Many of you followed my almost daily post on Facebook, entitled “Walk in The Secret Place.” Now I have wrestled myself free from social media, I thought you might like a weekly post with photographs I have taken during the last week. Enjoy.
Keep safe. Be Kind. Enjoy
[NOTE: This piece was written by Abi, our daughter, on the first anniversary of her Grandma, my Mum, passed away.] It took me years before I learnt that the beautiful pieces of art around the house were painted by my grandma. She was an artist, an aspect of her I don’t remember much of. And I’ve recently been thinking about my belief in the Great Artist. My grandma could create masterpieces from nothing, in the same way that The Great Artist created everything in existence from nothing…including us. Human beings are art work. My grandma was artwork.
I feel sad today that she could make such incredible art, art that has and will outlive her, art that has a place in my home, art that speaks. Yet she never saw herself as artwork, as a masterpiece. And she never saw others this way either.
Of course human beings are art. How can we not be? Our prayers are spells, our words are poetry, and our smiles are a fresh flick of the paintbrush, and our bodies are the frames we’re in. Our expressions, our frowns, our tears, our exclamations – even our clothing, our mannerisms, and our choices- are all communicating art. Our joy, pain, accomplishments, pain, conflicts, failures, disappointments, hope…do we not use these to create paintings and patchworks and sculptures all the time? We are complex and evolving and abstract. But isn’t that art? The painting in my grandma’s dining room that is vibrant and feels like spring, is just as much art as the broken ships on the shore that now hangs in my living room. The yellows in the first painting are not more ‘art’ than the blacks and greys of the latter. Of course, some people will prefer one painting over another- preference is part of art I suppose. The latter painting speaks to my soul far more than the spring painting.
Even on our darkest days, we are art. Living pieces of art.
I wonder if my grandma would, have lived differently if she knew was a masterpiece, if she knew she was art. I wonder how she would have been if she knew that every single part of her was a work of art and that she was communicating with other living pieces of art. I hope it would have helped her to pray honestly and sincerely, authentically from her heart – not worrying about what or who God wanted her to be and feel, or what others wanted to see; that it would have allowed her to be a masterpiece. Her joy would be understood by her as art, her depression would be understood as art. Instead she saw some things of her masterpiece as needing to be painted into the forefront and shown off, and other pieces as mistakes on the canvas that needed to be painted over or covered.
I wonder if it would have empowered her to be kinder to others – to see the art in others that she encountered, lived with and loved. I can only wish that she would have seen the art in people, regardless of the colours used for their frame, and the accent in which they shared their poetry. I can only wish that she wouldn’t have spent her life advising others on the sort of art that they ‘should’ be, but she would have learnt to appreciate the art they were in those moments, always evolving, always changing, totally abstract, but sometimes with beautiful clarity. When I wander around art galleries, there’s frankly a lot of paintings and sculptures that are wasted on me. I don’t understand them. I’m not sure I understand the language of their spells or the meaning of their poetry. I can look at a painting and wonder why that colour was used or that part thrown into the forefront. My lack of understanding doesn’t diminish the fact that it is art. And so, this goes for people too. Our lack of understanding of others doesn’t make them any less a masterpiece.
The thing that pains me the most when I remember my grandma is that of my first image in her last weeks at the hospital: old and frail, tired, lonely and terrified. I remember her telling me that God wasn’t ready for her yet, and she wasn’t going to die yet, and I kindly smiled and said, “Grandma, God is always ready for you, and you don’t need to worry about that. If it is God’s timing, then it is God’s timing and there’s not much you can do about that.” Gosh Grandma, don’t fight with The Great Artist. Don’t you see, that even in death, He is making art? He is making things new and making things beautiful. I can remember my sister sitting with her reading the Psalms, and others playing her hymns in her last days to bring her peace. And I mostly remember trying my hardest to love her and look after her and alleviate her fears – to see her art, her painful, terrified, exhausted art, and meet it with my own art: kindness and love and peace. When we see people as art, it allows us to stop for a moment and consider how we should reflect and respond to the art being presented to us. I didn’t present some of my other spells and poems and expressions of art for my grandma on those days in the hospital – my own grief and anxiety and pain for her. I shared that art with others, in the carpark outside.
My comfort today, a year on since she died in the hospital and not in her home, is that she is entirely and authentically a masterpiece, existing amongst art and able to see and celebrate art that her eyes wouldn’t allow her to see while she was with us: in a variety of frames, praying a huge host of spells and speaking poetry in accents and languages that will no longer make her feel uncomfortable.
15.44. It was bitterly cold this morning when I ventured out for a walk. But the sun was out and the wind had dropped. The beach was crowded with runners – crazy people! But I was alone with my thoughts and with My Papa and that is always more than enough for me.
We talked about doing life together, about the importance of friendships, relationships, collaborating together. I honoured The Divine Dance, The Divine Romance, the fact that Papa, Mama and Aslan dance around me and sing over me. I found myself, yet again, drawn into the heart of The Mysterious and Glorious Three-in-One, the reality that is diminished by the stone cold, hard and dead doctrine of The Trinity. It felt like they loved all over me, kissing and licking me to a place where I was undone and wrecked.
And then I saw that which is obvious, that which is probably the most doctrinally correct I have been in ages. The blindingly obvious can only be seen by those who have eyes to see. For whatever reason, the reality of eternity has gone undetected and unnoticed by those that won’t see. And “no one is blinder than he who won’t see!”
I have always lived my life within the very restrictive confines of my life lived here on earth – my seventy-years or however many God deems I am worthy of. In practice, I have lived my life believing that my life ends the day I stop breathing. After that there is nothing, despite my holding to a Christian worldview.
And then I read “Cross Roads” by William P Young! My conversation with Papa, Mama and Aslan this morning, flowed out of that reading. Now I see! As much as I can! My life does not end when I leave this world. In fact, the few years I have lived and will live are just the introduction to eternity. And one thing is powerfully clear to me. Whatever reality is, disrobed of the robes and finery of the Christian theology, it is, intrinsically about LOVE. It is about friendship, relationship, collaboration; the most perfect and sublime intimacy. In the first place, this is an eternal reality, outside of time and space, an intimacy that has existed within the Godhead – Papa, Mama and Aslan and now shared with me. Yes! I am invited, for all of eternity to become a part of this Glorious Three-in-One and share in the love that exists between them. And time cannot contain such a power. It has to be an eternal thing. And this is what I was designed and created for. This is my reason for being, and will always be.
And the passing from this life, into the unspoken glory of eternity, will make this complete rather than partial. I am lost for words, because it is the most sublime thing. “Thank you, Papa.”
Meanwhile, in the here and now, this is designed to be my modus operandi. Life is about friendship, about collaboration, about LOVE. If it is less than this, it is nothing. Work, Church, family, recreation, parenting, spending money, wasting time – without the power of friendship, of loving The Next One, they mean nothing. They are a lot of noise, without substance.
So whatever The Great Adventure holds for me in the future, one element is not up for discussion and debate. LOVE conquers all. It has to. I can make plans, and do “ministry” – whatever that is – but if it is not relational, and if it is not driven and oozing with love, it is a complete and utter waste of time. A salutary lesson. A defining encounter with My Great Papa this morning. “Thank you.”
The Papa Journey 