As I walked along the shoreline that morning the waves of the sea rolled and roared beside me. Each new sparkling wave first rising to its peak. Then tumbling over itself, capped with sprays of saltwater mist trailing behind. Finally crashing down onto the outgoing current of water below. Ending in a beautiful mass of white bubbling foam. The fall air was crisp and clear, and the sun shone on my back as it began to warm the day. Along the sandy path I found items from the sea strewn everywhere: various shells, colorful pebbles, slimy seaweed, dried driftwood, glossy sea glass and more.  

It had been a difficult week. Truth be told, it had been a difficult many months and I had recently started seeing a counselor to help me process all that was going on in my life. I felt incredibly blessed that the location of this particular counselor’s office happened to be only blocks from the ocean and my favorite beach. It’s a quieter beach. One that I come back to again and again. For the most part, only the locals frequent it year-round, though it’s situated in a very visible spot between a rocky cliff and a jetty. For years when my daughter attended a charter school program in a nearby city, I used to pick her up after her special ed services were done, grab a coffee, drive over, and park along this stretch of shoreline just to listen to the waves and take a moment to breath. It’s a familiar and comforting place for me. A place where I can drown out the noise of my world and hear the voice of God through His nature and the quiet that settles into my soul. 

As I walked along the beach that day, sinking my feet into the sand with each step and feeling the warmth of the sun on my back, I reached down occasionally to pick something up and inspect it. Slimy seaweed that was translucent and glimmered in the sunlight like a stunning stain glass window. Seashells broken but yet still beautiful. Dried driftwood, simple and mysterious in origin. A colorful pebble or piece of sea glass, both hard in nature and yet somehow worn and shaped by the sea in all the right places to create a collectible treasure.

Each of these treasures had come from the seemingly endless expanse of sea standing before me. Little gifts tumbled and tattered, shifted and shaped, and finally given up by the sea and sent onto the sands of the shoreline for passers-by to find. Items marked and marred by the tumultuous storms of the sea and yet found valuable. Each mark or chip serving as a reminder of the storms and trials the item had once encountered and yet also telling the story of the beauty and value that could come of it. 

The sea had offered up its treasures to me that day in more that one way. As I looked at the collection of items I held in my hands, I found that I could see the story of my own life written on them. The storms that I had been through, and was still going through, were just like the storms of the sea. How the tumbling waves and grinding sand had shaped those tiny pieces of sea glass into beautiful gifts, reminded me of how God had used storms in my life to shape and mold me and to bring beautiful gifts like: patience, strength, resilience, compassion, and an increased trust in the Creator who had seen me through. All treasures I could not live this life without. 

How about you? What treasures have you found after coming through the storms of this life?