I opened the door and my heart sank. The thing I dread more than any other thing. The realisation of inevitable destruction done. The despair and ‘if only’s’ running through my head. The sight I least wanted to see. The sense of impending doom.

If only I’d been more careful.

If only I’d learned my lesson.

If only I’d checked the pockets for tissues.

So maybe I’m being a touch melodramatic (although I think tissue hitchhikers are up there as one of the worst domestic disasters), but opening my washing machine this morning felt a bit like the world feels right now. For every clean item of clothing I pulled out, clouds of washed and shredded tissue came too. Every item needed shaking, brushing, or re-washing. The signs of its presence in every trouser leg, every cardigan pocket, all over the kitchen floor. All the good of the 30 degree cycle undone in a momentary oversight.

And that’s how I’ve felt lately. For it can feel like every good thing we find to hang onto is touched and tainted and not as good as we’d hoped. The vain promises of the months of lockdown preventing our current reality, yet we’re back here for the second wave.

The ‘lifting’ of restrictions actually meaning more restrictions. Choices to be made on who should be a bubble. How do you choose between people you love? How do I pick three of a group to go to a pub with? Why can we meet in a café but not my garden? If only four of us can meet outside which of my family do I ditch?

And as one country relaxes, another locks down, meaning more and more weeks apart from my family and friends over the bridge.

Fear over finances. Fear over illnesses. Fear over weeks and weeks of children at home, the mental damage, the lonely days, the self-isolations, the when will this end?

Like a damp and dreadful tissue in my washing, the virus has infiltrated every aspect of our lives. And that’s without all the other hard stuff of life that comes our way.

Sometimes choosing to shake every item of washing free and making it clean again is the harder choice than just binning the lot and starting again. Sometimes choosing hope when we take hit after hit can feel relentless and exhausting and, just maybe, not worth the pain?

But as I took and shook and watched the tissue float away on the breeze and hung the clothes to dry crisp and clean, I looked down and I looked up and was reminded of all the hope there is.

There can be lockdowns and reds fighting blues and blood tests and surgery looming and losses and fear and difficult anniversaries and little boys crying over going into nursery, and we can feel tired of it all. Of the anxious nights and the lonely days and the shakiness of the world around us. But as @emilypfreeman reminded me this week, it’s worth taking a moment to stop and stand and take the photos and create the diptych and take notice. Notice how the ground underneath is firm and the sky above still shines bright. Because ‘in the beginning, God.’ He was. He still is. He always will be.

I listened to a talk yesterday that reminded me. Whatever we believe about how the world began, we know it didn’t start with us. My being here is nothing of my doing, and my being sustained day by day is not of me either. I didn’t create the earth under my feet or the blood in my veins or the clouds over my head. I am a tiny part of a beautiful story that isn’t finished yet. One day in the not too distant future, the hard stuff of today will have passed. Memories will remain, we will be changed, lessons learned, and it will leave a legacy for sure. But like the tissue floating around my garden, I like to imagine God giving the world a little shake and Covid 19 floating away merrily into the atmosphere.

And in the meantime I can choose hope. Some days that’s harder than others. But I can make conscious choices of what I read or watch or listen to. Whether to search the news or the Bible. To scroll through screens or throw leaves and laugh. To comfort shop or to send a comforting message. To react with impatience or understanding. To email a complaint or to email a thank you. To sulk about Christmas or to celebrate Christ’s coming.

When Jesus watched the humans in His world self-destruct the beauty of His Creation, He didn’t throw us in the recycling bag, He stepped in, into the mess, and washed it clean with His blood. And He’s still in the business of redemption, through Himself, and through the people He loves. We can choose to shine the light, shake the negativity and hang onto hope. And with each choice we can make a difference of how we get through the days ahead. We can be overwhelmed by the chaos of circumstances, or we can overwhelm the world with hope, faith, joy, gratitude and love.

‘He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities-all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.’ – Colossians 1:15-20