No one has ever accused me of
being the crafty sort, especially not my kids. While other moms finger painted,
pulled ideas from fully stocked craft closets, made homemade play dough, and
otherwise provided hours of creative entertainment for their children, my kids
were lucky to find a coloring book and crayons. I admire – yes, even envy –
moms who take the time to gather ideas, stockpile supplies, oversee the making
of monumental messes, and then happily clean it all up like June Ward. I don’t suffer
from a complete lack of desire and skill. It’s more of a mental block: I can’t
see where I’ll find the time or energy. In fact, the idea of attempting some of
the cute ideas that flood the internet, and especially Pinterest plum wears me
out, so I just don’t do it. The ironic thing is I enjoy fashioning beautiful
things with my own hands when I take the time to do it. As I’ve learned new
skills with my girls through our Keepers at Home group (www.keepersofthefaith.com), I’ve
discovered the delight it brings to create something from nothing, to make
gifts, and to acquire useful skills that can be used for my home and others.
Given my history, then, it will
come as no surprise when I tell you it took me four years to complete “Miss
Monica.” I remember the day I brought her to my mother-in-law’s senior sewing
group at the local community center. The instructor actually laughed at my
choice of Brazilian embroidery pattern. Perhaps a bit ambitious for a rooky.
Never one to start small, however, I set to work, determined to show her I
could do it.
Painstakingly formed one stitch
at a time, with months between stitching sessions, her stamped pattern slowly
transformed into the perfect southern belle and the personification of this
girl’s desire to have lived at a time when corsets, petticoats, and
ridiculously full, flowing gowns were worn at all times.
Imperfect stitches, coffee
stains, and even spotted with a few drops of blood from a needle prick or two,
Miss Monica awaits a good cleaning before taking up permanent residence on my
wall. She is more than a skill mastered or a project conquered. She is a story.
She is lazy weekends spent at my mother-in-law’s place in Galveston Bay
complete with bike rides, shell hunts, lazy afternoons swinging in a hammock,
go carts, golf carts, blow up pools, and seafood cookouts. She is car trips to
escape for a few days, sometimes just with James, and other times the whole
crew. She is plane rides blanketing family vacation. She is Friday afternoons
stitching with daughters and friends. She is a summer sewing group with other
moms and daughters, Jane Eyre on CD, and my mother-in-law sowing into us with
her decades of teaching literature in public school. She is new friends and
expanded horizons. She is time travel to the early 1800s when life was slow and
women spent long afternoons sipping tea, working with their hands, and spending time
together.
She is Psalm 139:13-16 (NLT):
You made all the delicate, inner parts of
my body and knit me together in my mother's womb. Thank You for making me so
wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You
watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in
the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was
recorded in Your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had
passed.
I gaze at her, amazed that my
fingers formed the flowers, stems, hems, sun hat, and parasol. I knit her
delicate parts together. I chose the colors and details for each feature. When
I take her in, I am amazed. Did my hands really do that? It makes me wonder: Is
this how God sees us? Does God stare at us in wonder of what His hands knit
together? As I admire her, does He admire me? Not because I’m admirable, but
because I am His handiwork. Does He stand back and enjoy the work of His hands?
I see her imperfections. They
don’t bother me. They’re part of her story. They make her uniquely mine.
Different. Set apart. In the same way, God remembers we are dust. Our
imperfections simply part of the story we tell of His perfection and
redemption. His strength in our weakness.
I feel assured. I don’t have to be perfect, just His. Saved by
grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Humble. Willing. Ready. Obedient.
“For we are His workmanship,
created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we
should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:10).
Our value isn’t in who we are to this world or how we measure up
to its standards.
Our value is in the fact that He made us and completely changes
and transforms us in Christ Jesus so that we have what He knows is required to make
due use of the opportunities He prepared for us before He even saved us.
I don’t know that anyone appreciates “Miss Monica” the way I do.
Perhaps the way God appreciates us because of what He put into us.
Lord, may be a beautiful display of
Your glory as we become more wholly Yours today.
Shauna Wallace
Holy His
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