Stonecast

After Ike we did some repair work on and near the pier at the bay. The guys who we hired were locals and skipped out before finishing and left a mess of electrical wires tangled in a couple of cemented cinder block short columns at the end of the yard. It has been an eyesore so I have taken on the challenge to clean it up. Got the electrician out and he neatly tied up the good wires and got rid of the unnecessary ones....and now we are installing lanterns on top of these blocks....in the most economical way possible. Got the poles, got the lanterns but we needed a top for the columns.

Granite was too expensive...stone as well...so as I was riding down Hemstead Highway discouraged after pricing at the stone store...I saw this little store of cement figures and Texas star cutouts etc. out of the corner of my eye. Curious, I stopped. The name of it was American Stonecast. Randy, who happened to be their key salesman, was leaving as I was driving up. He waited for me to get out of the car greeted me and with a huge laid back sort of smile said "What can I do for you? I told him that I needed 2 - 2X2 tops...he said made of what.... I said at this point I just need them to be inexpensive. He said lets go look in the bone-yard.

And there my adventure began. This was a cement molding fabrication shop. Would would have guessed from the store"front". It was remarkable. They are working on stonework and molding repair for city hall and architectural projects around this city ..they have a dusty statue of Patton (probably been there for years...standing in the shop with his broken head just propped into place..monogrammed rocks and stepping stones, ..and they have hundreds of molds categorized and in their appropriate binds, benches etc. ...and when we got to the bone-yard sure enough there they were...2 white stone cast molds of cement, neatly stacked on a pile of other rejected pieces...2X2 in size, two out of the four sides bullnosed, sitting in abandonment among the weeds in the bone-yard. Randy would sell me these two stones and drill my 3" inch holes in the middle for my lantern poles....for almost nothing. The deal was done!

The shop was filled with dirt and flying dirt ...and sand cast masterpieces laid on work tables drying while workers carefully and meticulously went about their designated chores. What a world of creativity...We cannot imagine the workshop of God's mind as he creates what he does. The minds, the molds, the masterpieces. And yet I take so much of it for granted each day. This was just a stonecast shop....and it blew me away, not from the finished works that I saw on the outside, but the process that was ongoing on the inside.

Isn't that the way God works...on the inside for ultimate results on the outside. We look around at people and see what we see from the outside..but how many times do we take time to see how things are working on someone's inside. What they are thinking, how they have come to conclusions that they have ended up with, why they behave in a manners that they do...and then give God credit for working in places that we cannot see. We are all masterpieces in God's eyes.....a work of masterful proportion being molded into the image of His likeness. And no two are alike. His creativity abounds with each new design and each is purposefully projected for a placement in his kingdom.

Even in what "we" deem his bone-yard are treasures to some that are overlooked by others. For there in the weeds of overgrown,overlooked, abandoned rejection disappointment and grief lies HOPE. A hope that blooms internally and one day will be recognized if only we seek it from God. We are all created through a vision...God's vision. And as we are "like" a stonecast product that cannot create on its own but needs a master skillsman to mold his vision into place...we are "unlike" a stonecast product who is thrown into the bone-yard when cracked or broken or no longer needed because God uses our brokenness and our cracks to manifest the vision that he deemed in us and deems through us for his glory. He is our redeemer.

It was an covered outside workroom, filled with projects of all sizes, varieties of many stones, and of designs of many shapes. And it was such a reminder to me that we too are works of our master. We might start out rough around the edges and shapeless and in need of design and direction but as our relationship with God continues to grow and we allow him to use the tools that he has appropriately chosen to mold us; trials, successes, experiences, people, circumstances, coincidences (never...just situations God has chosen to remain anonymous in) ...we will begin to see the vision that the master craftsman has had all along....for our lives. Nothing is wasted in his workshop....he uses it all for our ultimate good and His ultimate best.

Isaiah 64:8
Yet, O LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand.

The toppings on my cinder block columns will always be a reminder of this field trip....and I will smile at a glance and thank God ...that I am a work in progress in his glorious workshop.

Dear Lord, We all are works in progress...Let us not be discouraged but go forth in hope that you are in command....you are the master planner and your vision for each of our lives will ultimately take shape according to your plan....in your time....and for your glory. Amen

Praise God wherever you are and whatever situation He has allowed you to be in . . . His glory will shine through!

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email address: cjodeit@gmail.com
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