The Artist's Hand

by Pastor Gina Johnson

For those of you who aren't familiar with the vocalist there, that is Don McLean. And many of us know Don McLean from his song, American Pie. He was a beautiful singer-songwriter who rose up in the charts, but it was this song, Vincent, that reveals more than just him being a songwriter. It reveals the depths of his soul as he used this ballad as an opportunity to share the life and the challenges and struggles of Vincent Van Gogh. When McLean is singing Vincent, he's not just singing of an artist's painting, he's singing the story of a soul. You see, McLean read a book about Van Gogh, and he was so inspired because Van Gogh was said to be troubled with mental illness, and his life did not meet the expectations.

We look at Van Gogh now, and we have all this reverence and love for his artwork, but McLean was deeply moved because Van Gogh's story always presented loneliness and sensitivity and struggle from having vision to see unlike those around him. McLean saw genius in Vincent that perhaps the world did not see. So the song “Starry Night” reflects Van Gogh's life, and one of his most famous paintings, Starry Night.

Vincent had a nephew who was also named Vincent, and he ran the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. And when he heard McLean's tribute to Van Gogh, he called him and he thanked him for capturing the spirit of his uncle so beautifully. McLean said what he saw in Van Gogh was a symbol of how society is often so caught up in the noise and in the distractions that they fail to understand the true work of an artist.

This is kind of where our message begins today. When I was young, probably around like four or five, my dad introduced me to that song. And it's interesting, the songs that my dad would introduce me to and how I would have ears to hear them in a different way.

I used to listen to that song, not knowing who Vincent Van Gogh was. It wasn't until I really listened that I understood the song was about Vincent Van Gogh. I always thought it was about Jesus. I thought it was about Jesus and his love and his artistry and his sensitivity towards the world, what he brought and the gifts he had and who he was as he walked and taught and loved among us.

I thought the song talked about him presenting a message that would never be heard, at least it wasn't being heard then, and perhaps it never will be heard. I thought, “Wow, this is such a beautiful song about Jesus and it's so sad, but what a cool way to make this song.” Then when I learned it was about Vincent, at a very young age, I actually thought to myself, “You know, it'd be great someday if someone would give a message tying Don McLean's Song of Vincent, Vincent Van Gogh's life and Jesus together.”

And once I actually became a minister, I've been like planning and planning, I'm going to do this someday and I hope I have a congregation that loves and accepts me enough for me to try this because it's going to be a little bit different. So congratulations, you guys won, you know, here we are 47 years later and it's happening. So good. Yay, Gina. But no, you know, it's interesting. So let's move into this.

Picture it with me. It's a sky alive with color. It's the deep blues that swirl across the heavens. It's the stars that are blazing as if they are breathing. It's the cypress tree that's rising up like a flame going upward. And beneath it, there is a village in stillness. And if you look, the lights are aglow in the homes, but there is a place where the lights are not on. It's that church. And as the steeple points to heaven, the windows sit in darkness.

Is that what you see in this picture? Because, you know, when I got my new office as the associate minister in Sedalia, I walked in there and that was hanging on the wall framed, a gift from a very good friend there. And I remember loving it so much because I would always be drawn to the church in the center. It wasn't until I did more studying that I saw that the lights aren't even on in that church.

This is considered, as I've told you, one of the most beloved paintings in the world. It was painted in 1889 while Vincent van Gogh was confined in an asylum.

He had been cast aside, misunderstood, and rejected. He actually grew up the son of a pastor and decided himself to answer the call to ministry. He preached for a very short while, but as he continued to be dismissed and rejected by the church, he decided to pursue painting.

And through painting, his canvas became his pulpit and his paintings, his brush strokes, his imagery became his message. But the world still did not see him. Do you know that in his entire lifetime, he sold one painting? And now I can get a tote bag, a pair of earrings, probably some underwear, a toothbrush, you know, something to put on the side of my car that would be starry night or sunflowers or something else.

But in his lifetime, he only sold one painting. And it's interesting because as he continued to be ridiculed and considered unstable and ignored, we hear those words, they would not listen, they did not know how. Perhaps they'll listen now.

