God’s Art is Awesome

In the beginning you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. 

Psalm 102:25 

Yirah, 2020

Oil on canvas

20” x 16”

God’s art is awesome and it is all around us! His glorious brush strokes can be seen on every flower, every mountain, every starry night, and every sunset. All of Creation boasts the glory of God and bares His fingerprints.

It is not uncommon in the art world, for one artist to drawn inspiration from another artist’s work. As God is the creator of the “every-everything,” I consider Him to be the original Master Artist and the beauty of His creation inspires me on a regular basis.

When I began this blog, one of my biggest concerns was inspiration - or rather  summoning inspiration… consistently… on a deadline.  Would I be able to pull from a steady stream of ideas for pieces week after week? Or would I hit a dry-spell and experience the dreaded “artist’s block” (in front of the whole internet). After twelve weeks of creating and posting I can state with absolute confidence that: on my own this would not be possible… “but with God all things are possible!” (Matthew 19:26 NIV). Week after week, God has faithfully blessed me with beautiful ideas and images that inspire me. Thank you, Jesus! He has revealed the most wonderful scenes to me and often when I least expected it.

The inspiration for this piece was one of those lovely unexpected moments. First, allow me to start by telling you where I wasn’t - I was not on vacation at some idyllic destination, nor was I at a picturesque national park, nor even at a lookout point on our local trails. I was at our storage unit. How is that for amazing?! I was running errands with my sister and we happened to look up. We both just sat in awe, totally captivated by the beautiful scene unfolding before us. 

As I attempted to recreate this awe inspiring moment with paint, a devotional I once read came to my mind. The devotional was part of a Bible reading plan called 7 More Hebrew Words Every Christian Should Know. On the 3rd day of this plan, author Dave Adamson introduced the word “yirah” (יִרְאָה). The Hebrew word yirah is commonly translated in English as the word “fear.” This, however, is a gross simplification of the term and a bit of a misrepresentation. A more appropriate interpretation would be, “to behold with awe or reverence.” Dave Adamson used the example of experiencing a sunset to better illustrate this feeling:

When my wife and I saw this red sky over our backyard in Georgia, we called our girls to see it too because we were in awe. We were in awe of the colors, the shapes, and the God who created this spectacular scene. The Hebrew word we translate as “awe” is yirah, which also means “respect, reverence, and worship.” Yirah also means “fear.” I grew up thinking to “fear the Lord” meant to be afraid of Him, but as we watched this stunning sunset, I didn't feel fear. I felt awe and reverence. I felt yirah. (Day 3, 7 More Hebrew Words Every Christian Should Know).

Watching this sunset with my sister definitely stirred a feeling of yirah in my heart and I had to try and paint it! I was filled with anticipation and suspense as I mixed the colors on my palette (trying my best to imitate my Father’s work). Just a side note - our Father uses some crazy color combinations! It wasn’t until the last day that He helped me bring the whole wild rainbow explosion together. 

I stood back at the end of the process to survey the end result and was overwhelmed by what He had helped me create! My heart yelled, “God is so awesome! This moment was awesome! The colors He used were awesome! His faithfulness is awesome! His creation is awesome! The fact that sunsets happen everyday is awesome!” Yes, I was definitely feeling the yirah for God.