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Focus on what is Good…

SC STATE HOUSE • 40″ x 30″ original oil painting • 2016 Marie Scott

I love plants.

Plants are neutral. Plants are beautiful.

I like to focus my energy on painting plants. That feels more productive to me than gardening, which is an uphill battle. One definitely worth the fight, but an ongoing, never-ending battle, nonetheless.

Paintings of plants don’t grow weeds. Paintings of flowers don’t require water. They are gardens which remain perfect despite the elements. They are givers. Not takers.

Paintings that emit beauty, can bring peace to the soul as they require nothing of you. They have no agenda. All they need, is simply a space to BE. All they want is an occasional glance of your admiration.

I love South Carolina.

It is a place that is prosperous with natural beauty, wealthy in raw loveliness.

Like all places, however, it has its weeds. And unquenchable needs. The neglected, overgrown garden of issues that can feel hopelessly irreparable. 

I love peace.

Which is why I focus the time I spend in my painting studio documenting scenes which allow the mind to rest, and the soul to feel refreshed.

I need more peace. And most likely, so do you.

Just like a real garden, full of needy plants, paintings of beauty will eventually become takers too.

Paintings of peace, in and of themselves, will never be enough to calm whatever it is that eats away at the deepest core of your being. Paintings of gardens will never fill the unquenchable hidden longings of your heart.

There is nothing in this world that can truly satisfy the varying size hole, that each of us has within our soul. And that, is what will ultimately wear you down. And then wear you out.

A “Soul Hole?” Yes.

Wow. That sounds pretty hopeless. And peace-less. And, unfortunately true.

I love Jesus.

It is hope-less to put my trust in plants. Or paintings of plants. Or South Carolina. Or peaceful scenes.

But Jesus? Yes! 

He IS hope. He IS peace.

Jesus is the only person, place, or thing, — where unending, perfectly satisfying, honest-to-goodness, True Soul Peace can ever be found. 

Call me crazy if you want to. He is the real deal. I promise.

More on this, another time… another day.

I love a new month.

Time for a new page, and a new picture. A chance to take a deep breath and re-focus my thoughts. But with a lot less pressure than a new year commands.

Focus on this…

No matter where you are this June, my hope is that this focus-reminder will help to get your summer thinking off to a more healthy start. The words below, are from the Apostle Paul in a letter he wrote to the church at Phillipi while he was locked up in prison, around AD 61-ish.

I plan to spend the next 30 days trying to focus on what Paul suggests. I hope you’ll join me, in my “Focus on what is Good” Summer Thinking efforts. (Feel free to check-in with me on this. You know what can happen with the best laid plans…)

“Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies.” Philippians 4:8-9

SC STATE HOUSE • 40″ x 30″ original oil painting • ©2016 Marie Scott Studios • Click on the image to download this free wallpaper for your computer for the month, compliments of Greenville, SC artist Marie Scott. Enjoy the view!

Wishing you a month of peace…

Don’t forget your Focus!
— Marie Scott

BTW… If you want to hear some more about this Jesus, from somebody who is an artist both with words and teaching, you can listen to one one of the South’s finest thinkers as he explains the bible in the most accessible way, at http://downtownpres.org/sunday/sermons/