The Tapestry of Our Lives

I once heard or read an illustration about a beautiful image on a tapestry ... being compared to the image of our lives. We see the front of the tapestry woven into a most beautiful scene by the artist. But turn it around and you see a jumble of threads and knots. Our lives are like that. Sometimes we can't see the front of the image, we "see through a glass darkly" not comprehending what the Artist of our lives is creating. Especially when things are hard and we are in a dark place where we can't see the light. Oh how I love light! Many of my paintings, whether the image is of a child, a still life, or a dog portrait, is really about the light. Which shines the brightest next to the dark areas. My friend Annie Herring has a song she sings about how the "God of wonder, God of might, reached His hand across the night and pulled my soul into the light." (from her "Wonder" CD) God did that for me, "He reached his hand across the universe and pulled my soul into the light!" I was reading in Isaiah this morning one of my favorite passages in scripture, Chapter 61, verses 1-3 (which Jesus speaks from years later in Luke 4:18) about how God wants to give us Beauty for ashes, the oil of Joy for mourning, and the garment of Praise for the spirit of heaviness. I have experienced great joy but also great sorrow in my life. It has not always appeared beautiful to me. But I will continue to have faith that the Master Artist is creating beauty, even when all I can see is the back of the tapestry. He creates beauty from my ashes and has clothed me with the most beautiful white garment of salvation ... Oh the Wonder!