I love pottery. I’m not sure what it is about it but I just love handmade pottery. I have a very vintage shaving mug rack that was from a barber shop in a town near me. It held shaving mugs for the barbers’ customers. When they would come in for a haircut and a shave each one had their very own mug with their name on it and a small cake of soap in the bottom that the barber could whip up into a froth and slather it on their face for the cleanest shave that they ever had. Well, this mug rack now holds all of my special pottery mugs for coffee, tea or whatever beverage anyone chooses. I have a favorite, of course that I gravitate towards every time. It was taller than most of my 40 or so mugs, had a tree painted on it ( my weakness is a love for trees) and it just felt “right” in my hand you know! One day as I routinely headed for my mug rack to grab my favorite mug for my morning cup of Joe I noticed that it wasn’t there. I turned and looked at my hubby who had been unloading the dishwasher and he had that ‘ deer in the headlights’ look on his face and he slowly produced , you guessed it, my favorite mug. However, this once perfect vessel was now in 3-4 pieces. I was as crushed as that mug! I quickly ran for the glue and started trying to make it look as it once had. When the last piece was set into place I could see that it would never look as it did before and most assuredly would never serve the same purpose that it had in the past. The last piece that I’d tried to glue back into place looked ok but something about the mug was off. My thought was that the glue would get hot when the mug was filled with coffee and the glue would release. I picked up my shattered and broken mug and walked into my sunroom and sat down. My sunroom is where I sit and watch nature and get inspiration for my art. I took my favorite mug and sat it Next to my chair. I sat there looking at all of my paintbrushes scattered everywhere so I pick them up in a nice bundle and put them down inside of my broken mug. Now my broken mug would hold my favorite tools and I could still look at it everyday. I know it seemed silly and childlike but I asked God, “Why? Out of all the 40 other mugs did it have to be this one that was shattered?” Sometimes in life things don’t seem fair, they don’t seem like they serve our best interests. Oh, but they do! You see, as I sat there feeling sorry for myself and mourning the loss of a coffee cup, the Lord was doing something in me. I looked at that mug holding all my beautiful paintbrushes and looked at it and looked at it and realized that I could look at it. I realized it was still here! It was still my favorite, but it had just taken on a new purpose. Instead of holding my coffee it held my tools. Its usefulness was still intact. It wasn’t the mug that was shattered but my expectations of what made me happy and what was normal in my mind that was shattered. Sometimes things change. Sometimes our thoughts of what a perfect picture can be can get shattered just like my mug. Sometimes we lose things that are dear to us, sometimes we lose people that are precious to us or sometimes we have to move on from our comfortable and normal spots in order for change to be realized. The mugs’ purpose changed and it was a good thing. But the good thing was that I realized in my heart that God has more than one reason for things happening to us and it’s how we resolve it in our hearts and move on and embrace the change that actually makes the difference. God always knows what he’s doing and why he’s doing it. It can be sad, it can be depressing, it can be hard and it can test your mettle at times but ask God to show you and renew your mind and your thinking about all the questions of why? I have a paintbrush holder that I love, it’s my favorite and it has a tree on it ! It reminds me of the days when I drank deeply of the pleasures of my morning coffee and time with my Father and now I have a wonderful memory of that PLUS a new smile because I now realize that by drinking deeply in the presence of my Father that my eyes can now see that His ways and His purposes reach much farther than the shattered brokenness that is evident in front of me.
