I recently read the book, Angel Children, about a mother who loses her young infant. In it, the author, Mary V. Hill includes a story from Melvin J. Ballard that goes...
"I remember going to a carpet factory where they were making beautiful rugs. I approached from the seamy side. The shuttle was flying back and forth and the warp and woof were being made but there was not any design there. It was all ravelings and ends. It was just like life. When I stepped around on the other side it was another picture. It was the same operation - the same things exactly, only this was the design side. The color was blending; the figure was developing. There was not any failure there. We look at sorrows and we think they are tragedies, but we are only looking at things from the seamy side. There is another side to the picture, the designers side - God's side. And there are no blunders there.
"Some day we will see it. Some day we will be able to say, "The Lord liveth! The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord!"
I found a rug to use as a visual aid as I read this story to our Young Women. You could also use a tapestry or other item that has a beautiful distinct pattern on one side, and a dull, or disarrayed back side. The young women were able to see how God's perspective is so much different than ours... how this life may seem hard and ugly to us, but how He sees the beautiful person we are becoming.
