In the Hands of an Artist - New Blog Post
I am no artist, and my 2 artistic claims to fame, one was of Leonardo, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, done on a school chalk board, and the other, was a painting of a tree in the foreground with mountains in the background; that was displayed in the hallway by my teacher and that someone ruined when they wrote an obscene comment on it; thus, ending my art career. Today, I’d much rather create art through words, create a painting in the minds of my readers and be a blessing to their hearts.
In Tasha Cobb Leonard’s song, “Royalty”, she sings the lyrics, “like a brush in the hands of an artist, I am your masterpiece”, and as I began to hear that song in my heart over the course of several days, after the song was released, I began to not only think of my life, but each of our lives. When God begins to take us through a growth process, life can get unsavory. It makes me think of a painting, where in the background you see some dark, grim, and haunted-looking scene, but in the foreground, you see something with color, life, and beauty. It also makes me think of a video I watched of an artist painting during the singing of the national anthem at a basketball game, the entire time I was trying to figure out what he was painting, and then at the end of the song, he turns the painting 180 degrees and reveals a painting of the NY firefighters raising the American flag after 9/11/01.
I have spoken before to someone on my church’s pastoral team about being thankful in the middle of the discomfort. At the end of 2022, I have found myself stepping away from some things to focus more on my writing and taking a break from most of my responsibilities at church. It’s just hard because I want to be involved, and serve my church family well, but I realized the roles I was filling were just that, “roles”; and not where I could best serve them.
Our lives, our marriages, our careers, our relationships, and/or our ministries can each feel much like those two images I spoke of; beauty encased in darkness or flipped upside down, but like a brush in the hands of an artist we are Jesus Christ’s masterpiece.
Stepping away from things that are familiar, comfortable, and “safe” is like stepping out of beauty into darkness, but like a brush in the hands of an artist, we are His masterpiece. Many times, we are asking, “What’s going on?”, but God’s not done yet; He’s still putting His brush strokes to the painting; he’s letting some of it dry before he continues.
YOU ARE HIS MASTERPIECE!