Makeovers

The Today Show chooses a somewhat ordinary-looking woman who is sent off to another room and, a little later on the same two-hour show, is brought back with a whole new look: hairdo, makeup, clothes, and accessories.

Time magazine features an article describing the television show Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. It tells the story of Alive Harris of South Central Los Angeles.  She still remembers the day the good people from ABC volunteered to demolish her house.  In 2003, a flood had left the uninsured community activist and her family living in just one bedroom of their destroyed home.  Worst of all, the waters had ruined a stash of Christmas toys Harris had collected for underprivileged children.  Harris said, “I figured no one was going to come to Watts and help us.  No one had ever done that.”  But Extreme Makeover: Home Edition found her.  Its bullhorn-wielding host, Ty Pennington, shipped Harris and her family off for a week’s vacation in Carlsbad, California, while over 100 workers and neighbors tore their home down to the foundation and built a brand new and bigger one.  They replaced the Christmas toys and donated appliances, mattresses, and landscaping to her flood-stricken neighbors.  They even threw in a basketball court for the neighborhood kids.  Now that’s an extreme makeover.

So what does all this have to do with New Years?  Simply this—all of these extreme makeovers have something in common: an outsider comes in with a one-two-three program.  First, the outsider sees the possibilities the recipient couldn’t see.  Second, the outsider does what the recipient couldn’t possibly do. Third, the outsider pays for what the recipient could never afford to pay.

As you face 2015, remember that there’s an amazing God who is in the makeover business.  He’s in the business of transforming your life and mine.  He has a similar three-step program.  

One: He sees possibilities in you and me that we’re not apt to see in ourselves. 
Two: He is able to do for you and me what we simply cannot do for ourselves.  
Three: He’s able to pay the price for what He does.  We can’t afford the price so He paid it for us.  

However, God’s makeover is slightly different in one area.  The reality show makeover is an external job; God’s is an internal job.  He makes you and me a new person from the inside out.

As you face a new year, please, let Him do His work.  He’s really, really good at it.

Bill Crofton