December 18th, 2024
I pick up my vanilla latte from the counter and scoot into my favorite corner booth at the coffee shop. I’ve had this day marked on my calendar for at least a month: my annual planning meeting with the CEO of my art business (me) and my assistant (me).
Before getting into the nitty gritty of key metrics and action steps for 2025, I look up the Mass readings for the day.
The parable of the talents. I’ve read it a thousand times, but this time, I’m struck by the third servant’s honesty.
“I was afraid.”
Like the others, he waited for the master to return—but his waiting was found unworthy.
His fellow workers were found pleasing to the master because their waiting was both active and obedient.
I sit stunned as my latte grows cold, realizing how much I relate to that third servant. For the past few years, ever since God gave me the dream of being a professional artist, I have approached this path cautiously, taking only slow, calculated steps.
I have been afraid of wrapping my identity too tightly in being an artist. I have been afraid of loving art or the money or influence that could come from it more than God. I have been afraid of failure and rejection. I have been afraid, even though God showed me this path, that surely it couldn’t be the right one. It’s too dangerous, too full of ego and self-centeredness. Too scary. Too uncertain.
I have stayed back, clinging to my idea of what God must want for me, while He stands a step ahead, reaching out His hand and asking me to move forward in faith.
As we wait for Jesus this Advent, I have to remind myself that waiting does not mean doing nothing.
The servant, in his waiting, was commanded to invest the money entrusted to him. Joseph, in today’s gospel, is ordered to take Mary into his home rather than quietly divorcing her as he had planned. In our waiting, we are being invited into action that may feel risky or even crazy.
It’s easy to question the path we are being called to. The voice of the Enemy creeps in, insisting, “Did he really tell you that?”
Yet, as we see in the parable, if we do nothing when God is calling us to do something, that too is sin. In waiting for Jesus, it’s not enough to just be a good little girl or boy who does nothing, says nothing, and stays invisible and out of the way. Jesus is calling us to participate in His coming, to be a lamp on a lampstand, a city on a hill.
So my encouragement for you (and for me) this Advent is this: Do something. Take action. Take your vocation as an artist seriously. You’re not bad for wanting to pursue the vision that lives in your heart. God is the one who gave you this desire, and He is the one who will guide you and provide for you in it. He will multiply the fruits of your faithfulness.
The talent is in your hands. What will you choose to do with it?
Marissa Thornberry is a painter and poet based in Little Rock, Arkansas. She creates art to soothe the souls of recovering perfectionists and to remind you that “the world needs your fingerprints.”
Find out more about her here.