Envying Bezaleel. . .

Exodus 31: 1 - 6 "And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, See, I have called by name Bezaleel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah: And I have filled him with the spirit of God, in wisdom, and in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship, To devise cunning works, to work in gold, and in silver, and in brass, And in cutting of stones, to set [them], and in carving of timber, to work in all manner of workmanship. And I, behold, I have given with him Aholiab, the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan: and in the hearts of all that are wise hearted I have put wisdom, that they may make all that I have commanded thee;"

Exodus 36:2 "And Moses called Bezaleel and Aholiab, and every wise hearted man, in whose heart the LORD had put wisdom, [even] every one whose heart stirred him up to come unto the work to do it:"

I won't lie. Everytime I read about Bezaleel I get kinda jealous. I want to be that skilled! I want my skills to be useful to the Lord. So often I feel like the abilities that God has given me don't matter much in the Kingdom of Heaven - I mean, I could make some banners for the church - but other than that I generally feel useless. I mean, I don't even like most of the banners in churches - I think they are kinda lame most of the time. So what can I do? There aren't many temples going up in Phoenix that call for a "couturist."

I quit my job today. It was a really tough thing to do. When I first started thinking about it a month ago I felt really great about the idea. I felt free. I felt like I was being given a second chance at life. It was great! Today I just felt scared and sad. My last day of work is April 25th. I don't know what I am going to do. . . I just know that I can't sell myself to Macy's any longer. I have a million ideas of what I want to do, they all involve having lots of money so that I can hire people to interpret my ideas for me. Focusing on only one thing was never one of my strengths. . . I just know I have two eyes for a reason. . .

Read this guys blog. . .

When I read what SCL had to say on one of my favorite passages of scripture I had a hard time not thinking about myself and how I am literally in the desert burying my talent in the sand. Although, seeing it from the artists perspective I can understand why we so often do that. . . No one is giving us a place to work! How are we suppose to serve God with these funky/crazy skills we have that we don't even see as valuable. Yeah, we could build the Temple, but we don't know it. . . I think if we did that some things would change.

When I was in Vegas with my dad we started talking about some thrift store that Love INC. is suppose to be putting together (it may even be together, I'm not sure). I want to do something like that out here. It would be like an antropologie/coffeehouse/bar/artstudio/lounge house/library/jam session/small group/hostel/garden/farmers makert, only everything would be done by local artists/workmen. It would be a huge collage of overlapping work done by people who have never known how to use their talents for God. Everything in the store would be for sale and the people who made these things would be for hire and could go into people's homes and do installation projects of sorts and then the money, instead of going to them, would go to supporting local missionaries or something of that sort. We'd have workshops where people could come in and learn how to do something like, build a cabinet or make a pillow or knit or learn to weld or change their car oil. And everyone would be happy and the only bottom line would be to do something the best you can and to do it for the glory of God.

It's going to be in the middle of the desert and people are going to like it I bet. . .