Desperate Joy

  Kintsugi is a Japanese art form in which broken pieces of a vessel, like a vase or bowl, are glued back together with lacquer or enamel that has gold or silver powder mixed into it. When the restored piece is finished, where there were dark cracks, now there is brightness and light. Where there was once brokenness now there is value and glory. If possible, the vessel is made even more beautiful and valuable than before. The vessel is not just restored, it is made into something new, something better. When God created Adam and Eve, he made them perfect, they were flawless and without a trace of blemish. They were completely without sin or corruption. God had made them in the likeness of his Son. Adam and Eve were not exact replicas, carbon copies, of Jesus Christ. They were unique, but still similar. Adam bore the image of God perfectly in the Garden of Eden. Then he sinned when he ate the Forbidden Fruit, and the world was plunged into chaos. The universe was wrecked because ...

  I have a young niece who has just entered the wild world of kindergarten. Watching her grow and mature over the years has been a joy. It is fascinating to see how she is like her parents in many ways. These sorts of comparisons are usually superficial at first, “She has her mother's nose."  "She has her father's eyes."  As she gets older and her personality develops more, we might notice that she enjoys reading like her mother and is really ambitious and hard working like her father. Sometimes we can even identify negative character traits children have in common with their parents. "She has her father's temper."  "She is melancholy like her mother." We can observe children and see the similarities they have with their parents. We can often tell a child belongs to a parent simply by his appearance and mannerisms. In the last post we started looking at this idea that humans are created in the image and likeness of God. This is one of the ...