My mind is always moving, and my hands become restless when they can’t keep up. I sketch during lectures. I see fifty different colors in a field of grass. I can’t stop thinking about the feeling of a brush against a surface. I don’t even know why I do it, but nothing else seems quite as much like home.
I’ve visited an oak at Riley Trails once a month since I’ve been in college; to breathe, to pray, to run away from my collegiate world of preconceived, landscaped arbor. Wild trees capture so much glory, as their roots claim ground and their arms reach high. God has taught me most of His vital lessons under that very oak.
Last week, I was saddened to see that it had been cut down. Many trees were cut down, including my tree- the tree where God showed me He exists; where He stripped me of fear and pride; where I’ve prayed relentlessly for my family; where He taught me the importance of loving purely; where I’ve fought with (and submitted to) Him. I took a seat on its trunk amidst the ruins, and muttered a verse from Ecclesiastes: “a time to plant and a time to uproot.”
I had come that day to pray about my calling.
I had come that day to pray about my calling.
I had come to pray about painting.
Painting is a hobby. It’s my mistress from the routine. But a calling?
My greatest love affair and my biggest fear.
God is literally handing me the opportunities and the passion, yet I fear how that could possibly bear fruit in His name. Then I looked around at those trees. Not only were they cut down; they were completely disregarded- unused, dormant, rejected. Those trees had been chopped and strewn about as if by beauty’s own bully. I often feel pursuing painting fully would be like claiming ground and reaching high, only to be cut down and strewn about.
Painting is a hobby. It’s my mistress from the routine. But a calling?
My greatest love affair and my biggest fear.
God is literally handing me the opportunities and the passion, yet I fear how that could possibly bear fruit in His name. Then I looked around at those trees. Not only were they cut down; they were completely disregarded- unused, dormant, rejected. Those trees had been chopped and strewn about as if by beauty’s own bully. I often feel pursuing painting fully would be like claiming ground and reaching high, only to be cut down and strewn about.
But we don’t serve a bully.
We serve a Redeemer. A God incarnate whose heart understands our own. A Suffering Servant, mocked on our behalf to pay the price for compassion on His. Upon this realization, I remembered Ecclesiastes once more: “He has made everything beautiful in its time.” To pursue the creative act requires full trust in the same God who can use me like He used that unknowing oak to teach me lessons. Even today, that broken tree was an instrument for my heart.
We serve a Redeemer. A God incarnate whose heart understands our own. A Suffering Servant, mocked on our behalf to pay the price for compassion on His. Upon this realization, I remembered Ecclesiastes once more: “He has made everything beautiful in its time.” To pursue the creative act requires full trust in the same God who can use me like He used that unknowing oak to teach me lessons. Even today, that broken tree was an instrument for my heart.
He brings beauty to severed trees and severed souls.
And I really want to paint that somehow.
