Like Sea Glass: Transformed by Love

by Lori Wilson

During a recent spiritual direction session, my directee and I found ourselves contemplating sea glass—those smooth, frosted gems we discover along the shoreline. What begins as ordinary glass, perhaps a discarded bottle or jar, undergoes a remarkable transformation. Broken apart and cast into the sea, these fragments are tumbled by waves, rolled across sand and stone, their sharp edges gradually worn smooth. Years of this gentle violence reshape them into something entirely new: translucent treasures in soft blues, greens, ambers, and whites that catch the light and take our breath away.

How perfectly this mirrors our own spiritual journey.

We, too, begin whole. Life inevitably brings its storms—seasons of challenge, loss, disappointment, betrayal, or abandonment that can leave us feeling shattered. In those moments of brokenness, we face a choice: we can resist the healing process, clinging to our sharp edges and nursing our wounds, or we can choose to enter into partnership with God's transforming love.

This divine refining requires both God's grace and our willingness to participate in it. Like sea glass that must surrender to the waves rather than fighting against them, we are invited to open ourselves to God's work within us. This means showing up for the healing—perhaps through prayer, spiritual direction, therapy, or honest conversation with trusted friends. It means choosing vulnerability over self-protection, forgiveness over resentment, hope over despair. We must actively release our grip on old hurts and familiar patterns that no longer serve us.

God's love works like those patient waves, but we must choose to stay in the water. We cooperate with grace by doing our inner work, seeking help when needed, and practicing spiritual disciplines that open us to transformation. The very experiences that once threatened to destroy us become the means of our healing when we consciously partner with God in the process.

This collaboration doesn't happen overnight. Like sea glass, we are shaped slowly through countless choices to trust, to forgive, to hope again. Our rough edges—those places of anger, fear, or self-protection—gradually soften as we actively practice wisdom, compassion, and deeper trust.

God loves us through every stage of this process, but also invites our participation: in our bright beginning days of wonder, through our rebellious wandering years, in our seasons of breaking, and in our conscious emergence as something beautiful and new. We are beloved not because we are perfect, but because we are willing to be transformed. Each scar tells a story of grace received and grace chosen; each smooth edge speaks of love's patient work and our faithful response.

When we find sea glass on the beach, we treasure it precisely because it has both endured the storms and yielded to them. So too does God treasure us—not despite our brokenness, but because of how we've partnered with divine love to transform that brokenness into beauty. We become living reminders of what's possible when we work together, catching and reflecting God's light in ways we never could when we were merely whole.

Reflection Questions

• When you think of your own healing journey, where have you experienced the partnership between God's grace and your own active participation?

• What does "staying in the water" look like for you right now? What spiritual practices or healing work is God inviting you to engage?

• How do you discern the difference between surrendering to God's transforming work and simply being passive about your spiritual growth?

• Where in your life might you be resisting the refining process? What would it look like to cooperate more fully with God's healing work?

• In what ways do you see yourself as a "treasure" that has been co-created through both divine love and your own faithful response?

A Prayer

Gracious God, like sea glass tumbled smooth by patient waves, we offer you our broken places and our willingness to be transformed. Work in us with your gentle persistence, and help us show up faithfully to partner with your healing grace. Give us courage to stay in the water when the waves feel too strong, wisdom to know when to surrender and when to act, and strength to do the inner work that transformation requires. Help us trust that your love and our faithful response are making us into treasures that reflect your light. May we recognize in our scars the artistry of grace received and grace chosen, and may our transformed lives be reminders to others of what becomes possible when heaven and earth work together to create beauty from brokenness. Amen.