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By Her Hand: #30DaysOfArtChallenge

Kristen Steele will give me my first tattoo.

That’s a sentence I never thought I would type. I was anti-tattoo for a long time. I’ve always had changing attitudes and interests, I didn’t want to be marked with something permanent.

Then I learned that nothing is permanent.

Even tattoos change. Their meaning can change. Their color and shape changes. They grow with you.

This tattoo will mark a new chapter in my life. After five years managing my household alone, Kristen will be joining me to expand our lives in innumerable ways. This one work of art will symbolize the many creations we are to bring into being.

That’s a lot to fit into one design. Focusing on beauty and art this month is part of that journey.

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Accident and Surrender: #30DaysOfArtChallenge

Art is crashing into my life. God has rarely been subtle in lighting my journey.

I found another podcast discussing a broad spectrum of art and philosophy. It is one in a series of “accidental” discoveries in recent days.

For the next thirty days I am going to explore art in new ways, with curiosity and a focus on becoming a vehicle for more beauty in the world.

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Conversations on Art

The next chapter of my life approaches.

He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Art will be central for the first time since poetry consumed more of my mind than any college essay could.

I’ll be cohabitating, working, and creating with another adult in deeper ways than I accomplished in ten years of marriage.

As shocking and new and devastating and dangerous as widowhood was (and is), it wasn’t a choice. This next chapter is filled with purpose and I am authoring it willingly, yet it is still unnerving.

Art is unsettling. Beautiful creations put into relief the ugliness of the world. There is peril and risk as art at once reveals and creates mysteries. It is not a casual endeavor.

The conversations below fell into my day to remind me the responsibility that comes with making art.

The first is about Mary, mother of Christ, and her symbolic meaning as portrayed in two-thousand years of art.

The second pertains to the contemporary state of art. It has me considering the Why of this next chapter. It is in my heart, but I’m piecing together the words.

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365 Devotionals: Overthinking Faith

And a certain man was there, which had an infirmity thirty and eight years.

John 5:5 KJV

I had thirty and eight years when I found Jesus in my heart. Many of those years had been spent in discussions, debates, books, lectures, and entertainment designed to uncover the mysteries and meanings of life.

It wasn’t any of that study that ultimately brought me to believing in Jesus Christ as the son of God on Earth. It was reading the words Jesus spoke in his short ministry.

I began my healing in that year. Before I had thirty and nine years, I would lose my wife. If Jesus had not shown up when he did, I don’t know how I would have survived the pain and brokeness of widowhood.

I still lean into the discussions and lectures (debates, not so much). I have an active, curious mind and I want to feed it nourishing food. However, I’m happiest and most comforted when faith is easy and heartfelt.

We have a skin infection running through the house. One son likely got it in a jiu-jitsu tournament and now my other son and I are suffering from it. I was feeling low and ugly this morning. Physical affection is my love language and I felt untouchable. To protect those I love I would have to be lonely. I thought a simple thing, “Only Jesus would hold me like this.”

The woe-is-me became a solace. No matter how much the world might reject me, I have absolute faith that Jesus will love me. I’m spiritually vulnerable and convinced that is how this infection was able to take hold.

I am healing. God is the source of healing and we are called to meet Him in that healing place.

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Spiritually Hungry

I’ve tried different routines, but I haven’t been able to find a groove with studying Scripture.

Jordan Peterson’s Exodus seminar restarted today and I’ve felt relief just by listening to these scholars discuss the Word from a variety of theological, philosophical, and rational perspectives.

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Legacy Letter Challenge

I purchased this domain shortly before my wife became ill. Before I got to blog about local events, as I had planned, I was a widower.

This became my sounding board in a lonely existence. I also thought of it as a record to leave my sons. I’ve thought many times about posting letters directly to them, but never followed through.

Tonight I learned about the Legacy Letter Challenge. A father who lost his dad at a young age is now guiding parents through their own legacy letters.

The workshop is soon, March 8th, at 7:00 pm EST. Use the link above to register if you wish to leave something that your children will value more than anything in your abscence.