Trust the Process

     It’s always fun to show the process of a painting, especially since it’s a bit difficult to have a full painting to post for the Instagram algorithm every time. I started this painting before school ended but haven’t been able to truly work on it until coming home for the summer. I would tell you more about the painting itself, but that’s a post for another day. Instead, I want to focus on the process.

              Oil painting is very much a “trust the process” sort of thing. Any art is really. You do something, unsure of how it will turn out. You may look at your work and think, what do I do now? You may think you know what you’re doing, but then something unexpected happens, like a splotch of paint you accidentally throw on it, or maybe someone else does something to it. The art process is never one that you can fully know. Yet, if you continue working at it, trusting what you know and learning along the way, you’ll eventually end up with art that you love.

              Funny how following the Lord can be the same way. So often on this walk, you won’t understand how your life will turn out. You may think it will go a certain way, but then the Lord takes you on a different path. You may be in a situation where you do not understand how it will work out. The Christian life is just a big, long “trust the process” with the Lord. My personal testimony is proof of that. And sometimes, when you look at where you are now, it can be scary to know if it will end well or not.

              The good news is, God reminds us to trust the process. Jeremiah 29: 11 says “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” Now yes, this verse is taken out of context all the time. The Lord was speaking to the Israelites at the time through the prophet Jeremiah. However, this verse still applies to us Christians today. Just like this was what God spoke to His chosen people, the Israelites, centuries ago, it is what He tells His people now, us Christians. We can trust the process, knowing that the artist at work has already showed us how it will turn out, with our hope, Jesus Christ, defeating death and sin for all eternity.

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