Right now, your life may seem a hopeless mess of shattered pieces, but your divine Lover treasures every fragment, even those life experiences you have suffered that seem worse than useless. Discarding nothing, he will lovingly treat each incident in your life as a critical piece of a jigsaw that only a supernatural genius could solve. He will reassemble every meaningless disaster, shameful failure and hideous sin, until together they form priceless beauty that no one would ever guess could emerge from such evil and chaos.

Will God really turn our sin into something that glorifies him? Yes. Obviously, things would have been better still had we not sinned, but when we come to Christ for cleansing, he not only removes our shame and makes us sparkle with his purity, he works all things together for good (Romans 8:28).

Consider, for example, the apostle Paul’s atrocious sin. Christianity was in its vulnerable infancy. Like perhaps no one else in all of history, Paul had the opportunity to permanently wipe from the planet every memory of Christianity. And he was intent on doing so. God intervened, of course, but had Paul’s determined plans succeeded and Christianity were eradicated before any of the New Testament were written, all of us today would be without the Gospel, destined for hell. He tortured and tormented Christians, trying to make them blaspheme their Lord, hoping to force them to abandon Christ, thus destroying them eternally. Given the eternal implications, this makes serial murder seem like a parking offense. How could even the God of the impossible wring any good out of that evil? And yet he did.

The book of Acts recounts Paul’s conversion testimony not once or even twice but three times (Acts chapters 9, 22 & 26). That’s how significant to God is Paul’s sinful background. That the apostle Paul was once violently opposed to Christianity has been the critical fact that has convinced countless thousands throughout history of the power and authenticity of the Gospel.

What about sins after conversion? Though you would be excused for expecting the opposite result, throughout history literally millions of Christians have drawn comfort and inspiration from Peter denying his Lord three times. “If there’s hope for Peter, there’s hope for me,” they gladly conclude. The same is true of King David’s shocking adultery and murderous cover-up. Moreover, who alone out of David's many sons did God choose as heir to David's throne and ancestor of the Messiah? Bathsheba's son, Solomon. This man should never have even been born. His mother should still have been married to the man David murdered. And yet God so forgave that he chose the product of David's greatest moral fall to be a key figure in Jewish and redemptive history and the one he endowed with astounding wisdom.

As I have written elsewhere:

From Crushing Defeat to Eternal Fame

We find him lurking in the shadows of Scripture. He was a breath of fresh air in a whirlwind. John Mark was bad news. In the human race he led the field from go to woe. He has often been identified with Christianity’s first streaker – the man who blurred through Gethsemane’s garden with the raw grace of a plucked chicken, leaving behind his clothes and his Savior (Mark 14:51-52). More humiliations were to follow.

His unflattering nickname, stub-fingered, suggests he was physically impaired. To this he added a handicap of his own making: he was branded a deserter – a second time.

When the pressure mounts, the last thing you need is for a trusted companion to abandon you. That’s what Mark did to Paul and Barnabas.

His desertion seems to have deeply hurt Paul. The apostle was adamant that hanging out with this dodo was a no-no. Barnabas, who always stood up for the under-dog , defended his cousin Mark. The result was a rift between old friends; the shattering of a great missionary team (Acts 15:37-39). We never hear of Barnabas again.

One look at ‘stump-finger’s’ yellow face and you knew this jinx had had mistake and eggs for breakfast again. Whenever this egg-head cracked, everyone got egg on their face. Just what the church needs! He must have felt as blue as a browned off white man seeing red because he’s accused of being yellow.

Mark could have drowned in self-pity. He could have resented Paul. He could have turned back to Judaism. Instead, he redoubled his efforts, eventually being recognized even by Paul as having an outstanding ministry (2 Timothy 4:11; Colossians 4:10; Philemon 24). Peter also spoke affectionately of him (1 Peter 5:13). As writer of possibly the earliest gospel and a primary source of Matthew and Luke, Mark’s contribution even to today’s church is beyond measure. This planet is a better place today because nineteen centuries ago a ‘no-hoper’ called stub-fingered decided to tough it out.

Knowing our weaknesses, our loving Father has preserved many such stories for us to gain strength.

‘Then will I teach transgressors your ways,’ crooned David. When? After a calamitous moral fall (Psalm 51: title, 3-5, 12-13).

‘Simon ... feed my sheep’ (John 21:17). When? After denying his Savior.

‘He slew at his death more than he slew in his life’ (Judges 16:30, paraphrase). When? After Samson’s greatest humiliation.

Samson and David each knew the horror of spiritual failure. On the crest of their vocation, they plunged to abominable depths. Their lapses were inexcusable. Their ministries were desecrated. Yet they refused to dwell in defeat. They were failures for a moment, but they were overcomers forever. Grasping God’s hand of forgiveness, they clambered to new heights for the exaltation of the One who washed them clean.

Oppression crushed Simon the rock into sand. On the brink of ministry, after years of grooming, he blew it. He lied. He invoked a curse on himself. He disowned his Lord (Matthew 26:74). Yet though it rocked him, this one-time rock didn’t peter. Empowered by his Savior, he again turned to stone.

Though the righteous – that’s you and me in Christ Jesus – fall seven times, they rise again. That’s a promise (Proverbs 24:16, see also Psalm 37:23-24).

It was just a hair-cut
For the plaything of Delilah;
And just a prayer-cut
For Peter the denier.
Strong they dozed
But weak arose,
And knew it not.

Men destroyed by fatal cuts;
Left to wallow in their ruts;
Left with blame
And haunting shame,
In sin to rot.

A seed so small and barely sown
Meant to die, but how it’s grown!
Things so small
Grow so tall,
But marvel not.

If sin can grow,
So can prayer;
If prayers will flow,
So will hair.
With faith restored
Hope will soar,
And blunders blot.

His repentance real,
The victim of Delilah,
Had victories still.
And the spineless Christ-denier
Shed his shame
And became
The church’s rock.