really if you consider its original use as storage space. This time, we hired a company to come and finish the work for us.

Once the renovation to the basement was finished, there were several pieces of heavy and cumbersome furniture we wanted moved to the basement and we knew we could not do that ourselves. So we hired movers from a company called A Better Way Moving. This company is part of a program called “A Better Way” that was started a number of years ago by a man in the community who wanted to help young teens and men break the addiction of drugs and alcohol. He wanted to give them a second chance. The program requires the men to live and work on a farm while recovering from their addiction. The young men who have been in the program for a while and have shown they can be trusted are allowed to work for the moving company. We were privileged to have three of these men in our home. These young men were so polite – always saying “yes sir” and “no sir” – no bad attitudes – no foul language and no “slacking off.” They were there to do a job and they got in and got it done. I suspect that “A Better Way” may not have even been their second chance – it could easily have been their last chance.

That’s the way God is and it’s also the way we treat Him. God is a God of second chances – even third, fourth, fifth and on and on – chances. He is always waiting for us to come back to Him. And sometimes, we wait until He is our last chance to cry out to Him. But even then, He is there, waiting to give us a second chance.




© 2008 Edwina E. Cowgill