A Blank Canvas

Every now and then, an artist needs a blank canvas.  Sometimes that blank canvas comes out of a fresh package, other times it's made by hand, and even still there are times when a blank canvas is created by sanding and painting over an old canvas with Gesso.  Well... this is where I am right now.. God is sanding me and has begun painting over the old painting to create something new.

There are times in life when everything around us seems to come crashing down around us and everything we knew to be true is ashes.  The good thing about that is God already said He would give us beauty for our ashes (Isaiah 61:3).

The process of reworking a canvas amazes me but also expresses exactly where I am right now.  Imagine this... you're a canvas that's had a picture drawn on it and as you've walked through life that drawing has been filled with color and texture... brush strokes, flicks of the artists brush, scrapes of a painter's knife, and even some thinner here and there.  The picture looks beautiful, but there's also some extras that have made their way into the painting...dirt, fingerprints, loose bristles from the brushes, and contaminates from the environment.  Every now and then God comes back to admire His handiwork and sees that the picture there isn't the one He initially drew and painted.  So He begins to scrape away the layers of old paint... He sands and sands until we're down to the bare basics of just canvas and a few spatters of paint from the very beginning.  He doesn't stop there... He covers the whole thing in Gesso.. makes the canvas white as snow so He can start fresh!  I hope ya'll are picking me up in the spirit. My God!  I just got excited thinking about how God continuously shows us examples of Himself in everyday things!!

Then He can begin recreating His original masterpiece.  What was underneath is gone, buried and covered!  The only things people see is a fresh white canvas... SO the only thing people see is the newness of the painting, the details and care He took with creating this work of art and how masterful He is in His creation.  They can't even tell that a painting used to be under there, there's no evidence of the process except the finished product. That just hit me like a Mack truck!! Jesus, I am the first partaker of this fruit!

No matter what has happened, no matter what condition your canvas is in, what's drawn, written or scribbled on it, what's been said about it, or even where it's been... it's not too late for the Creator to create again! Exodus 22:4 tells us that if the theft is found still alive in the enemy's hand, he must restore double.

Insert a praise right here and let me tell you why this is so important. To restore something means to bring it back to the original state, to return to completion or wholeness, to repay, to make recompense.  This isn't God paying you back or restoring... this is the enemy who has to give you double of everything he stole, tainted, tried to destroy, delayed, and messed with.

If you're in a season of transition right now, or you feel like the enemy has just been running you ragged... stop and go after your stuff.. look for life in those things he thought he'd destroyed, look for life within yourself and tell him today that you're coming after it.  Be encouraged and let God wipe away the residue of what the enemy tried to plant, the twisted images he's painted on your canvas, and begin with a fresh start.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.  2Corinthians 5:17

Get back in Christ!!