You know, Vincent wasn't painting in madness. He was painting with truth and he was trying to show the world that the word is alive, that God's presence is in everything, in everyone, everywhere. He was trying to help them stop misunderstanding the beauty that is surrounding us, not just in creation, but in people's lives, in their tragedies, just as much as their celebrations.

And this is where his story begins to echo the story of the one we call our Lord and Savior. The prophet Isaiah wrote, “He was despised and rejected by mankind. A man of suffering and familiar with pain, like one from whom people hid their faces, he was despised and we held him in low esteem.” Isaiah was pointing to the servant of God, the Messiah, and centuries later, Jesus embodied those very words as he came to be among us.

He too was misunderstood, he was mocked and he was rejected. People wanted a conqueror, and they were so disappointed because they received someone from Nazareth, a servant, a carpenter's son. What is he going to do for us? But he emptied himself, and he triumphed over their levels of understanding, even though he didn't triumph in their terms. He continued to offer love, even though they saw his love as weakness.

They saw his love as pushing for something that went against everything that was being modeled in their world. The Apostle Paul put it best into poetry in Philippians 2, where he says, “Though he was in the form of God, he did not count equality with God as something to be grasped. Instead, he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant. He humbled himself to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore, God exalted him above every name.”

The Sower by Van Gogh is a great representation of this because as Jesus walked through his life in this incarnation, he was planting seeds. There's a lot of times for those of you who are familiar with farming or even a garden of your own, where we throw those seeds, we cast those seeds, and some are going to come into a beautiful bloom, a harvest, a time of gathering, while others are going to fall on dry, cracked soil, and others are never going to have the opportunity to birth into anything because of who they were received by. That's the same message of Jesus.

As he threw out seeds of love, seeds of hope, seeds of truth, reminding us who we are, some had the ears to hear and receive what he was saying. While others were too hardened by their circumstances, and others were too closed off by what was going on in their own life. You know, like Vincent van Gogh, Jesus revealed beauty that was hidden in plain sight.

But while Vincent was using brushstrokes and paintings, Jesus used his very life. We can witness acts of compassion, the parables of the seeds and the lilies, meals with outcasts, and the healing that he continued to bring simply with his presence. He kept saying, “Look again, everybody. The kingdom is here. Can you see what you're missing because it's right there inside of you?” But like Vincent, most of the world did not see. Behind these paintbrush strokes and behind Jesus's life, there is one that stands even greater, and that is the artist's hand.

That is the hand of God. That is the presence of the I am. And since we are in a Christian church, if we go with just the Bible itself from the very beginning of scripture, we hear, and God said, let there be light, and there was light.

So, from the very first brushstroke of scripture, we are given the canvas of creation. And what went on from there was more of the seas and the stars and the rainbows and the rivers. God's palette was way beyond. It was emerald rainbows around the throne. It was jasper. It was a golden lamp stand and even sapphire beneath God's feet. You see, God was not only painting the skies and seas and creation for us to see, but God was painting his very people.

In Ephesians 2:10, Paul writes, “For we are God's workmanship, God's masterpiece, and the psalmist's declare, I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.”

When I was picking this particular painting, Almond Blossom, I thought, you know, that works perfectly next to a photo of the stained glass within our sanctuary. They remind us we are God's handiwork. We are created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared us in advance to do. We may look at what's in front of us and the challenges we're facing, whether it's our health, whether it's finances, whether it's our relationships, or whether it's just that challenge to remember who we are, to come back to ourselves, to be bold enough to truly embody the fullness of who we are in any place that we're in and as we sit in this moment with the stained glass here and Almond Blossom there, can we recognize that anything that this world holds for us, anything that this experience holds for us, we have already been prepared to navigate through. We have absolutely everything we need within us, even if we cannot see it in the moment.

But here's the heart of the message that I wanted to get to is, Vincent was trying to show us creation and life and beauty through his art and Jesus was trying to show us who we are, not just who we are in him, but who we are within ourselves in that full remembrance. And God has been telling us that truth since the very beginning. But I want to tell you, if you cannot see who you are, if you cannot truly take a look within yourself and see how you have been fearfully and wonderfully made, divinely created, then you will not be able to see others.

