paint me perfect

because we humans love our analogies, and because it's difficult to understand our relationship with God, the bible is full of helpful analogous descriptions of how we are regarded and how we, in turn, should regard God. our God is our shepherd, our rock, our foundation, our shelter, our strong tower, our provider, our groom. i could go on and on. interestingly, the parent-child (usually father-child) relationship is probably the most popular. i say this is interesting because, looking at the state of many parent-child relationships around us, i don't know that we, as a species, really have that one down. all of the others can be more easily understood. a provider, for instance, is, by definition, one who provides. a father, on the other hand and as sad as it is, is not necessarily one who fathers.

i have recently come to fancy a different analogy. God is my artist. if we think about it, the artist chooses everything about his or her creation (not the same can be said for parents and children). the colors, the shapes, the mediums - it's all intentional and meant to work together to accomplish something - the expression of the artist, the glorification of the artist, the connection between the artist and the spectator. i like this. i like to think of myself as a piece of art, crafted for a purpose - an expression of my creator, something to bring glory to my creator, something that can help others connect with my creator, who they might come to know as their creator.

i like this, too, because it helps me celebrate myself. parents are often trying to shape their children - curb things that may prove problematic and encourage things that will be helpful. artists are different. if there is something in art that appears to some to be errant, it is not. the artist put it there and it will serve a purpose at some point. i fear that some christians of a more legalistic persuasion miss out on this. if dancing brings joy to my soul, i can be confident that i was created that way - it's a gift, not a blemish. it is not something shameful, it is something put in me for my own good, at least, if not for something greater (in my case, it's probably just for me).

let me push the analogy to include the human condition and human error. i acknowledge that everything in me is not good. i do have a capacity for evil. perhaps that capacity is an imperfection in my canvass that the great artist manages to work into the piece. it is said that God does not waste pain and i believe that. i can think about some of the most painful things that have happened in my short life and not wish them away. they are so much a part of me that i can't imagine myself without them - without the things they taught me. how's that for efficiency? no waste. God is so green.

in light of all of this, let me say that as pieces of art, we have certain responsibilities.

• we cannot mute ourselves, or each other. imagine, if you painted two pictures and they came to life and decided that they were ashamed of and needed to hide the very pieces of themselves that you loved best - the parts that made them special (adam and eve?). i realize it's a weird hypothetical situation, but it would be rather heartbreaking.
• we cannot mar ourselves or others. same situation - if one of the paintings set itself on fire while the other attacked it with a knife. even a little weirder and definitely more heartbreaking.
• we must embrace ourselves and each other so much that we nearly explode. i don't really know what that would look like for our live-painting analogy, but you get where i'm going with this.

in short, you are beautiful people, and i'm not so bad either, so we should act like it.

but seriously

a theology professor once explained learning about God this way - sometimes we can draw a box of definition around God using only what we know God is not. finding what God is can sometimes be more of a challenge.

i know that God is not a God who has intended for me to live my whole life by emotion, chance and my own interpretation of events that may or may not be natural. i say this because i have seen christians live this way. i have seen some people very close to me live in agony and fear because the only way they know by which to make good decisions is to wait for a consuming conviction-to wait and see what God reveals to them through fleeting sentiments, billboards, or the good old fashioned 'open and point' scripture-reading. don't misunderstand me. i have heard several stories of God speaking through these very things, but as a general rule, i don't think that my relationship with my Creator should hinge on feelings and divinations.

i believe, rather, that i have been divinely equipped for this life, in a way that allows me to walk in humble gratitude and confidence in a life that is guided by principles of righteousness and love, when it is, in fact, guided by principles of righteousness and love. i do not always need to wait for a feeling to tell me 'yes' or to tell me 'no.' i do not need to live in guilt and uncertainty. guilt is not of God. once again, do not misunderstand me. it is important, it is vital to be ever-sensitive to the leading and the presence of the Holy Spirit. one would be a fool to disregard such a priceless gift. once again, i think i am just trying to find truth by naming non-truth. if i get caught up in over-spiritualizing every thing in my life (for instance - i saw a purple finch sitting on a lilac bush and so clearly, God wants me to move back to nh. no, that's silly), i believe that i will dilute what it is that i love most about God - the beauty and grace right in the midst of human depravity.

my real question in all of this is the role of God in my life. i think i that i understand, or at least know how to pursue further, how the existence and character of God changes the way i live my life. what i don't understand is where to draw the lines between attributions: for what am i responsible? for what are you responsible? for what is God responsible? for what is no one responsible? i'm not sure.

i started thinking about this a couple of years ago in the context of babies. my friend was getting married and having a hard time deciding what kind of contraception to use, or whether she should use it at all. i had heard before that the bible calls children a blessing, and so who are we to try and dictate when or how God chooses to bless us. this made sense to me at the time. then again, it didn't matter too much to me - marriage and babies being so far away.

then, my friend and i had a conversation with our pastor and his wife, who had decided to have no more children. they told us not to over-spiritualize the situation. they said that when a woman mis-carries, it's not necessarily because God took the baby away, but because God designed our bodies to work a certain way. this made me think about conception. i know that the bible says that i was knit together in my mothers womb, and that's a beautiful thought, but i wonder if we've interpreted it in a slightly over-literal sense. for instance, every day there are babies born in africa to impoverished women with AIDS and they do not survive through their miserable first year of life. is that the will of God, or is that just a consequence of humans refusing to care for one another?

since that time, i have struggled with this whole idea of attribution. i still don't really understand, but i guess if i understood everything, i wouldn't need a God. i have resolved to the philosophy that i should do all that i can do because that is all that i can do. whatever is out of my control may or may not be orchestrated by God, but i do know that whatever happens, God will help me to find the good and encourage it to grow.