I clearly remember the first time I saw a mosaic portrait in real life.
Of course, I’ve long been familiar with simple mosaics. There were the tile floors I helped my dad grout, and the bathroom walls of a favorite coffee shop studded with bits of broken china. I had sewn colored squares of fabric into the mosaic of a quilt or stitched a myriad tiny x’s to make a cross-stitch pattern. I once taught an overview class on mosaics to 7th and 8th graders, which concluded with making our own of tiny pieces of colored paper on black poster board to line the school cafeteria walls. But on this day, I knew that I had previously known next to nothing about mosaics in comparison to the piece of art before my eyes.
I was drawn to the portrait because, unlike the oil paintings around it, it shimmered with light. That was the only difference from any distance. I actually thought it was a painting until I walked up to it and read the placard beneath, which identified it as a mosaic—and it was only then that I looked closely and realized that what had appeared to be a painting was really a myriad tiny pieces of glass painstakingly composed into the tender likeness of a mother and her child. 
It was Mary, cradling the baby Jesus, of course; a truly breathtaking masterpiece.
What an appropriate medium for such a daunting subject, I thought. How, after all, does an artist depict the faces of people we have no actual likeness of? Perhaps a thousand tiny beautiful pieces is the best way, because when you think about the birth of Christ, it is indeed a figurative mosaic of epic proportions and complex plot.
Hundreds of prophecies over thousands of years, each piece coming together flawlessly in the grand unveiling of God’s masterpiece plan to save mankind.
Secular decrees by pagan emperors made so that at the perfect time and place, a baby born in a stable to a God-favored mother and the God-fearing man who would fill the role of earthly father, from exactly the right kingly lines.
At the perfect time, in exactly the right place in the sky, a star appearing to be seen by exactly the right men who understood that it was not just any star, an epiphany so definite they would traverse the deserts to find the source of such celestial celebration.
Angel messengers. Angel hosts. Angels in dreams.
A miraculously-conceived yet-unborn infant leaping in his mother’s womb in the presence of the Christ he would pave the way for.
The list could go on and on.
So many intricate pieces. Such flawless, artful and epic execution. But the thing that really floors me is this:
God is still crafting that mosaic. Christmas was only the beginning of the greatest story of all time! And it doesn’t even end at Easter. It hasn’t ended yet. What we see is stunning, masterful, breathtaking…but yet incomplete. There are yet prophecies waiting to be fulfilled, trumpets waiting to sound, hearts and battles waiting to be won before it can be framed and signed by the artist.
And if you have let Him win your heart, you get to be a piece of that mosaic. Yes, YOU, like a shimmering little piece of glass, skillfully shaped and precisely placed into that epic Christmas mosaic that stretches back through the corridors of time. You, a mosaic within a mosaic, all the pieces and parts of you forming a life that can matter a lot and shine bright in the grandest scheme of things—if you have faith and are willing.
“But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ
—by grace you have been saved—
and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus…
For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” (Ephesians 2:4-8, 10)
Photos: beneath the Ghost Bridge, Lake Superior, December 2018
It’s the current miry state of the driveway.
The rest? Nothing a good washing machine and bathtub can’t fix. And that’s a good reminder to praise God for this even more remarkable truth:
Watching the wind move fine snow over the landscape is mesmerizing to me.
It’s like an Olympic figure skating performance, complete with the artistry, sparkles and gold. The wind and the snow, they are like the perfect couple, as the wind tosses the snow up, spinning, catching it again with effortless ease, moving in perfect time with each other and the sound of their own music. Only it’s right in my front yard, nobody’s keeping track of points, and I seem to be the only one watching.
Run, slide, repeat.
Ah, winter with all your juxtapositions of icy beauty and cozy routines—how glad I and my sleek fun-loving neighbors are to welcome you back!
I’ve been seeing this black and white photo challenge happening around social media that sounded like fun.
And speaking of contrasts, here’s verse that contains a truly glorious one:
Every spring, there’s this short window of time, just before the ice goes out, in which there are little open areas of water around the edges of our lake. All the waterfowl congregates in these puddles and pools to forage for food and paddle around in one great companionable waiting game for the lake to open.
The ducks and geese seem to have a mutual agreement that it’s a nice little community event, too, and mingle quite nicely.
Such a fuss we had from them, of fiercely territorial wing-flapping, neck-bobbing and trumpet-blasting, particularly when another pair of swans would come in for a landing (on a multi-daily basis). It was all very exciting, and we’re going to rather miss it now that the lake is open and the spring festival is over.
The night was bright with a million stars, each one pulsating distinct and three-dimensional against deep black velvet of the sky. The aurora was dancing low but visible on the horizon. Across the lake, a monkey owl laughed, and in the distant forest echoed the drum roll of a grouse. Just above the treetops, a slender waxing crescent of reflected sunlight rimmed the lower curve of dark round moon. It dangled, then dropped out of sight. One meteorite fell, and then another. It was a good night to go walking without a flashlight, and so we did.
The otters had been playing not on but in the ice while the northern lights rippled softly green, enjoying the effects of the steadily aging and honeycombing lake ice. I didn’t realize how rotten the ice was until I stood on the shore and watched their game for a good hour. They were literally running all over the lake breaking holes in all the thin places and diving in and out of them, which explained the mysterious tinkling and shattering sounds of the previous night.
One of my favorite things about living on a lake in the winter is having unlimited ice skating access. Getting to walk straight out your door right onto your own private skating rink? To a girl who had to hike a good half mile for such a privilege when she was growing up, this is a luxury I don’t take for granted. That is, except for when the weather doesn’t cooperate, like this year, and it freezes and snows at the same time, effectively ruining the ice for the rest of the winter. What a disappointment!
February had a change of heart and decided to surprise everyone with an uncharacteristic thaw. That thaw lasted long enough to melt the snow cover and create some pretty massive puddles of water on top of the ice. Then, the thermometer plunged and it all froze solid again. Then, the wind drove tiny particles of ice and snow across it for several days straight like a giant sand blaster, smoothing rough spots, scouring it largely clean of snow. And when the sun blazed up out of the east one morning, I saw a glassy surface shining beneath it—and all my skating dreams buried since the beginning of winter rose up and wooed me out the door.
“Are you going to fall in, Mommy?” I heard the little voice call from the pink-jacketed figure perched on the bank, concerned.
“Can I touch it, Mommy?”
Funny, how my delight over getting to ice skate this winter after all managed to pale next to her delight when she overcame her fears, believed, and walked on water.
The ice is in.
Today, all was still and silent.
I must say that reading E.B. White’s whimsical classic, “The Trumpet of the Swan”, as a young girl did little to prepare me for hearing the real trumpet of a swan for the first time. Up until I got married, I had barely even seen a swan in the wild, let alone heard one. I thought it would be something like the honking of the Canadian geese that always flew over my childhood home in the spring and fall. I had no idea.
Then, I got married and moved here—and the swans suddenly became an integral part of our lives. The first spring, we watched them perform their spectacular mating dances on the river outside of the front windows of the little resort cabin we called a temporary home. They showed up at our next home, too, where they nested on the lake our neighbors had access to. We never actually saw them, but the sound of their great beating wings and calls echoed over to us tantalizingly all summer long. And then we moved to our current home, and soon learned, to our great delight, that the little lake our farm bordered was the valiantly defended private nesting grounds of yet another pair of swans.
I stopped what I was doing and just listened for a few minutes, thrilling to the sound. The silence of winter was over; the trumpeting prelude to the grand symphony of spring had officially begun. It was glorious!
Rejoicing Hills 