My apartment is currently a bit of a building site. Well, technically not my apartment, but the hallway and the apartments below and the stairs and the foyer. It’s covered in dust and dirt and bricks and bags of rubble and, I’ll be honest, I’m sick of it.

Right now, it looks filthy. There’s splinters on the floor and there’s an odd smell. Mixed with the rain of the British winter, the dust is turning to mud. It’s hard enough to live near, let alone live in.

In a few months time though (please Lord, let it be sooner), when the builders and electricians and plumbers and interior designers have all worked their home-making magic, the cold dirt and water will have been replaced by glossy worktops, warm fires and power showers. Children will grow up safe in this space, marriages will happen, families built with long nights of friendship, stuffed with good food, soppy films and sleepovers. The building site will be a forgotten past, compared to the memories made in those apartments.

It’s a reminder to all of us that most good things take time. And that often, the process of getting to the good thing doesn’t look particularly fancy or glamorous. In fact, it can look a lot like a building site on a wet November day; messy and dirty.

2 Corinthians 4:17 tells us that our “…light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison”.  In other words, what it looks like now isn’t what it’ll look like in the future. Our earthly mess will someday be gone and all that remains will be eternal glory. Our brokenness, our sin, our darkness will all be swallowed up and all that remains will be life: full, happy, Jesus-life.

Let that encourage you today: what looks like a building site right now is actually accomplishing something wonderful. It might not feel good, it may not look pretty but what God is building in your life is more than you could possibly imagine.