A Tender Care that Nothing be Lost:
God the Button Collector
By Nita Gilger
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The image— and it is but an image— the image under which this operative growth of God's nature is best conceived, is that of a tender care that nothing be lost. - Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality |
There was on old, blue tinted Mason jar with a lead lid that lived for years in our home. This jar held buttons. The buttons in this jar were from my grandmothers, greatgrandmothers, aunts and my mom. It was a very colorful, large jar and to my child's eyes it was a treasure trove of goodness and beauty. My mom collected buttons--some as family hand-me downs and some found at antique stores or given to her by others who knew of her passion. Some buttons had "jewels" on them that looked like rhinestones. Some were bright colors of red, blue, orange, green. The buttons were all shapes and sizes. One of my great joys as a child was when I was allowed to dump out the beautiful buttons and play with them. My play included sorting, matching, scattering and hearing stories about who the buttons belonged to or where they came from. As I sat sprawled out on the floor with buttons all around me, my mom would be at her sewing machine making the next outfit.
You can hear the conversation and the million questions of a precocious child. Where did this blue one come from? How many silver buttons were on grandma's dress? (I hoped to find the full number). How do you make button holes? Why are there so many buttons in this jar? ---on and on. My mom must have tired of my incessant questions and need to play with those buttons. If she was worn out from me, she rarely showed it and instead offered me a safe place to discover and perform my mathematics of counting and sorting. In those moments, I not only gathered buttons, I gathered love and stories.
This memory helps me to look at creativity and Source. When I think about the provision and encouragement of God in our creative work and process, I sometimes have as many questions as the button child did. Does God work in and through our chaos? How does our own form of art inform our faith and how does our faith inform our art? What is it that keeps the fire of the Divine alive in our work and lives? How do we sort through the ordinary and the challenges of life?
I think of God as the patient button collector who helps me sort through the chaos and inspires me with life-giving stories that feed my creativity and life. God has an entire assortment of provisions and choices for me. And as I struggle while matching and mismatching my "buttons", God is love and God provides a way. God is my joy and provider who helps me to move with wonder and joy deeper and deeper into the life given to me. God gives me stories. God helps me sort and find beauty in my art and life. It is relational and co-creative.
Every now and again, a button from that old jar of my childhood would have a little crack in it. I remember one time in particular as I sorted through the pile of buttons. One very pretty button broke. It was the sparkly red one. I was so upset. I thought my mom would be upset too. Instead, she sat down on the floor with me and held the broken button in her hand. She said, “Sometimes life is like that button. Things break but it does not mean they lose all their beauty”. She asked me what I could think of to do with that fractured button. I wanted to glue it back together. And so, we did.
The crack in the button was always visible and the button was never used on a garment again, but it remained a part of the collection and was a reminder that things can be repaired and still beautiful in their own way. It’s funny. I remember burying that repaired button deep into the middle of all the other treasured buttons. Then, my game became to find the broken yet "healed" button the next time I dumped the hundreds of buttons out again.
Maybe it was in those button moments that I began to believe in a God who loved me unconditionally and would help me to grow and enliven my creativity and life in such an encompassing way. Creativity requires some courage to embrace and maintain. When God is understood as a patient One who loves us in all times-- even in our brokenness and missteps-- then it is easier to trust an enduring love and provision. Perhaps God’s care is not always overt. Rather, God can sometimes be found in the middle of a button jar. I wish I still had that jar of buttons. I do not. But I still have the love of my mom, the memory of stories, and the assurance of God who creates out of the chaos and fractures in life. Amen
You can hear the conversation and the million questions of a precocious child. Where did this blue one come from? How many silver buttons were on grandma's dress? (I hoped to find the full number). How do you make button holes? Why are there so many buttons in this jar? ---on and on. My mom must have tired of my incessant questions and need to play with those buttons. If she was worn out from me, she rarely showed it and instead offered me a safe place to discover and perform my mathematics of counting and sorting. In those moments, I not only gathered buttons, I gathered love and stories.
This memory helps me to look at creativity and Source. When I think about the provision and encouragement of God in our creative work and process, I sometimes have as many questions as the button child did. Does God work in and through our chaos? How does our own form of art inform our faith and how does our faith inform our art? What is it that keeps the fire of the Divine alive in our work and lives? How do we sort through the ordinary and the challenges of life?
I think of God as the patient button collector who helps me sort through the chaos and inspires me with life-giving stories that feed my creativity and life. God has an entire assortment of provisions and choices for me. And as I struggle while matching and mismatching my "buttons", God is love and God provides a way. God is my joy and provider who helps me to move with wonder and joy deeper and deeper into the life given to me. God gives me stories. God helps me sort and find beauty in my art and life. It is relational and co-creative.
Every now and again, a button from that old jar of my childhood would have a little crack in it. I remember one time in particular as I sorted through the pile of buttons. One very pretty button broke. It was the sparkly red one. I was so upset. I thought my mom would be upset too. Instead, she sat down on the floor with me and held the broken button in her hand. She said, “Sometimes life is like that button. Things break but it does not mean they lose all their beauty”. She asked me what I could think of to do with that fractured button. I wanted to glue it back together. And so, we did.
The crack in the button was always visible and the button was never used on a garment again, but it remained a part of the collection and was a reminder that things can be repaired and still beautiful in their own way. It’s funny. I remember burying that repaired button deep into the middle of all the other treasured buttons. Then, my game became to find the broken yet "healed" button the next time I dumped the hundreds of buttons out again.
Maybe it was in those button moments that I began to believe in a God who loved me unconditionally and would help me to grow and enliven my creativity and life in such an encompassing way. Creativity requires some courage to embrace and maintain. When God is understood as a patient One who loves us in all times-- even in our brokenness and missteps-- then it is easier to trust an enduring love and provision. Perhaps God’s care is not always overt. Rather, God can sometimes be found in the middle of a button jar. I wish I still had that jar of buttons. I do not. But I still have the love of my mom, the memory of stories, and the assurance of God who creates out of the chaos and fractures in life. Amen