Repurposed....

I'll call nobodies and make them somebodies;
I'll call the unloved and make them beloved.
In the place where they yelled out, "You're nobody!"
they're calling you "God's living children."

---Romans 9:25

I'm interested in the idea of repurposing. And I was hitting a major major plateau on my interpretation of biblical confidence. I think I'll still return to that topic, but I had no new or creative thoughts, and that in and of itself got super discouraging and then I didn't write for awhile, and then I got out of the habit of looking for illustrations....blah blah blah. I'm back. With something new.

Repurposing is a huge buzzword in the environmental and green communities. It's all about recycling and eliminating waste, but I think repurposing may go a little deeper than that --- here's a quick wikipedia definition:

"Repurposing is to use a tool for use as another tool, usually for a purpose unintended by the original tool-maker. Typically, repurposing is done using items usually considered to be junk or garbage. A good example of this would be the Earthship style of house, that uses tires as insulating walls and bottles as glass walls. Reuse is not limited to repeated uses for the same purpose. Examples of repurposing include using tires as boat fenders and steel drums as feeding troughs. Incinerator and power plant exhaust stack fly-ash is used extensively as an additive to concrete, providing increased strength. This type of reuse can sometimes make use of items which are no longer usable for their original purposes, for example using worn-out clothes as rags."


Upon further internet research, I discovered an entire art community of people creating amazing and innovative things out of existing objects.

How interesting is that doll house turned into utility room shelving?! I also really love those lights.  

So I set out today with the goal of creating a repurposed work of art. Easy right? I'm crafty. I knew exactly where I would go to find my "junk" that I would use, and I've done something similar in the past ---- I wish I still had a picture of an old fashioned glass blender that I turned into a fish tank (I cut the cord off of it---the fish was safe at all times).

This is the Kraft Furniture store on like 16th and Leavenworth and it is a crying shame that they are going out of business this month. Because people need a place where they can buy bagged doll heads in bulk.....

$1 per bag or 15 cents a head. Bargain.


There is so much potential in the bins and barrels here that I can hardly stand it.....

Here's the thing....it turns out you have to have a purpose in order to re-purpose something. I wandered around that place for way longer than a person should safely breathe fumes in a place like that, with so many ideas and possibilities in mind that I walked away with nothing.

 

I desperately tried to think of something to do with these cute little bottles... Wind chimes? They don't clink nicely when I tapped them together. Tiny little vases? LAME. I was stuck. And what this girl doesn't need is a dozen tiny little bottles sitting in her very full one bedroom apt..."just in case" I think of something I need them for---you know??

I still love the idea of repurposing. It completely challenges the way that I think. You've got to look at something in terms of potential and possiblity. I'm so quick to say a suitcase is a suitcase, because that is what I've always used it for ---- but when tipped on its side and mounted on the wall its your new opening/closing medicine cabinet. It's crazy?!

Here's where my heart becomes so full and excited --- I'm pretty sure Jesus is the master of repurposement. And I'm pretty sure he's laughing at the fact that I'm just picking up on this now. He can take nothing, and make something out of it. Beauty from ashes right? Our culture pats itself on the back because we're so crafty in making asphalt interstates out of our old car tires, but Christ started this whole process when he redeemed us on the cross.

His death was Him showing us that it does not matter how much crap we throw down or how far gone we get ourselves, he'll buy us back. Even when we are still in the thick of it, he wants us back. Because He's got a purpose :) An original purpose. And even if that means repurposing me? He can do it.

So I'm kind of looking at it as a challenge now...and I am in a sorry state of I-can't-stand-this-winter-one-more-second-ness, so I'm pretty punchy.... but as I've been praying about this, I try to offer God my most non-dignified, unglamorous, unacceptable traits to see what he can do with them.....

Today God... all I feel like I've got a lot of.... are acne scars and emotional baggage.... what do you got for that?

"I'll call nobodies and make them somebodies;
I'll call the unloved and make them beloved."

Even if all you've got to offer is a mix-matched bag of doll heads -- metaphorically speaking--- he wants it. :)

It's not just making sure the original item is not wasted, it's helping it find it's purpose in a new and amazing way. I think a lot of my interest in this word is its close tie to redemption. Which is how God eventually snatched up my heart and I have never been the same --- I'm redeemed. And when that finally got through my thick head, I just couldn't go back.

"Full redemption is when God buys back everything that has happened to us and every sin we've committed....He not only diffuses our past of all power to harm and haunt us but he infuses it with power to help others. Redemption is incomplete if our past is only diffused. Satan won't be completely sorry and God won't get all the glory until the bad is used for good." --Beth Moore

Hallelujah. That's what I'm talking about!

I am SUPER excited to walk through some of these ideas with you. Hope you all are having a good week! Beth