If you cannot see the beauty, if you cannot see the work of God within yourself and truly understand who you are, then you will not be able to rightly see others. If I cannot see myself as God's beloved, then I will never see you as God's beloved either. If I cannot look at myself and see beauty, but all I can do is hold on to failure and shame, if all I can hear is a voice of rejection and all I can see is the darkness on the windows of my soul, then I will never be able to see the beauty, the light that is within you.

As I start to see myself through God's eyes, as you're able to see yourself through God's eyes and recognize that you are a masterpiece, you are the beloved and you are radiant and you are created with divine color, then as you look upon other people, those same projections, those same abilities to see yourself, you will see in them. If you can look upon your own life and see every place that God's mercy was present, then you can look upon a stranger, you can look upon your family member, you can look upon every person in this congregation and see who they are. It's amazing because Jesus continued to walk with that vision.

Even though he was mocked, even though he was ridiculed, he never lost sight of who he was, who he is, the beloved. He was the divine. He was the one that came here, not just to go before us and have us all bow down behind him, but he was here to remind us of what it looked like to truly understand who you are in the reflection of God.

He came to show us that he wasn't about being equal with God and placing us beneath him, but because he knew who he was in the fullness of God, he was able to look at the leper, the woman at the well as we've talked about, even the thief on the cross and say, “I see you with the same eyes of love that have seen me.”

This is the invitation to each and every one of us. Can you start to see yourself as God sees you? Can you start to look at those around you, regardless of who they are or where they've come from, whether you've known them your whole life or whether you're just going to meet them today for the first time? Can you greet them with the same welcome and acceptance, with the same authenticity and honest, vulnerable love that God offers to us every time he looks at us?

I want to offer you guys a practice this week. Each day over this week, just take a moment and pause, pause and really look at something. It can be a tree. It can be something you have in your home.

It can be a person near you. Now don't make it awkward, okay? But it can be a person near you and it can even be yourself. But don't rush past it.

Take the time and look and try and see what Jesus was trying to tell us. Ask yourself, what is the divine beauty that is hidden here within this person, within this picture, within this place of creation?

I challenge you to go and spend some time in front of a mirror and look at yourself. Don't see yourself as aging or dying or here's the things I have to do this week. Don't see yourself as forgotten or cast aside. See yourself in the fullness that God sees you each and every day.

I don't want to get too romanticized over Vincent's story because if you all recall, he did die by suicide at the age of 37. He was unable any longer to carry the weight of the world. He left behind over 2,000 works of art, but the world, like I said, didn't recognize him until it was too late.

Jesus was rejected, mocked, crucified at the age of 33. And once again, we could say the world missed out on him within that moment. But his demonstration, what we call the resurrection, revealed the truth. That it wasn't about death, that death was not a thing, but in fact it was about eternal life.

So, Vincent's suicide and Jesus' crucifixion, they're not the same. But they are both a mirror of what happens when people refuse to see each other. They are both an example of the cost of blindness. They are both tragedies that remind us of what happens when people fall asleep to beauty, when people fall asleep to truth, when people fall asleep to God, and simply fall asleep to themselves. So quickly, we will go through this life in that sleep state. We might as well be in that death state.

It brings us back to those words. “They would not listen. They're not listening still. Perhaps they never will.” But let's not let that be our closing line.

Let us recognize that perhaps they never will can be for a different time and place. But perhaps we will. Let it be said of us that we did see, we did see ourselves and we did awaken to the truth of Christ's life in creation and in our lives.

Let us recognize the artist's loving hand, and let us not hold to that idea that perhaps they never will, but perhaps starting today, we will.

Please pray with me. Our most gracious, loving God, we are so grateful for the way your presence is made known to us through songs, through stories, through art, through our reflection within the mirror.

God, as we have received your message and your word today, help us to receive what was needed in this moment, that we can truly see who you are, that we can be receptive to what you are revealing within us, that we can release the things that are keeping us from our highest self, and that we can be the reflection of love and Christ wherever we are. We ask these things, and we give you our undying love and gratitude. In Jesus' name, amen.