Restoring Broken Art

You don’t know someone until you know their story - including the broken parts.

I am blessed to know the story of my good friend Bezz.  It is a four-part tale, rich with drama and triumph.  May I share it with you?  But be forewarned -- when you hear it, you may find that it is your story, too.

Act One:  The Creation of Art

In an artist’s studio you can at once discover the tools of his artistry, the seeds of his inspiration, the heartbeat of his passion. 

Bezz danced about in his studio, flowing from one creative work to another.  His loving, good, and pure heart overflowed into his every work.  He was somehow a master creator across a spectrum of artistic expressions.  With equal ease he decorated blank canvases, composed musical scores, and planted gardens bursting with life and color.  He mixed and swirled blues and reds and yellows until they blended together into a radiant dawn to the east of the studio and then into a somber sunset to its west.  And somehow, one might say magically, Bezz infused this whole realm with moisture and light that began to stir his creations.  Was this artwork, or was it alive?  …  It was both.

One by one Bezz began to shape pieces of formless clay with his sculptor’s knife … depicting crawling critters, swimming fish, grazing livestock, flying birds, and so much more.  Each began as lifeless clay, but they were not still for long.  One-by-one as they were placed into the realm, Bezz breathed toward them and they somehow began to breathe too.  Crawling, swimming, flying.  Chirping, lowing, even roaring.

But Bezz was not finished.  A culminating creation began to take shape in his artist’s eye.  This one would be made in his own image.  After creating this beautiful realm and filling it with such wonderful diversity, Bezz added one more creature, a culminating work he named “Art.”

“Tobah!” Bezz exclaimed.  With this single Hebrew word, a joyful-yet-exhausted utterance of one crossing a creative finish line of sorts, Bezz was saying with knowing pride, “It is finished.”

Act Two:  Betrayal

Bezz gave Art free reign over the world he had crafted.  But he also set a boundary at the edge of the realm.  Art was not permitted into Bezz’s studio. One from among the creation must not have such understanding or power … it would end up poisoning him and the whole creation. 

But Art’s curiosity began to grow, and that one forbidden boundary began to call out to him.  The freedom of the realm began to invite Art’s budding power to find its voice.  And soon, another creature with a similar struggle and a jealous eye began to tease Art, asking, “Did Bezz really say you couldn’t go into his studio or become the fellow artist he shaped you to be?”

Temptation grew, boundary beckoned, and soon Art made his way into that forbidden studio.  His eyes grew wide with amazement.  His mind was stretched to the limit and beyond as he saw the whole realm from the vantage point of the designer’s studio.  But at the same time, something inside Art, deep down inside, began to feel terribly wrong.

Bezz's voice behind him gently-yet-pointedly asked, “Art, what have you done?”  It continued, with a growing tone of stern sadness, “I gave you everything you needed, and just this one boundary to obey, but you have chosen to cross it, and now you must leave this sweet and accepting place and go into the cold harshness outside this realm. I will wait and long for your return, but it can only happen when you are ready to demonstrate complete obedience of spirit.

Act Three:  The Return of Hope

Many, many years went by.  Art’s original features had faded in the harsh coldness outside the realm.  And he was surrounded by quite a number of friends who had all met similar fates.  A tired and weary bunch they were.  You see, they had tried and tried to obey all the rules in order to return to Bezz and his great realm, but they always fell short.  The seeds of rebellion lodged deep in their hearts always led them astray.

But then one day a young, new friend came along.  His name was Hope.  Some said he was an artist like Bezz, and yet he was also an artistic work himself.  Unlike Art and his old friends, Hope’s features were fresh and unscarred. His colors were rich and vibrant – like new.  The old friends were astonished.  They gathered around Hope and marveled.  He was as they knew they were meant to be – as they perhaps once were.

But in time, they became jealous of Hope.  He was so full of glory that theirs seemed to fade all the more.  Their jealousy became bitterness, and soon headed toward rage.  They sulked and secretly began to dream and scheme about the newcomer’s destruction.  The fires in their hearts grew and grew.  Finally, one night they ganged up and destroyed him.  Hope’s colors began to dim.  His pierced canvas slowly faded.  The ultimate betrayal was complete.  Hope was dead.

Sadness descended on the world.  Darkness and gloom took over.  Deep inside, Art and his friends each knew they had done something terribly wrong.  They had not just destroyed a young, new friend.  Rather, they felt they’d somehow killed their own futures.

After a long night of unrest, they awoke and stepped back into their old, tired lives, intending to go on as if nothing had happened.  Another long night was followed by another bland, unsettled day.  Though the bright sun still rose day after day as always, the colors of their world and the colors inside their hearts somehow seemed sadly faded and lifeless.

Act Four:  Art Restored

But on the third day as they woke before the dawn to begin what they assumed would be just another day, they noticed some strange things.  The breaking dawn appeared unusually colorful.  The air was fresh, and the critters were stirring with renewed joy -- something had changed … but they knew not what.  And then as the light of day grew, they saw him.  Hope!  Full of life again.  Still scarred from their blows, yet fully alive again.  “How can this be?!” they wondered. They looked on the one they had pierced in baffled wonder, and with deep shame.

In time, they would come to understand that Hope had come back to life to rescue them.  He had paid the price of their redemption.  Though they had never been able to demonstrate the complete obedience of spirit that Bezz had required of them, Hope had now done it for them.  It cost him dearly, as the deep scars in his canvas still evidenced, but Hope’s sacrifice somehow opened a way for them to be restored. All they had to do was to yield to him - to accept his loving kindness while knowing they deserved the opposite.

Gradually, their hardened hearts began to thaw, and one-by-one they each turned toward Hope.  They basked in the joy of his radiant colors, and as they did, their own colors began to return.  While their scars of old remained, those scars were somehow also being transformed into new forms of beauty. 

The friends found themselves inescapably yet willingly drawn closer and closer to Hope.  And soon all of them found themselves following as Hope resolutely set out in the direction of the sunlight.  As they walked with him, a wave of joy swept through their sweet fellowship as they realized he was leading them back home, back to the realm, back to Bezz – the One who had made them, who had always loved them, and who now stood with outstretched arms and welcomed them home.

[scroll down for some questions to ponder and the author’s reflections]