Painting Death

I had a most unusual request from a friend recently.  Six month ago, she and her family adopted a daughter from China, who would become their 5th child and 2nd adopted child.  This 10-year-old girl is spunky and curious and soaking up the language and culture.  She is also deaf and has the wonderful ability to express herself through art.  Her art is full of manga-style princesses, rainbows, ruffles and glittery crowns.  She carefully labels the portraits with her new English name and the names of her new brothers & sisters, and mom and dad.  She is finding her place in the world through art.

Throughout these 6 months, as she works to bond with her daughter, my friend has also been caring for her mother, who had late-stage cancer until she died a week ago.    How do you explain death to a young girl from a different culture who has limited sign language.  How do you explain the belief that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord?  

My friend asked if I could help...if I could somehow draw this concept.  As she talked, I formed a vision for the painting, and then, startlingly, my friend described what I was picturing...the bed, the hand, the body, the spirit.  It was a Holy Moment that made me shiver!

I said I would try, and the next day I laid the watercolor on their kitchen counter.  The picture was of a manga-style grandma, rising from her final resting place into the heavenly realm and toward the hand of God.  I'm glad I clothed her in a rainbow gown before I even knew how much this girl loved rainbows.  

​She quieted and studied the picture.  Her mom signed "grandma."  She nodded knowingly.  And I thought to myself that God, the Grand Designer, paints around and over and through us all grief and joy and beauty and love and hope.