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Created in September 2021 a gift to my dear friend Cyndee Buck.

Currently on display at Southwest Christian High School in Chaska, MN

Has anyone else ever met someone during a season of their life when you’ve just walked away from everything trying to find a life worth living and meeting this person at this crucial time caused your life path to change forever? And then you look back often to that moment and can see clearly how God was heavily involved. Cyndee Buck is that someone to me because she introduced me to the power of God through art. She helped me recognize that the power lies within my own heart and mind. She taught me to pray before I create.

She recommended reading Ephesians 3:14-21, so I read the whole chapter. And I try to read this before I create every time along with other scripture. This is a gift from God, this is what grace looks like. He sent his Holy Spirit to dwell within our hearts to strengthen and guide us to the fullness of Gods love.

To be “filled with the fullness of God” means that God is the controlling influence at a given moment governing your feelings, desires, thoughts, hopes, relationships, words, actions, reactions, calendar, check book, etc. We all have the Holy Spirit within us all we have to do is invite Him to be apart of our life and trust 100%!

I have painted through some of life’s most difficult times as well as through some of life’s biggest celebrations. In the last few years creating art has become an even richer experience for me because I turned my life around to God.

March 2017, before I checked myself into rehab I applied at Lutheran Church of Hope. I was upfront about my struggles with alcohol and that I was about to admit myself into impatient rehab for 30 days. The facility’s lead Rick Stessman, said he would consider giving me a chance after he got the background check back. We stayed in contact and just days before sucessfully completing rehab I was offered the job on the facilities team at Lutheran Church of Hope in West Des Moines.

My first few days working at Hope was Easter weekend. The worship center holds like 2500 people and they have a large room for overflow that holds several hundred. It was incredible to witness thousands of people in and out of the church to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. This experience absolutely guided me onto this spiritual discovery and journey I have been on ever since. Hearing the sermon started a fire inside me causing a deep desire to find out more.

Durning rehab I had a spiritual awakening that started to change the way I looked at things. It was as if something just clicked, I felt like I was being called to be around the Church. I had been praying desperately for God to breakthrough into my life. It was humbling to work in God’s house everyday while I was so fresh in my recovery. Something about it made me feel safe and feel hope that I could live a different life. I got to know some amazing people while working with the facilities crew. Behind the scenes is an extremely hardworking dedicated bunch of individuals all who have incredible stories. Daily I would pass by the art room while doing my facility duties and I was incredibly drawn to find out what goes on in there. I soon discovered the Creative Arts Ministry in the basement. I knew they had beautiful art in the gallery and powerful live art during Christmas and Easter but I did not know there was a ministry for the arts!