PAINTING PICTURES

Rain’s Rustle by Leonid Afremov

...I am sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.

-Acts 26:17b-18

Think of life as a canvas.

Picture today as a single brushstroke.

Imagine the collective sum of those strokes as the painting of your life.

Apart from being born-again in Christ, the only color available on the palette is black. Why? Scripture tells us plainly in 1 John 1:5b, “...God is light; in him, there is no darkness at all.” Then, in Romans 14:23b we read, “...and everything that does not come from faith is sin.”

God is light.

Without light, there is no color.

Apart from God’s unmerited gift of faith, we have only sin’s darkness to paint with. Stroke after depraved stroke and layer upon corrupted layer, we spill, spew, splash, and spray only darkness.

In stark contrast, picture this:

...there before me was a throne in heaven with someone sitting on it. And the one who sat there had the appearance of jasper and ruby. A rainbow that sparkled like an emerald encircled the throne… Also in front of the throne, there was what looked like a sea of glass, clear as crystal.

Revelation 4:2-6

Ephesians 2:10 tells us that we are God’s ποίημα (poy'-ay-mah), His workmanship, His handiwork, His creation, His masterpiece. Jesus is the perfected expression of obedience to the Father’s will. He is revered, celebrated, and adorned more than any other in history; rightly so because as Hebrews 1:3 tells us, “The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of Him…”

Faith is God’s gift of Himself, His light, living in and through us. When the Presence of God’s Holy Spirit truly reigns on the throne of our hearts - the resulting fireworks display of color and light is unmistakable.

So who’s painting the picture me or God?

The answer is - both. It’s an extravagant dance of intimacy and light, color and passion, emotion and intentionality, of subtlety and surrender. But why? Why would God invite us into this cascading rainbow-rhumba of worship? “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

Are you painting vivid strokes on the canvas of life with the light and color only God can provide? Will the finished canvas be God’s handiwork and masterpiece of, in, and through you -or- will it go on the scrapheap of oblivion as yet another painted exclusively with the blackened darkness of autonomy and sin?

What kind of picture are you painting with your life? What kind of picture is God painting with you?

Blessings,

-Kevin M. Kelley

aMostUnlikelyDisciple.com