Message Quilts: Quilts that Speak

We are learning at Shore Vineyard Church, South Toms River, NJ, about love and honor, the concept of seeing people as God sees them and recognizing their potential to be amazing when God finishes his transformation in them.  I had the opportunity at church one day to see that sort of honor in progress right before my eyes.

A little girl started climbing on the edge of the stairs by the railing where she could fall and get hurt.  Her mother might have yelled, “Get down before you hurt yourself!”  Instead she said to the girl, “Come off the stairs.  You are not acting like yourself.  That’s not who you are, climbing where you know you’re not supposed to be.”  The mother took her daughter by the hand and called her back to her identity.

That’s how God calls us back when we go astray, too.  If we lie, he doesn’t call us liars.  He reminds us who the “father of lies” is, and who our Father is.  “That’s not who you are, little one”, he says.  “You’re my child.”  Then we have the opportunity to say, “You’re right, Daddy.  Forgive me.  I forgot for a moment who I am.” And that counts for however we stray from who God made us to be, whether it’s a lapse back into addiction, lying, unbelief, anger, bitterness, pornography, etc.   

We learn from the Father how to call back to identity people inside and outside of the Kingdom.  Jesus called the dishonest tax collector, Zaccheus down from the tree and told him he was going to Zaccheus’ house for lunch that day.  “Me?” Zaccheus must have thought.  “He wants to hang out with me?” Jesus identified Zaccheus as a man who wanted intimacy with God, and a man whose intimacy God also wanted.  There was no more room for thievery in Zaccheus, the God lover.  Right away Zaccheus promised to pay back four times what he had stolen from the people through unjust tax collection. 

In keeping with the call to love and honor, I invite you in the Ocean County, NJ area to join me in making “quilts that speak”.  Instead of making quilts that are just your favorite colors or pictures, we are asking some different questions.  How can I prophesy over my grandson, daughter, mother, with this quilt?  What is it that God wants to say about this person?

Does God see my grandson as a knight in his Kingdom?  Then I will put knights in shining armor in his quilt.  Does God see my daughter as a princess, daughter of the King of Kings?  Then I will use fabrics with crowns and tiaras.  It doesn’t matter if my grandson is not acting like a knight at the moment, not particularly chivalrous or bold.  If I ask God what he sees in him, and God says “knight”, then I will agree with God and call forth a knight.  If my daughter is going through the rebellious teenage years, but God says “princess”, there will be crowns and jewels befitting the princess she is called to be.

Quilting class currently meets on Tuesday evenings, 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., at my home in Forked River, NJ.  If you are interested in learning to make “quilts that speak”, please contact me for more information.