Title: Self Portrait

This painting was done at a time when Abba Father said I was released to paint portraits, and that I should begin with my own.

On the right side, in the background above my left shoulder, the image of the head of a female lion appeared.     This really pleased me, as I’ve known for years that I am a Daughter of the Lion.  I began to wonder if this would be a hallmark of the portraits I would do - that each one would somehow incorporate a symbolic image of the person’s true identity.

In this painting, as well, I was listening to Holy Spirit on which colors to apply where, and when, and how.  The background and the design of the top I’m wearing were a real stretch for me, because they are done without the extreme perfectionism of my own personality, but yet exactly as I was shown, one step at a time.  In this listening and careful application, I suddenly saw all kinds of images begin to appear!

This painting will also stand for all of my life as evidence of one of the hardest lessons I have so far had to learn during this painting discipleship.  You see, before I saw the prophetic images the Lord had created in the dark top, I got impatient.  He had shown me where to put each color as He had been doing with other paintings.  I wanted more gold in this one.  I wanted it more balanced in my own eyes.  I knew that I was not listening to Him even as I smeared a swath of paint across the bottom left corner of the canvas.  I casually shrugged off the guilt of my disobedience.  Later, when He began to reveal the images to me, I saw the battered face of my crucified Lord on that side of the painting.  His brow bone with a nick from a cruel thorn, His swollen eyelids, His broken nose… and an ugly smear across where His mouth would be.  My ugly smear that I was so sure would bring ‘balance’ to the painting.  It is a constant reminder to me when I see with amazement all the creatures He put into this painting.  Now my heart’s desire to hear Him and to obey are more fervent than ever.  More and more, I want His work to come forth through me, and not my own feeble attempts to make something happen.

I was asked recently whether I would always only do “religious” pictures.  The short answer is that I don’t know.  The longer answer includes my abhorrence of that word “religious”, and that I am in relationship with the Living God Who created all that is, seen and unseen; and I live to glorify Him.  It’s my hope and prayer that whether I am drawing a still life of flowers, doing a landscape, photographing beloved family members, or painting or doing some other creative thing, that I will do it all for the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, and so that others may know this wonderful God Who has shown Himself to me!

Hidden Image Descriptions:

Box 1 (lower left of the painting)
From right to left are an owl face, an antelope head, a calf's face with one ear up and one ear down, and Jesus' face both frontal and in profile.  There is also a comic lion cub perched on my shoulder.  (I did add three brush strokes to him to make him easier to see.)

Box 2 (right bottom side)
Aside from the lioness face, there is also a fox face by her cheek, a full profile of a rearing Ming horse, and the top of a wolf's head just barely peering over the edge of the canvas.  Above the lioness is a prophet yelling in my ear. At least, to me he looks like he's yelling!

Box 3 (top right edge of the painting)
There is the full image of a Cheshire looking cat, smiling back over his shoulder, with his long tail hanging down the side of the canvas.

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