Grief has broken me.
Do you know what Kintsugi is? It’s the Japanese art of taking broken tea bowls and piecing them back together with gold. Even though they are broken, their scars are filled with gold making them even more valuable than before.
I feel like this is what I look like now — broken. I look at myself in the mirror and I don’t even look like the same person I was before Jim died. It’s really quite strange. But on the inside, where it counts, Jesus has taken those broken pieces of my life and He is filling them up with Himself to remake me. I am scarred — but the scars show the absolute beautiful love of God who is mending me.
Part of that broken, unrecognizable person I have become has developed a new way of seeing life — and seeing art. It began with a verse on April 20th, 2021, less than a month before Jim passed away. We were laying in bed listening to our nightly devotion before we fell asleep. Jim was on my right and we were holding hands — he was holding my right hand. The verse that night was “For I am the Lord your God who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, Do not fear; I will help you.” Isaiah 41:13. When I heard that verse, I squeezed Jim’s hand with my right hand. I knew I wouldn’t have Jim’s hand forever so I held it tightly and committed that feeling to memory. Since he has passed away, every time I hear that verse, I still imagine squeezing Jim’s hand, feeling his hand in mine. But now his hand is gone.
But God’s hand is there in its place.
At some point not long after Jim’s death in 2021, God showed me an image of that verse in my mind and I made a quick painting of it. The painting is representational of a hand reaching up and God’s hand reaching down. I painted it quickly on a small canvas and painted the verse on the canvas where it could be seen as part of the painting. I held onto that image for a long time and I just kept thinking about it. Then God started showing me other images when I was reading scripture, praying or singing to the Lord. It’s actually been pretty exciting for Him to reveal scripture, hymns and music in this way to me and I’m excited to share more of those paintings with you.
But back to how all this started with Isaiah 41:13. It’s 2024 and I’m just now starting to put this painting - my first painting from the Lord in this way - on canvas. So when I began to paint the image from this verse, I wanted to show it through time-lapse like I’ve done with so many of my paintings because I know people love watching the process. I painted 2 or 3 paintings and it never was coming out right. I would write the scripture on the canvas, then I would paint the background, then add the gold and then represent the arm reaching to the Lord and the Lord reaching down — and it never looked right. I’m reading a lot of Mako Fujimara right now and he talks about how creating art (as a Christian) is sacred. So as I became intentional about entering that sacred space with the Lord before I started another try at this painting, I felt the Lord say you’re trying to show what you’re doing instead of just doing it. So I scrapped the recording idea. And decided to enter the sacred. Normally when I paint on something smaller and probably when I painted this first original and it looked like I wanted it to, I held it in my hands. I didn’t have it propped up to show off. And it dawned on me how the Lord has held me in His hands to make me into who he wants me to be.
So that’s how I created this final painting and I believe that sacred process is why it turned out the way it did and why I’m happy with it. To tell you the story of how I made it — underneath is the scripture written in pencil. The background color I mixed to give a soothing, almost cloud-like peaceful heavenly color. I have added a little bit of gold just because the Lord is King and royal. What I’m trying to depict in my marks with my palette knife — I first started with my arm going up to the Lord which starts at the bottom left and kinda comes up. You can see it’s a thin line and it’s kinda weak looking. It’s reaching and you can sort of see where it ends but it’s just a feeble reach. But then I come down with the Lord’s reach that you see on the top right —the strong paint coming down and reaching. It not only comes in contact with me so we’re touching, but it’s reaching as well into all things. The Lord is in my future but he’s in my past too and he’s bringing it all together for His glory. It’s a promise. I see it as a promise from the Lord that I don’t have to be afraid. He will help me and He will continue to help me.
Thank you for letting me share the story of Isaiah 41:13 as seen by me. :)