I've always been creative.
As a little girl, I spent years dancing. I loved moving to music, and at the very same time I was constantly making something with my hands. One day I'd be learning a new dance routine, and the next I'd be painting, sewing, or trying another craft. Creating wasn't something I did in different seasons of life. It all existed together. Looking back now, I realize creativity wasn't just something I enjoyed. It was part of the way God wired me.
As I grew older, that love only expanded. I made ceramics, cross stitched, sewed, baked, gardened, painted, decorated, designed shirts, poured candles, and probably tried just about every craft trend that came along. If there was something new to learn, I wanted to give it a try. At the time I simply thought I loved hobbies, but now I wonder if God was nurturing something in me long before I understood why it mattered.
Eventually, creativity became my career. I began designing projects, teaching classes, filming tutorials, and serving thousands of women through something I genuinely love. I wouldn't trade that calling for anything because I know God led me here. But over time I realized that almost all of my creativity had become productive. I was creating for deadlines, for customers, for videos, for workshops, and for my business. I was still making beautiful things, but I wasn't creating simply to be with God.
Recently, as I've become more intentional about spending time with Him each morning, I found myself wanting to learn something completely new.
Drawing.
It still makes me smile because I've painted thousands of things over the years, yet I'd never really learned to draw. It was always one of those things that looked interesting, but I never slowed down long enough to begin. I assumed it would take too much time or that I'd somehow missed my chance.
One morning I picked up a pencil anyway.
Now, after I spend time reading Scripture, I sit quietly and sketch whatever God impressed on my heart while I was reading. Sometimes it's a flower. Sometimes it's a needle and thread. Sometimes it's a mirror or a jar of perfume. The drawings are simple, and they're certainly not perfect, but perfection was never the goal. They're simply helping me hold onto what God is teaching me.
I'm falling in love with drawing and lingering.
Before, I would read my Bible, close it, and move on with my day. Now I stay. I think about what I've read. I picture it. I meditate on it while my pencil moves across the page. Instead of rushing to the next thing on my list, I find myself sitting with God just a little longer, and those extra minutes have become some of the sweetest moments of my day.
The drawing itself only takes about ten minutes, but those ten minutes have changed far more than my sketchbook. They've changed the pace of my mornings. They've reminded me that spiritual growth isn't always found by doing more. Sometimes it's found by slowing down enough to let God's Word settle into your heart before the noise of the day begins.
As I've been reflecting on all of this, I keep coming back to the opening pages of Genesis.
The very first thing Scripture tells us about God is that He creates. Before we know Him as Shepherd, Redeemer, Healer, or King, we meet Him as Creator. Then, just a few verses later, we're told that we were created in His image.
I've read those verses countless times, but they've taken on a different meaning for me lately.
If we were created in the image of a Creator, then creativity isn't just a talent that a few fortunate people receive. It's part of God's design for every one of us. It may look different from person to person, but I believe every one of us carries that imprint because we reflect the One who made us.
Maybe that's why creating has always felt life-giving.
Not because it's about producing something beautiful, but because it slows us down enough to enjoy the presence of the One who is beautiful. When our hands are busy creating, our hearts often become quiet enough to listen. The project becomes secondary because God begins doing something much deeper than what can be seen on the page, the canvas, or the table in front of us.
Maybe drawing isn't the thing that draws you closer to Him.
Maybe it's baking bread while your kitchen fills with the smell of something homemade. Maybe it's tending flowers in your garden before the rest of the house wakes up. Maybe it's quilting, woodworking, knitting, writing, playing the piano, arranging flowers, or finally trying something you've always wanted to learn but never thought you had time for. The activity itself isn't what matters nearly as much as the space it creates for God to meet you there.
I've spent a lifetime creating beautiful things.
What I'm learning in this season is that God is far less interested in what I'm making with my hands than in what He's making in my heart. The pencil has simply become the invitation. It gives me a reason to stay a little longer, to meditate a little deeper, and to notice things in Scripture that I might have hurried past before.
If you don't hear anything else, hear this.
Don't neglect the creative part of yourself that God placed there. It doesn't have to take hours, and it doesn't have to result in something worthy of hanging on a wall. Start with ten intentional minutes. Give yourself permission to learn something new, to make something imperfect, and to sit with God while you do it. I have a feeling you'll discover what I'm beginning to discover, that sometimes the greatest masterpiece God is working on isn't the one in your hands. It's the one He is quietly shaping within you.
Love, Beth
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