Painted Barn Exploration

"Love...always hopes, always perseveres."
[1 corinthians 13]


Heather and I drove by this painted barn on the way to church last week, and I, being the Washington tourist, didn't want to leave without taking pictures. So today, a week later, we ventured out after church (and after the rain calmed down) to take pictures.

I didn't realize what many of the painted words said/meant until arriving at the destination. The obvious draw to the barn came from the colors and the big HOPE and WHAT'S YOUR STORY inscriptions. The rest is not as clear until you get close.

In many places on the barn RIP was written, followed by various names. I climbed into the barn through a door on one side so that I could get to the part where HOPE was written. As I walked inside, something sad swept over me. Heather later told me that for a while, a lot of kids would come out to the barn and draw as a way of remembering friends who found life to be too hard and eventually gave up on life altogether.

I loved the colors and the positive messages, yet I couldn't get away from the tragic element that permeated the whole thing. The faces of those who I knew growing up, who didn't know how to continue on, flood my memory even now.

The barn reminded me of the fight we are in for hope and the often masked truth that there is a big story each of us is telling with our lives. Each one.

I felt the fight come back in me to first of all recognize that such a hope needs to flood my heart, and secondly that it should be so strong that others receive hope from my heart. I know that may sound co-dependent or like a savior complex, but I feel like it might be part of becoming love.

The painted barn held a lesson for me today; maybe many lessons to come. I won't forget the mixture of joy and grief that I felt as I explored this work of art. I won't be okay with living as a resounding gong or a clanging cymbol. Not when what is needed is real, raw hope that says, "Yes, that story that you're telling with your life...it is big. It does matter. You matter."