Winter break was an extremely tough time for me. There were times when I had literally zero motivation to do anything. But, through reading scripture, prayer, and the support of my friends I made it through. Not only did I make it through, but I had also found something to get motivated about.
I was struggling with my faith, not necessarily doubting it, but I just didn't have much of it. But like I said, inspiration hit. I remembered who I am and why I'm here; it's not for me. It's for God. And no matter how hard things get, He will be there with me every step of the way. So I decided to make myself a physical reminder of this, similar to the little cross necklace I made back in high school. I wear that necklace every day to remind myself of what Jesus did for me, and so I don't take that for granted. He gave up everything for me and He deserves no less than my best regardless of how I feel.
I tell you that so that you might have a better understanding of why I took on this other project. What is it exactly? It's a shield. But not just any shield. It's not even a Captain America shield, as cool as that would be. It's a shield for faith. Now, you might be wondering why I didn't say "a shield of faith." That's simple. The shield is not made of faith. It's just metal and paint. But, I made it to remind myself to always have faith. Because it's one thing to say, "yeah, I've got my shield of faith today." It's a whole other thing to carry around a physical shield. It's there. It's tangible. It has weight. You can't help but be reminded that you're carrying this thing around. What I'm saying is, it makes it real. It solidifies the concept in my mind. I know that God will be with me whatever I may be going through, sure. But when I look at that shield, I instantly think, "you know, God's got this. He's never failed before and He won't start now. It doesn't matter how I feel. It doesn't matter how hard the situation may be. I am His, and He will always be there to get me through. I can always have faith in Him.
Making the shield was no easy task. I started with a circular metal sled. I cut the outer edge off to remove the curled lip. My friends let me tell you, cutting a perfect circle on a curved surface is no piece of cake. After that I stripped the red paint off of both sides of the disk. That was a pain as well. Eventually,I found a better paint stripper, but it still took me about four solid days to get down to bare metal. I definitely thought about quitting at that point. But I didn't. By the time I had the paint stripped, it was time for the spring semester of college to start. So the project got put on hold. At some point I decided to take a weekend and just finish it. By then, the disk was covered in rust. So I had to clean that off. It took a whole day to clean and mask off my design. But by the end of the day, I had it painted. The next day I clear coated it. I did not have the proper technique and in the end, some areas the clear coat puddled and in others it splattered. It was ruined. The only way to fix it would be to strip the whole thing and start over. I was in tears. I had put so much into the disk and was so close to having it finished and then I screw it up. After that happened, I was done. I gave up on it. I planned on getting a spun aluminum disk and starting over. So the ruined disk sat in my room for over a month.
Two weekends ago I was having another hard day. So I was in my room listening to music. The song that came on reminded me that life isn't perfect. Rarely, if ever does life go the way we expect it to. I looked over at the disk and something just clicked. I realized my faith isn't perfect either. I have doubts, I falter, I mess things up, but that's what makes me who I am and makes me turn to God. It's easy to praise God in the good times, but it is hard as crap to praise Him when everything is crashing down on you. So I finished the shield. I cleaned the rust off the back, made a handle and an arm strap, and cleared the back. It was done. Now, some of the rust had started to show on the front through the clear coat. But, this wasn't news to me. It had looked like that a couple of days after I cleared the front. The clear coat prevented it from rusting any further. But the rust that did show through, gave it this beautiful golden color. That made me think, that's kind of the way God uses us. He takes all of us, including our broken parts and makes something beautiful.
I said I made the shield for the same kind of reason I made my necklace. I wear the necklace every day. Now, I'm not going to carry around a giant metal shield around everywhere I go, not every day at least. I had a hard, disappointing day this past weekend and I knew that Monday would be an especially tough day for me. So I decided to take the shield with me and carry it around wherever I went. I needed the physical reminder that God has me and I could and needed to put my faith in Him to get me through. That's why I made it in the first place!!! It helped. It also strengthened something else in my mind. I often worry about what other people will think of me. So it took a bit of courage to walk around campus all day with a metal shield on my arm. I mean, that's not normal. People know that's not normal and some even stared. But then I remembered, it doesn't matter what anybody else thinks about me. It only matters what God thinks about me. So for those of you that did see me with it yesterday, know this: I wasn't carrying it around to show off. In fact, I was a little embarrassed walking around with it at first. But, I was carrying it because yesterday was a hard day for me. I'm okay, though.
To everyone who's reading this:
I love you! Jesus loves you!!! I hope you have a great day!
Here are some pictures of what the shield looked like at different stages of the process.
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