The Chair

The Chair

Dawn  had a chair for many years it grew faded, the fabric was worn, the legs and arms and back started to show through the stain.

One day she put it out for garbage saying she did not want anything that did not look new and impressive for her beautiful home.

An older man drove by he sees the old chair sitting there and pulls over as she walks out.

He asks if he can take the chair if its meant for the garbage truck to pick up, Dawn thinks he must be desperate and nods her head.

 The man starts to lovingly make a list of what it will require to make this chair whole again.

He could see it in his mind, and wanted to make sure he gave it back the new life it should have.

A new seat is required, new padding, new fabric, a leg is cracked almost split up the leg so he makes a note of this, he knows hours of sanding and staining will be required.

The supplies he locates and starts searching for the perfect stain, he wants the chair to look like it 

use to only better with new life. Then the man starts searching for the piece of fabric for the seat.

Hours and hours till he finds the perfect piece. He knows the chair will look amazing and is excited to remove the years of wear and tear and give it new life.

Sanding, for hours, smoothing the rough spots, gluing the leg back together and hours of making 

sure it was on solid footing again were spent with tender loving care.

Slowly the chair started to look fresh, the wood was beautiful the smell of the wood underneath

gave him the boost of energy he needed to keep going.

The seat he spent days on making sure it was comfortable, beautiful and matched the design of the chair and the stain he would apply.

Stain applied slowly, with careful loving strokes making sure it was flawless when you looked at it.

With each stroke he could feel the history the designer mean it to have come back.

As he waited for the stain to dry he would look at it and wonder where it had been, who had sat in the chair, the conversations that had been had. Then he smiled as he thought about the new life, the new people who would sit and the conversations that would take place.

The seat went on effortlessly he carefully secured it to the frame and went over every inch to make sure that no trace of the past was showing. Only the fresh new start that he had given it.

Those who sit on this will never know its history he said out loud only see the beauty that it holds.

Those marks are gone, the cracked leg repaired and made whole.

He took it to his shop so those who came in could admire it and the light would shine on it.

One day Dawn came in and the man recognized her as she walked towards the chair.

Where did you get this beautiful piece of history she stated, I want to buy it no amount is too much

I want it to be the showpiece in my home.

The man smiled and softly said "its not for sale, you see it should be here for weary shoppers

for those who just want to sit and chat. Its a work of love and I could not part with it.

She asked again where he found such a treasure, he softly said "In your garbage miss"

You threw it in the trash, I saw the beauty it would become not the old worn out chair it looked to be.

you see it I saw its inner side, the side the creator wanted it to be" The woman was shocked, and humbled. 

As Dawn left she said "I did not deserve this chair, you were its creator thank you for what you did as it is now a thing of beauty"

The man smiled and said it was not about deserving it, and it always was a thing of beauty you just could not see past the outside shell to imagine what it was meant to be.

We are all this chair and some of us have cracked parts, roughened up edges, parts that are worn out

and we do not feel beautiful anymore.

God can come along and find our inner beauty and give us a new fresh start, a chance to see our own beauty, our own purpose, what we were meant to be all along.

It requires a lot of pain as he sands away the things we have done wrong, it requires a lot of time and patience. But If you listen to him, reach to him he will make you whole again a thing of beauty that others can see and you can see the inner beauty in yourself.

I am this chair, we all are, and this is the lesson I learned when I was refinishing a chair I got out of the D.I garbage. Then one day a neighbor came into my home and purchased the chair thought it 

was amazing. I let it go because it would be appreciated and loved and cared for.

This is what we should aim for is someone who appreciates our beauty and the care that went into 

healing us and making us whole again.

Written by Jill Ferrin Bailey