I was sewing together a rug this morning by hand, a project that’s been going on for several years but one I’ve never gotten around to finishing, because it’s always more work than I expect it to be.
What it involves is knitting and knitting and knitting and then untangling everything you’ve knitted (because it gets all knotted together because there’s so much wool with nowhere to go) and so you untangle it and stitched it altogether in circles, and voila: you have a rug.
Well, I have no rug yet. Or I do, but it would be a very very (very) small and useless rug. Well, it would look pretty, and that’s kind of the point to most things I’ve sewn.
Anyway, so I’m sewing this rug and I’ve been sewing it together for two and a half hours, and I stop to get a drink of water because I’m dehydrated and I need to stretch my legs, and I look at it and how it doesn’t look like I’ve made any progress, and I think “why are you doing this?”
Why are you doing this.
I like things with a point. I like cleaning because no one likes dirt. I like studying because that’s how you get to the end result. I like cooking because it means you eat.
But I like blogging too, and what’s the point of it? I like sewing, and what’s the point of it? I like writing and reading and singing and what’s the point of it? What’s the point of doing creative things you love? Because most of the time, there isn’t a particular ‘point’ or ‘use’ except to simply enjoy it and love it and feed your spirit and feel joy and enjoy the aftermath, too. When you wear something you’ve sewn. When you read the last page of a book and feel satisfied. When you bake something cute. It’s the feeling; that joy, that accomplishment, that feeding of the spirit.
I don’t have to sing. God loves me when I don’t sing, He would love me if I couldn’t sing. But it brings such a joy I can’t explain. It fills me up and energises me and I feel like I can give out to the world after I sing because I’ve replenished myself.
I look at this nearly-finished rug and I don’t care that I don’t need a rug. It’s satisfying to work at it. It’s fun to stitch together. It relaxes me and brings life. That’s the point of creativity. It feeds you and connects you to God. When I sing or dance or write I feel God. I feel close to God, I give Him glory, and there’s nowhere else I’d rather be in that moment except with Him and His love and the fullness that I’m feeling.
Sometimes we ask ourselves why we’re doing something. But keep at it if it brings you joy, because that’s what feeds you and keeps you going and that’s something God will use. God is creative.
Sarah xx
the softest words 