POW! POUND! OUCH!

During the recent renovation to our dining room that I wrote about in my previous post, I recovered the seats of the dining chairs. My grandmother had recovered them many years ago with what I'm sure was once a lovely gold fabric. But from many years of  gluteus maximus' in the chairs, the fabric was now faded and worn. And it ABSOLUTELY did NOT match my Butterscotch accent wall!
To redo the seats, I first had to remove them from the chair, and then go about the task of removing all the old upholstery tacks. Not an easy thing to do. With each tack, I would murmur, "Mimama, you did a great job!"  I was admiring her work and complaining about how difficult removing the tacks was at the same time. After removing the old fabric, I cut and placed a new piece of fabric on the seat (it actually came from the curtains I took down before the renovation and was not going to use again). Then I had to go about the job of nailing new tacks into the bottom of the chair to hold the fabric in place. Easy, right?
Here is a little snippet of trivia about me. I am simply horrible at hitting a nail on the head. I am as good at that as I am at playing "Cornhole".  It's a really sad thing. So with each swing of the hammer, there was a good chance I would catch my finger holding the tack in place. My hands and fingers took a beating!. As Izzie slept in the little cushion in the kitchen, I sat in the middle of the floor pounding one tack after another into one chair after another. Six chairs in all. Pow! Pow! Pow! Pound! Pound! Pound! Ouch! Ouch! Ouch! It was LOUD and painful. But as I continued, with each loud pound, God began reminding me of His Son Jesus on the cross, and the nails, hundreds of times bigger than the upholstery tacks, that held him there.  Pow, Pow, Pow, Pound, Pound, Pound. It was loud in the kitchen and I'm sure it was loud that day on Calvary when the Roman soldiers pounded nails into Jesus' body. Pow, Pow, Pow. Pound, Pound, Pound. The tacks I used never drew blood. The nails the  soldiers used, drew lots. With each nail, a loud Pow! Pow! Pow! Pound! Pound! Pound! Add to that, the sound of bones being crushed in Jesus' hands and feet. Blood spurting and pouring in different directions. Muscle and tendons tearing. Soldiers and onlookers mocking and  women at the foot of the cross crying. I can hardly imagine the pain. I can't even begin to fully realize the scene. I continued my "upholstery work" and continued to think of Jesus on the cross. With every hit of the hammer, I saw Jesus on the cross before me. Why did God sacrifice His Son for me? Why did Jesus stay on the cross when He could have come down? Why did he have to endure the agony and such a painful death? It was all for me. It was all for us - sinners in need of salvation. Jesus took the nails for me, for us.
God speaks to me in different ways. That day, on the kitchen floor, God spoke to me with some upholstery tacks. Each pound on the tack said "I love you that much." Thank you God, for using chairs, tacks, a hammer, and an occasional hit on the finger to remind me!

Romans 5: 8 "But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."