The article below was written in collaboration with my friends, Brad and Linsey Woodard, as we visited them during the week of July 4, 2024.
Have you ever noticed wear on a statue, a book, or a leather saddle? What is it that you are seeing? Some might say it’s a sign that the product has reached the end of usefulness and is ready to be discarded. Others might say, on the other hand, the wear or darkened hue reveals a story, a heritage, or a history.
A word often associated with this change is the word patina.
What is patina?
Patina is the quality of change that occurs over time through the interaction of various elements. It’s the green on a copper statue from contact with multiple elements, such as oxygen. It’s the discoloration of a book resulting from the oils on fingers transferred as its pages have been turned. It’s also the darkening of a leather saddle resulting from a rider getting on and off with sweat, dust, rain, and more.
In each case, when something patinas, its character has changed.
Take the leather saddle, for instance. There was a day when the horse was the primary mode of transportation. It was the saddle that enabled the rider to ride in moderate comfort. However, over time, the saddle–through sweat, use, rain, dust, and more would take on a darker hue that may seem a sign of expiration to some. However, others might say that the patina on the saddle instead reveals character, story, and history.
Is there a lesson within the concept of patina that helps us in our lives today?
I believe there is…
The basic logic of patina:
- Patina indicates a change that occurs over time.
- This change happens because of the contact between various elements.
- Thus, patina reveals a story expressing how those elements interacted.
How Does This Apply To Us Today?
- Your life represents a patinaed hue of interacting with diverse elements: people, places, experiences, learning, and more.
- Your life’s patina is the total result of your decisions, good, bad, and everything in between.
- Those decisions shaped, formed and represented your story, heritage, and values.
For some, the patinaed life reveals pain, heartache, and sorrow, leading to a too-low view of self. For others, patina reveals success, victory, and self-praise, leading to a too-high view of self.
There must be a better way to view our life experiences.
What is the better way to view a patinaed life?
- God created us for a purpose that is revealed in time and space.
- That is to say, for God’s glory and our good expressed in various ways within different gifts, dispositions, personalities, skills, and more.
- However, we sinned and continue to sin, causing challenges within our environments.
- God placed us in time and space to belong to and communicate His image with others, His created world, and Him.
- Relationships connect us to a community as we interact with other people and things, steward God’s creation, and more.
- However, we sinned and continue to sin, causing challenges within our relationships.
- God allows our decisions (good, bad, and more) to shape, mold, and conform us to the image of His Son, Jesus Christ.
- Our purpose, within our spheres of influence and with our community, provides the environment for change.
- Our lives reveal a patina, as it were, because of the change that occurs over time and through contact with people, places, and things.
- Indeed, our lives, though challenged with sins we commit and are committed against us, display God’s work of bringing about His glory and our good.
Therefore, our patinaed lives don’t mean we’re too far gone or successful beyond measure. Instead, they reveal the character God has forged in us (through our living in His world) to better reflect His Son, Jesus Christ.
“And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.”
Romans 5:3-5
— July 4, 2024