She Decided for Art

I am one of those weird people who will frame words.  And I mean this in the literal sense.  If you look closely, scattered around my house are framed bits of poetry, song lyrics, and prose.  I purchased a print of a painting I love for my husband at Valentines Day and, of course, couldn’t resist copying poetry up and down the back of it before it was placed lovingly into it’s frame.  Because I believe that if a picture is worth a thousand words, the right words, put together in a thoughtful way are worth at least a thousand pictures. 

I recently came across this piece by Ann Voskamp.  She is the author of One Thousand Gifts, and writes a wonderful blog, www.aholyexperience.com.  Her work is poetry, really.  Poetry in the modern disguise of a 21 century blog.  If you aren’t following her already…you should be.  This piece so resonated with me that I placed it here, next to my bed. 

It's a reminder for me to decide for art.  To make my life art.  To seek out the beautiful.  Because when you're really looking for it, you'll find that He's placed little reminders all around you.  It felt right to repost it here in this week leading up to Mother’s Day.  It's a piece she titled "How to make a Home".  Enjoy.

How to Make a Home

Sometimes in the middle of the night, her hip would graze his and his arm would find her waist and she would lay awake in the middle of their life.

She didn’t know what would come next and how it all would unfold, but that new mercies always would.

He made it simple. Raising, teaching, the children, wasn’t.

And the meals she always had to keep figuring out, and the laundry that toppled over, and the floors that kept growing mess. The way her mind and heart would wander, crumble at the edges, and she would reach for steadying in her Maker. The way she’d get lost– and remember to breathe. But this, this making of a family, it was not a calling to dismiss but a calling to make disciples.

A calling, that which keeps calling you and you never stop listening for, that is what a calling is, the way He keeps speaking: “This is the way, walk in it.”

So she made soup and matched socks. She scrubbed out the tub. She awoke: One always gets to decide what is mindless work and what is soulful work.

She would decide.

She decided for art, to make her life art. She would make it all art — it all would be art, worship, a gift back. It all would preach Gospel.

And he, he too had these simple ways that steadied her, there in the dark, always in her dark. The way that he talked and moved his hands and worked and held her: he knew how to keep it simple.

Just keep the focus simply on Christ — Walk Forward. Keep company with Christ. Love always. Bend low.

In the midst of everything that went wrong, that was all. They would see everything as the ugly beautiful –  because Christ is redeeming everything.

Together, they would make a life of doing hard but holy things.

She would light candles. She would murmur thanks.

She would touch him often and gently.

And there would be that:

The best place to make a home is in the state of amazing grace.

~Ann Voskamp