Visiting the one-armed lady

Greetings from the city of the one-armed lady!

This blog comes from one of the oldest cities in the world, founded by the Phoenicians around 770 BC.  We’re in Málaga, in Andalusia, at the bottom right of Spain.

Just down the road, Calle Alcazabilla stands the Cathedral, built on the site of a former mosque after the Reconquista, the period in which Christian kingdoms gradually took back control of Spain and Portugal from Muslim rule.

Locals call it La Manquita, the one-armed lady.

Why? Only the one tower was ever completed; the second remains unfinished.  A popular story says funds meant for the tower were diverted to help American independence or local charities.

A cathedral unfinished, just like me.  For the good news is that God isn’t finished with me yet – which explains a lot! As for all Christians, I am a work in progress, still being shaped by his grace day by day.

For here we rely on God to keep his promise, as the apostle Paul would remind us. “There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears.” (Philippians 1:6 Message)

For in complete contrast to those who built the cathedral God does not give up on us, which is just as well.  The good news is that he keeps on going until “the flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears.”

I recall a conversation some years ago now with someone I happened to bump into.  We were talking about some of the members of our church whom she knew, including Joan Smith, not her real name for reasons that will be soon become obvious. 

She commented how Joan, by her life and demeanour, showed the peace of Christ.  At that point I asked whether we were talking about the same person because the Joan I knew was a bag of nerves.

I always remember her response:  “But you didn’t know Joan ten years ago!”  Very simply she could see how God effectively had been working in Joan’s life – but clearly with a lot of work still to do.

I’ve come across this wonderful quote by Spanish priest and writer José Luis Martín Descalzo: “God writes straight with crooked lines.”

It is a wonderfully honest observation. Life rarely unfolds neatly. Plans falter. People fail. Churches struggle. And yet—somehow—God continues to write his story through it all. Not despite our imperfections, but through them.

For the wonder of the Gospel is that God enjoys working through our weaknesses; it’s his MO. Not when I have everything together, but when I don’t. Not when I feel strong, but when I know I am not. It is there, in the cracks, that his grace finds room to shine.

So despite everything, our failures and our fears, God keeps going.  His Holy Spirit is committed to making us the very people we have been created to become.

But not just me – but even the entire created order.  As Tom Wright writes: “God’s future is not about scrapping the present world, but about redeeming it.”

Not discarding. Not starting again from scratch. But redeeming—restoring—completing what has begun.  And that includes us.

And like La Manquita, we may feel unfinished—but in God’s hands, even our incompleteness can become a place where grace is seen most clearly, and where quiet faithfulness tells a deeper, more beautiful story.

God is not waiting for us to become flawless before he can use us. He is already at work—here and now—in the middle of our ordinary, unfinished lives. In the conversations we have, the kindness we show, the faith we cling to even when it feels fragile. These are not small things. They are the very places where his kingdom grows.

So we carry on—not as perfect people, but as people held by a perfect grace. Trusting that even when we cannot see the full picture, the master builder has not stepped away from the project.

And one day, by his grace, what is now incomplete will be brought to completion.

Until then, we live as La Manquita people—unfinished, yes—but wonderfully, faithfully, and purposefully in his hands.

To conclude: a typical quote from the always down-to-earth Teresa de Ávila, my favourite Spanish saint: “ God walks among the pots and in everyday tasks.” 

And that is where God is hard at work—right in the middle of ordinary life.