Paint By Number Masterpiece

     Last week, I told you about a treasure that I did not buy.  This week, I am going to show you the one that I did.
     Patty and I were out when I spied this wonderful original painting of a clipper ship in full sail.  Isn’t it wonderful?
     Some of you art connoisseurs may have noticed that my treasure is a Paint by Number.  Paint by Number kits included a cardboard canvas with blue sketched areas appropriately numbered so that when you applied the coordinating paint to the segmented spaces, you would, eventually, end up with a masterpiece.

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     I loved these kits as a child.  I painted kittens, horses, ballerina’s, and landscapes.  Paint by number kits made me, ME, an artist.  Even the box proclaimed, “Every man a Rembrandt.”
     I still remember the scent that emanated from the little pots of oil paint as I carefully opened and stirred them.  And oh, the challenge of cleaning those little paint brushes so that the next color would be true and the brush supple enough to paint within those blue squiggly lines.
     The beauty of Paint by Numbers is that even though a kit may start out exactly the same as a million other kits, the end result was determined by the artists hand.  Some artists left sure deft strokes of paint, and others little blobs and smudges.  Some were signed with pride when completed and others left unfinished and hidden in the attic.
     Vintage Paint by Number paintings are becoming quite collectible.  An unpainted Clipper Ship is currently offered on ebay for $184.00.  There is even a Paint By Number Museum.  And look what I found on-line.  The same Clipper Ship painted as a mural in a nursery.

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     The Book of Genesis says, “in the beginning God created.”  Stop and think on that, God created.  God made art with His actions.  And when God made us in His image, He shared the gift of art with us.  We are artists.
     Now some of you are disagreeing.  I’m not an artist.  I’m a principal.  A construction worker. An accountant.  Because chances are, most of us haven’t gone to art school or been commissioned to sculpt marble, or paint murals.
     But could it be that our very actions of service are the art that we are to create?  That the daily responsibilities and obligations, that we just want to get through so that we can get on to the bigger and better things, are the art arena’s of our lives.  Could it be that we are artists when we serve our spouse’s, care for our children, and be faithful in our work?  Could it be that the very place of service where our feet stand is exactly where God is calling us to create our masterpieces?
Let’s allow our lives to be guided by the True Artist.

“For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.” – Ephesians 2:10

     You are an amazing work of art.  A masterpiece created and purposed in love.