Fay, Gustav, Hannah, Ike and Jeri

Poor Haiti! Probably the poorest country in our hemisphere and it's been hit by some bad hurricanes this late summer. And now Jeri. Oh, she's not a hurricane. She's Jeri Platt, a Columbus Methodist who has been on many mission trips to Haiti, and she's a fabulous watercolor artist. The Visual Arts Ministry hung a show of her wonderful paintings of the Haitian people at the Church at Mill Run, 3500 Mill Run Drive, Hilliard, OH 43026. There will be a reception for the artist next Sunday afternoon, 2-4 p.m. The show is on the second floor in the main corridor, September 6-October 16, 2008.

Update: We went over to Mill Run after the first service at Lytham to see how it looked (We were out of town when it was hung). I think there are 24 paintings, and they are just wonderful. NOTHING IS FOR SALE! She uses her art to tell the story of Haiti and Christian missions. But if they were for sale, I'd be in line.

Recycle your greeting cards

Here's another way to put fuel in the gas tank without burning corn and creating food riots. Recycle your greeting cards and spend that $4-5.00 on gasoline! On Saturday I got the box of cards out from under the bed and my husband had a selection of 20-30 Mother's Day cards, and he picked one from 1990, which of course, I didn't remember and enjoyed just as much as if he'd gone to the card store. In 1990 this card was $2.00, so I figure it would have been about $4.00 in 2008.

It gave us an opportunity to remember our own mothers, who were both alive in 1990, and also how he used to tape (VCR) the Blondie movies (although we had a break-in in 1986 and our VCR and tapes were stolen). Our son-in-law was just a future dream at that time, and my husband hadn't started his own business, and I probably didn't have tenure yet at OSU. I think Mystery our first cat was 14 and still alive and our Lynxpoint not yet born. I was driving my first Chrysler product van and loving it--now I'm on my third.

We enjoyed church with our children, and many stopped to admire my Mother's Day gardenia corsage--not too common these days at a service where many of the women are in jeans or slacks (contemporary service, 9:45). Then we came back to the house for a wonderful dinner prepared by our daughter (lasagna and lemon pie) and son (salad and Texas toast). She had purchased a pasta maker so this was really a fresh item. I think this is much better than going to a restaurant. I don't mind providing the tableware if everyone else brings the food. The tornado warnings sent them all home to check on their pets.

Also on the week-end I think I put about 50 miles on my car just running back and forth across the river to the Mill Run Church where we hung the Spring Show for the Upper Arlington Art League. That's actually what gave me the idea that we could recycle a card. UALC members on this side of the river could probably save gas just by switching back to Lytham. The grandchildren will survive, which is usually the excuse given for those who live a mile from Lytham driving over there.

Although, to tell the truth, the expensive part of the art show wasn't the gasoline, but seeing a piece of art by Jeanie Auseon that we agreed to buy. I don't think I could explain the medium because it is some type of photographic print on fabric stitched with a silver thread. If you see the show I think it is #45.

The Upper Arlington Art League spring show was judged by Tracy Steinbrook who is an instructor at the Cultural Arts Center in Columbus. The UAAL is one of the oldest community art groups in the NW area. The show runs until June 12 and can be viewed at The Church at Mill Run, 3500 Mill Run Drive, Hilliard, Ohio 43026. The show is sponsored by the Visual Arts Ministry of Upper Arlington Lutheran Church. Come out and support your neighbors.

3989

So much for cover design

Are library staff visually challenged? It was bad enough when they started throwing away the book jackets (which often included information not in the book), but now they are obscuring the cover too!

#31

Scripture and Trees

The Visual Arts Ministry of our church was formed during the summer of 2000, and for the first time this year we finally have a budget. It’s been a very frustrating wait. Fortunately, we have a fabulous gallery area in our Mill Run building which we call “The Upper Room” and hope to soon have our hanging system installed at our Lytham Road location. The Mill Run gallery space will soon be hosting the Central Ohio Watercolor Society (or as our publicity says, the COWS are coming).

The first choice of the Visual Arts Ministry for a purchase is a very large drawing of a tree by Linda Langhorst. There is no way to look at this piece and not see numerous Biblical passages. Although this particular piece is not on her web site, you can see others here. Linda works in graphite, charcoal and watercolor and has a background in agriculture.

There is a recently reviewed title Republic of Shade by Thomas J. Campanella, Yale University Press, 2003 which includes the following:

"In typological terms, trees in Scripture act like giant words, expressing not only the general glory of God but also more specific themes. Both trees and saints come out of the ground. Both grow on riverbanks (Ps. 1) and bring food and medicine to the world; "their fruit will be for food and their leaves for healing" (Ez. 47:12; cf. Rev. 22:2). Jotham preached "the trees once went forth to anoint a king over them," and the blind man healed began to see men as trees walking. Trees are images of humans, and they reflect our own fruitfulness, hubris, and decay.

And God manifests himself at trees—"arboreal theophanies," [James] Jordan says—like those in Eden and in front of Moses but also in the careful wood of the Tabernacle and Temple, which create grand images of God's people gathered around him. The entire Davidic line is pictured as a tree, a root, a stump, a branch (Is. 42; 6:13; 11:10) that ultimately develops into Christ, the vine, the tree of life, executed on a tree, having threatened fire to "every tree which does not bear good fruit" (Mt. 3:10). Christ Himself doesn't hesitate to urge us to read trees wisely: "Now learn this parable from the fig tree" (Mt. 24:32).

Learn from the tree? Why does that directive not show up regularly in seminary hermeneutics courses? We go to great pains to teach seminary students about exegeting Scripture and secret Foucauldian power structures, but we leave them largely clueless about exegeting nature." Douglas Jones, Reviewer