Searching for Answers

For all who are currently living in the aftermath of some kind of bomb shell discovery, I hope you might find my reflections this week helpful.  Please remember that whatever it is that you are currently struggling through, find someone to talk to about your feelings and as always I encourage you to turn to our Father in prayer.

Brown with Supplement, 1935, Wassily Kandinski (1866-1944) oil on canvas, 31.8 x 39.3 inches. Image Source

The Art

Kandinski was a Russian artist who used biomorphic forms to suggest the shapes of unseen cellular organisms as an attempt to express the feelings of a person’s inner life. This painting, in particular, is considered the first truly abstract painting of the modern era.

A Reflection 

As I view this painting I begin to jot down a quick list of words:

• Organized chaos
• pages in a book
• totem poles that represent the tones and feelings of our inner life…
• bringing the subconscious forward
• giving feelings color and shape that float upon the back drop of time…
• some are curved others are straight, somethings are fully seen, others are only hinted at to lure us into a sense of wonder.
• shapes (feelings) repeat, sometimes louder and sometimes softer.

And I think, “this artist is trying to make sense of the senseless. He is attempting to piece together something that cannot be put back together again. Like a reoccurring tape of “Whose on First?” that keeps playing over and over, with no understanding or resolution. I can relate to his seeing things suddenly from a new perspective. I understand his feelings of realizing that things you thought you knew are suddenly scrambled like the pieces of a puzzle dumped from a cylinder box onto the floor and only randomly connected.

Starting over — beginning again — separate and categorize–putting the pieces into neat little piles. Looking for reason, searching for meaning, accepting the chaos.”

There is a certain beauty to his attempt to organize and express the inexpressible and it draws me into the flow of his thoughts and I praise God for this man’s artistry.

The Music

As you listen to the 2nd movement of Beethoven’s Pathetique Sonata, imagine him sitting at his piano on a particular day, in his prison of silence, but still feeling the need to pour out his heart. Through these organized tones we can feel and understand the expression of his soul. And again we can praise God for his beautiful gift that lives on eternally…Beethoven’s music that captures his thoughts and projects them into the future so that on any given day we might turn on our time machine and travel backwards and forwards into his stream of thought, his moment of tenderness. Thank you Mr. Beethoven

 

The Quotes

The whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness of the interdependence of all these living beings, which are all part of one another and all involved in one another.

We do not exist for ourselves alone, and it is only when we are fully convinced of this fact that we begin to love ourselves properly and thus also love others.

~ Thomas Merton

 

“…in all things grow up into him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.” ~ Ephesians 4: 15-16

The Charge

“Go out into the world in peace; have courage; hold on to what is good; return no one evil for evil; strengthen the fainthearted; support the weak, and help the suffering; honor all people; love and serve the Lord, rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit.”

Asian Fishing Boat at Night, Image Source