O Sing My Soul

Over the past year or so, I decided to take a chance and do something I had never done and frankly, kind of scared me!  I decided to go Painting With a Twist – this is one of the businesses that advertises certain paintings and they walk the entire class through the painting step-by-step so that you have a chance of it looking like the original.  Sometimes my painting does and sometimes it takes on a more individual tone (that is code for it didn’t look anything like it was supposed to!).  Over the past year or so of attending these classes, I have developed a real love of painting and have started venturing out on my own by painting at home.

One day as I was driving home from work, I was thinking about the upcoming session I had scheduled to take my little niece  to a painting class as part of her Christmas present to have time with Aunt Kim (she’s 6 years old and absolutely adorable).  The song “Masterpiece” by Danny Gokey started playing on the radio — now I had heard this song many times before but on this day, it really touched a cord in my soul as I listened to the words and thought about my journey to “becoming a painter”.

Creating a painting is a journey – and God showed me that the journey I experience when painting mirrors the journey He takes us on to become His masterpiece.  From inspiration to action – the act of painting is relaxing and energizing at the same time.  Sometimes, I like the painting (nailed it!) and sometimes I feel like I wasn’t able to capture the essence of the subject (not happy with it).  Sometimes, it feels unfinished and I know there is more work to do.  I want to touch on all these aspects over the next several weeks but this week, the focus is on INSPIRATION.

Painting begins with inspiration – the desire to capture something you have seen or imagined onto a canvas – to capture that beautiful, perfect scene or evoke the emotion you felt.  Inspiration comes in many forms — a beautiful sunset (I love the colors and grandeur of sunsets), a captivating picture, a child playing with pure innocence, little baby goats (so cute on Facebook), or a touch from the Father through the Holy Spirit.  When He sends inspiration in the form of a great idea, we see the possibilities and all the wonderful things that come from it — our masterpiece — it’s exiting & mind-blowing & exhilarating until ……….

We start to think about how we’ll get there  — and we start up with the “what-if” and “I can’ts”  …….

• I don’t have the skills to do that (never worked with oil paints before)
• I’ve never done that before (I can’t paint a real cat)
• The last time I tried that it didn’t turn out so well (my clouds really looked like blobs)
• And so on…..and so on…….and so on…….

Until finally we ask, What was it God told me?

We get in our own way by looking at our skills rather than toward the great I Am and His power — at least I know I do and I’ll bet you have as well.  This kind of questioning can cause us to wallow in our doubt and indecision — we put off what we know God has called us to.  We procrastinate and then it gets harder and harder to remember The Call and easier and easier to do nothing.

I recently listened to a CD by Terri Savelle  Foy, called the Power of Now.  On this CD, Terri says that research has shown that if someone receives inspiration but doesn’t act on it within 24 hours, it often never happens.  That is a scary thought!  How many blessings have we missed or kept from others  because we didn’t act on inspiration?  That’s why I wrote this at 12:25 am after starting to compose this in my head while laying in bed in the dark — really my best idea time.  So I’m laying there composing this and I pray “Lord help me remember this in the morning — it’s good!”  Then I hear that still small voice —

God:  Why wait?  Write it down now.
Me:  Really, God?  I’m really comfortable and tomorrow morning is still within the 24 hour inspiration time so I’m covered, right?
God:  Kim, what did I say?
Me:  Lord, you said to do it now.

So, after a deep breath,  here I am at 12:29 am capturing my inspiration — it goes back to obedience (didn’t we just talk about that in the last post?).  I also didn’t want to lose the inspiration because He reminded me of the saying  “someone in need is waiting on the other side of your obedience.”  What if I don’t act on His inspiration?  Who will be left in need?

Inspiration – O Sing My Soul is from Him.  I don’t know how He plans to use this blog but I find myself very inspired myself to serve Him.  Not I have a new inspiration from Him — I’ve been praying about a business to start that will allow me to work for myself but all the ideas were just missing something.  So I prayed to Him to show me how I could use my idea but serve Him at the same time.  He answered in a big way!  I’m now working on figuring out how to make it happen while trying not to give in to the doubts.  A masterpiece in progress!!!   More on that in upcoming posts!

What has God inspired you to pursue?   Just leave a comment below — I’d love to hear from you so I can keep you in prayer!  

As you get ready to move on, check out Masterpiece.  Let Him make you a masterpiece.