Creativity and God

 Creativity as a means to see God in the world.
As part of a 10-month Urban Monastic Internship, I have the opportunity to challenge myself in various ways and with projects and assignments.
This month's assignment actually makes me rather excited, perhaps because it is in an area in which I feel I am gifted, or at least, enjoy delving into.
Part of the assignment this month is to do something creative and figure out how God is creative...
It's exciting to take creativity and delve deeper into it.
I feel like there are so many ways I could go with this... but for starters, I chose to do a drawing/painting.
A friend had recently given a whole slew of carefully collected shells...
so I took them as a base for inspiration one sunny afternoon.
Initial observations on sea shells:

-They are so small and seemingly insignificant
yet to attempt to capture them with colored pencil is time consuming because they are all so unique and display many intricate colors, makes me realize that things we see and take for granted are often much more amazing than we take the time to recognize.
- Going deeper, I recognize there is an artist who created each shell unique, with colors and textures as homes for various sea creatures. He took the time to fashion them the way they are, he put them into the sea with it's effects of sand and water. They are not without purpose. And are not grains of sand made from pieces of crushed and finely worn rocks and shells?

- He gave us eyes to see, to capture details with pencil. He gave us the ability to create pictures from what we see, to capture in various ways, what we feel when we see what he made.
- Creating is a God thing. He created the world and everything in it, and He fashioned and made it just so.
I feel like he probably felt a sense of happiness, joy, pride and accomplishment when he finished each carefully detailed piece of creation. I get a glimpse of that feeling when I've created something, when I look at a finished drawing that I labored over...