Trauma, Mended

Trauma, mended.
Makoto Fujimura

For reasons unknown to me, I have recently been drawn back into the work of Makoto Fujimura. If that name is not known to you, you may recognize his artwork from our Holy Gospels, from which we proclaim and receive the goodness of God weekly as we gather in worship of him. In one talk that Fujimura gave, he spoke about the Japanese art of kintsugi. This is the art of mending ancient, broken tea bowls by using gold. The end result is that "the object that is mended [is] more valuable than before." Two things impress themselves on me about this form of art and how it is a reverberation of the Gospel.

The bowls, though broken, are of great value. The fact that these bowls have experienced some form of trauma, whether intentional due to someone's rage, or accidental, does not degrade the value and worth of the bowl itself. It is of great value. It is worth keeping. It is worth the time and care taken to restore it. And once this restoration, this mending, is complete, the final work is of greater beauty than before. I think this is because the bowl is a microcosm of redemption. And Redemption may be the most beautiful act of all.

The other impression made upon me is the material used to mend the broken: gold. One does not use a cheap material, nor one that perhaps is expensive yet dull. Rather the artist uses a costly material–gold–which is also a material that conveys beauty and extravagance. Why this strikes me so is because it is a reverberation, a reflection–or to use some biblical language, a participation–of the blood of Jesus. His blood is both costly and beautiful: costly, because to be applied to the broken, it must be shed; beautiful, for from it (and only his blood) is redemption accomplished.

So as you reflect on your own life, know that you are a beautiful work of God's artistic design: trauma, mended.

– Matthew+