Day 12 of Embracing Your Creative Gifts: Caregiving is a Creative Act

 

When he had said these things, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and spread the clay on his eyes, and said to him: Go, wash in the pool of Siloe, which is interpreted, Sent. He went therefore, and washed, and he came seeing. – John 9:6-7

One of the many roles of Jesus while he walked the earth is that of healer. He came to heal people in both body and soul. While he had the power to heal with a mere thought, in this case he uses natural items — mud and water — as instruments of healing.

We are an embodied people. We are both body and soul. We need physical objects as signs and symbols. This is true in our faith as well. We baptize with water; we anoint with chrism. The physical objects are part of the creative, spiritually healing event.

We, too, are called to imitate Jesus in giving the gift of healing to others and we use physical tools to do so. Those in the medical field exercise this gift on a daily basis, tending to patients, doing what they can to help ease their pain and heal their ailments. Parents and grandparents tend to sick children. Grown children care for infirm parents. Whether it is as simple as serving a bowl of chicken soup or as complex as brain surgery, caretaking is a creative act.

But other creative acts can have healing properties as well. Has the right song at the right moment soothed your weary soul? Has a warm handmade quilt ever wrapped you in comfort? Has a work of poetry helped heal your broken heart?

In “God’s Troubadour’s of Beauty: Artists and Handcrafters,” Catherine Doherty writes, “An artist is a healer who partakes of the power of the Good Physician because his or her works console and comfort.” While this is certainly not the only purpose of creativity, it is an important one.

Prayer

Dear Lord, you are the Good Physician who can heal us in both body and soul. Help me to use my creative gifts to bring comfort and healing to others.

Action

Who do you know who is need of some loving care? Use one of your creative gifts today to bring love and comfort to someone who is hurting.

This is an excerpt from The Work of Our Hands. (Amazon affiliate link)