It's December! Wow. This semester has flown by. It seems like just yesterday I was moving in to my dorm room and feeling nervous about college. I was worried about finding friends and staying caught up with my classes and being homesick. Now, almost four months later, I am no longer nervous. This place feels like home. I have found amazing friends, people that feel more like sisters than friends. I have done well in my classes and am excited for my schedule for next semester. I miss my family but I know that they are supporting me while I am here and I know that they will always be a phone call or text away when I need them! God has definitely provided for me over these months that I have been at college. He has done more things than I ever expected. It is amazing. I am so grateful and thankful to Him.
For some reason, since I have been at SBU, I have gotten crafty. I love to make things with paper. Paper crafts are my thing. The other day, I googled paper crafts and eventually got to a website that showed how to make a 3-D star. I made one with some scrapbook paper that I had bought the day before. It turned out pretty cool looking, so I hung it from my ceiling. I love adding new, homemade things to my room! It makes it feel more like my own... more personal. I also love making collages. I started making a collage using newspaper on a page of a sketch book that I have. In the middle it says "Word I Love" and surrounding it are... words that I love. Who would have known?! But the point is, I love taking things that are essentially trash and making them something that is special to me. There is just something exciting about making something out of things that don't have any other purpose and probably wouldn't be put or glued together any other time. In fact, the dictionary definition of collage is: a technique of composing a work of art by pasting on a single surface various materials not normally associated with one another. Exactly! Miscellaneous things, when put together, can suddenly become art. And doing something artistic is so relaxing. I always feel less stressed and more in tune with my thoughts and feelings when I am doing art. I am able to translate sad or stressful feelings into something more productive than climbing into bed and eating chocolate or watching a movie or show. It becomes something beautiful.
Want to know what I think? I think I am a collage. I am human. I am a mess. I have sinned and am dirty. I could be trash. I am used and battered. But God does not discard me. He doesn't throw me to the side, dismissing me as I would dismiss an old newspaper or magazine. Instead, He takes the useful parts in me and puts them together. He makes me into art; something that He can use. If I recognize that He is trying to make my life a piece of art and allow him to cut and paste as He pleases, I will be able to work alongside Him. I can work to display His art, my life, to the world. I can show everyone what He has managed to do with me and what He wants to do with the rest of us. I can show His collage and give Him the glory. If I take such pleasure in making a simple collage of words that strike a cord in my heart, what does God feel when He can create a beautiful life?
He is the Ultimate Creator.
For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him.
Colossians 1:16
