Essays on Grace
The grace in these essays is not soft or decorative. It appears on a ceramic floor, in the mud of a schoolyard, in the moment a friend goes under the surgeon's knife. Harvey writes about grace as the thing that shows up after theology runs out — the bedrock conviction that God wastes absolutely nothing.
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The Ceramic Floor
On that ceramic floor, I couldn't see any of the blessings I'd been taking for granted. My words and reason reached their end. They were radically insufficient. All that remained was my bedrock conviction that our good God wastes absolutely nothing.
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The Weight I Couldn’t Carry
That seven-year-old in the mud decided he'd prove his worth by being the smartest and best-paid guy in the room. It took decades to realize my life is my testimony, and it has value simply because it is a gift I've received from the One who says it is good.
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When Beauty Breaks In
Every strum of the guitar gave voice to the pain I'd felt as a child, to the nothingness I felt now. Sitting alone in my room, my heart was cracking open to the presence of someone I'd known since I was four.
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When Your Friend Goes Under the Knife
As the surgeon works on Rick, my heart beats, carrying nutrients and oxygen to my cells, each one unearned, uncontrolled, winding down toward inevitable silence.