From broken pieces to beauty

(Updated Aug. 16, 2009)

Three nights of Vacation Bible School at the Cape Elizabeth United Methodist Church was a time to hear stories about inspirational successes emerging from broken lives — both from the Bible and from daily events in modern times.

Lessons learned from those stories and discussions within the congregation resulted in the creation of creative and colorful mosaics — inspirational images emerging from broken pieces of glass, plates, tiles and assorted objects found along the ocean.

The mosaics were part of VBS’s “Breaking Out” theme, focusing on how we can transform the broken pieces of our lives and relationships into something new and positive. This year’s Vacation Bible School ended in late July, but the work on the mosaics will continue through the summer.

VBS participants created their mosaics from a large collection of broken glass, tiles and plates.

Priscilla Dreyman, executive director of Spiral Arts, offered her expertise to the VBS participants, helping them to turn good ideas into polished mosaics. Spiral Arts is a non-profit community arts organization, which seeks to make the arts available and accessible to people of all ages and from all walks of life.

Priscilla Dreyman offers suggestions on how to improve each participant’s mosaic.

As has been the case during the past four summers of Vacation Bible School, the success of the mosaic project was that it was intergenerational, bringing together some of the youngest and older members of the congregation to work, side by side, on a common task.

The mosaic project is intended for the young and older members of the congregation.

Zoe Evans creates a mosaic with an ocean theme.

Some of the finished mosaics were taken home by VBS participants while others remained in the church and will be mounted on a chair rail in the back hallway, establishing them as part of the church’s identity.

Some of the mosaics have already been mounted on the back hallway chair rail.

At Tuesday night’s session, Bruce Lind read the story of the Good Samaritan and explained how it was a good example of “breaking out” of a comfort zone to help someone in need. Bruce challenged all participants to break out of their own comfort zones and “go out and help someone less fortunate.”

On Wednesday night, Steve Hill told the story of a New York City minister who resigned from his own church after a falling out in the congregation. He later learned the power of forgiveness and went on to create gardens of forgiveness, illustrating to others what he had learned.

Both stories provided the impetus to create the mosaics that will become part of the church and each of the participants’ lives.

Some examples of mosaics created during the three nights of the 2009 VBS: