Mosaics are made of broken pieces, and broken pieces make beautiful masterpieces.

An artist friend recently shared a reel about a mosaic she’d been working on this summer. Like most mosaics, this piece required a lot of work — breaking plates and placing tiles, grouting and scraping — hours upon hours of painstaking precision. Victoria’s words in her reel may resonate with you and where you are and how you feel, too.

An author friend reached out today with a little life update, and what caught my eye and captured my heart, even more than the vulnerable words she wrote, was the beautiful smile she wore in a picture she shared of herself sitting in the center of a mosaic staircase. That picture gave life to these words she shared…

“Sometimes the journey to a sincere smile begins with a thousand sad steps.” — Wendy Speake

Mosaics are made of broken pieces, and broken pieces make more beautiful masterpieces.

Like my artist friend and author friend, you, dear friend, are a masterpiece, too — a painstakingly beautiful masterpiece.

I used to be intimidated by the word "painstaking" because I feared the "pain" the word implied and the work it would "take" to get to the other side. After taking a moment to look it up, God used the definition to calm my anxiety about the sound of the word and see the beauty in its meaning. Painstaking, by definition, means "done with or employing great care and thoroughness."

Yes, friend, you are a masterpiece. God's great care and thoroughness is evident in your life. Your brokenness and pain are the bits and pieces that shape your beauty and purpose.

Mosaics are made of broken pieces, and broken pieces make the most beautiful masterpieces.