Soaring Eagle

Commissioned for Biola's Torrey Conference 2022

Eagles are highly mentioned in the Bible.

They fly high, and they are the king of all the birds.

A couple of times in their life they go through a process called molting; where they shed all of their feathers and are extremely vulnerable. They end up not flying at all. They can't fly without feathers, and they go through this process because their wings develop lots of oil. Their wings deteriorate, so they have to go through what we all know as suffering in order to be regenerated.

During this process, other eagles help them by dropping food down to where they are laying, and sometimes it can take months for them to regenerate all their feathers, but when they do, they restore their youth and are like brand new eagles.

This painting is an image of an eagle stopping or taking a pause in his life to endure suffering. As he is shedding his feathers I just saw these images of butterflies which are representations of animals that have already regenerated. They have already been through the metamorphosis, they have been through the suffering. The butterflies of the very animal, are taking the feathers off of the eagle as the eagle prepares for his months of suffering.

Suffering seems to be a theme that is very close to God's heart and it is only in that process can we actually learn things about Him that we could never learn had we not had that experience. This painting is an embodiment of that idea. Also, the eagle sits on the vine so the whole story is here. In your suffering stay connected to the vine. In the suffering stay close to Jesus, if not get closer than you were before.