Dear girls,
There are stages in the creative process where you may have nothing to show at the end of the day except a giant mess of pieces torn on the table before you. You may wonder why you spent time collecting scraps and tearing paper while seeking patterns and prints that inspire you. You will be tempted to think that your time was wasted and that you should have been painting and producing instead. It may seem that you’re missing the boat, that others are pulling out ahead of you. At moments, you may even feel that their wake is rocking your boat and that God has given your thunder to someone else.
You may not be able to see exactly where you are going when you are holding a stack of pieces cut from magazines, and you still don’t have a single finished piece to show for your work. It may be hard to trust that all the pieces will come together to form something bold and beautiful that’s uniquely you. From what I’ve seen though, God has a way of weaving torn things together if we take pauses to find new ways to play instead of rushing into production. When we let the Spirit bring forth His fruit in His own timing, you will see that there is an unparalleled sweetness down in the deep of that fruit.
It’s like the difference between strawberries and cream from Publix and strawberries and cream from Wimbledon. They are both good and somewhat satisfying, but in the end, the sweetness of the fruit served at Wimbledon casts a mighty long shadow over the baskets of berries bought from Publix. We may not have access to the berries of Wimbledon, but the good news is that everyone does have access to the Spirit if they are in Christ.
So let’s go play and praise our way through the waves of Corona’s grief. Let’s trust that God brings beauty from messes left while sampling new cups of tea and ways to play. Let’s be a family, a nation standing together, seeking and sharing new ways to praise in the storm. In the process, we may in fact produce the product we’ve been looking for. He may lead us to connect the generations through an endless summer of thanksgiving for God and one another. It might just be the way that God heals us as He leads us home to the mothership, the church.
Love,
Mom