The band Gungor sings, "You make beautiful things out of the dust....You make beautiful things out of us." This melody comes to mind when I cast my eyes on this stunning mosaic. The artwork was a product of the, "Messy Spirituality", sermon series we did in the Contemporary service, in October 2013.
During the series we explored how, oftentimes, our lives and our faith walks can be very messy. We are, after all, broken people who live in a broken world. Through the series we begin to imagine that, perhaps, it is right in the midst of our broken lives and turmoil that Jesus meets us. Maybe God doesn't wait for us to get our acts together to love us. We wondered if, in fact, it is in our clumsy stumbling through life's challenges where authentic faith and spirituality are born.
In the Life On the Road worship service, the congregation received broken pieces of pottery during the first week of the series. We carried these broken pieces with us until the end of the series as a means of reflecting on our broken lives and spirituality. On the final Sunday, in addition to bringing the pottery shards back, people were invited to bring things that were either broken or represented brokenness to them from their homes. Following the sermon, we all left our broken pieces, objects and symbols at the foot of the cross.
During the service that day, in an empty frame constructed by Russell Ehrlich, Clover Clamons began the mosaic using the returned items from the congregation. In the year and a half following, groups of people and families gathered on occasion to work on the mosaic. One of the 4 squares of the mosaic was completed. Eventually it ended up at Anna Landry's house and she worked on the other 3 panels to complete the work. With her artistic gifts and the Holy Spirit working alongside her, she filled in all of the panels with the objects and the grout to complete the work.
It is something to behold!! Spend some time looking and studying it. Listen and open your heart to the message God is wanting you to hear from this. You will find broken jewelry, broken china from the 2013 Halloween flood, a wedding ring from a broken marriage, a broken AA chip representing broken sobriety....even a broken heart....all wrapped around the only thing that makes us whole....the cross.
The negative space in the mosaic forms the cross. There is a path that runs through the whole mosaic and the seasons change in the 3 panels. This path depicts the journey in our lives and how we grow and change as we go.
May we offer all our broken pieces to Jesus as we walk together in this journey. God DOES make beautiful things.....out of us.
~MUMC Sesquicentennial History Committee
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