Pour It Out church, Sunshine Coast, Queensland
It was a big week in many aspects, the least insignificant of which was Pour It Out’s full week of prayer nights calling forth revival. I am still processing the prophetic meaning of this painting, but here I will share the process with you.
In prayer preparation that morning I was listening for any direction on what I would paint, and having heard nothing I was happy to ‘wing it’ as I know painting angels always appear.
I was staying with Ben and Jodie Hughes. In their kitchen before leaving for church, I noticed the image on a cereal box. It was milk being poured into a bowl and the cereal sloshing from the edges. I questioned whether I was just noticing the ‘pour-it-out-ness’ of the image or whether God was wanting me to paint the pour-it-out concept again. Admittedly I muttered quietly ‘oh no’, but I felt a quick sense of … yes, more pouring it out.
The next image I noticed was the antlers of a stag holding a sphere. I had a sense of the sphere as a globe of the world, kinda felt ‘pouring it out from heaven (like the milk) into the world’ made sense, and I also sensed a fullness somewhat like how an egg fills the shell when you crack it open. On arrival at church I asked a friend for an image of Australia.
Armed with these three images I was ready to start. During the pre-service prayer Jodie saw cracking eggs being poured over my head in the spirit. Fun eh!
The painting evolved …. as always not what I start with, but always in the direction He takes me in. Worship was deep and off the charts. Ben and Keely Hughes leading alone but somehow sounding like a full band with an angelic choir (that was Lauren Darlington on BV). I had plenty of worship time to paint (an hour) and could have stopped and had a finished painting several times. I just kept adding details as I saw them in my mind. I almost didn’t add the Australia map but in the last few minutes knew it belonged in the picture.
After worship I kept being drawn into the painting. The ‘antlers’ took on an embryonic form. The globe looking more and more like an egg. The connectedness of Australia as the ‘Apple of His eye’ and the glory gold being poured from heaven. Then I just knew – it was what we had been praying about this week. The birth of revival. At that moment Ben Hughes began speaking about the revival in Hebrides being birthed in prayer. Hallelujah.
Don’t you love how God works?!!
Oh! PostScript.
After the service we were gathered around the painting sharing what God had spoken to us about it. Always the greatest feeling to hear how He connects with each heart. Then suddenly the spotlight shining up onto the painting from the floor was turned off, and the gold just leapt from the canvas. It came alive! I just laughed. It was still speaking in the dimmer lights. Such a word in that thought! Also Pour It Out often just use dim lights and candlelight so it is appropriate that the painting glows when the lights are off. (And yes, the dim light you see in these pics is the lighting that I painted in.) Selah.
Post Post Script: The summer following this painting. Ben and Jodies Hughes led 90 days of Revival meetings on the Sunshine Coast, known affectionately as The Pineapple Revival, named after the venue in which it occurred – The Big Pineapple.
