In January of 2023, I took a trip out to Nevada and found myself watching the sunrise over the Valley of Fire State Park. I was struck by the beauty and joy I experienced while hiking my way through the most vivid pink landscape and desert that I didn’t even know existed. And guess what, it also rained while we were there. I was speechless!

This encounter with joy and beauty saturated my heart and would then carry me through one of the hardest seasons of my life not even 8 months later. This was the first time I think I have ever experienced “peace that surpasses understanding” to the depths of my heart.

This Collection, Streams in the Desert, are visual declarations for all of what we have been waiting for that is still yet to come while also standing as reflections on the beauty and goodness that has been there all along.

The duality of both/and. Harsh ground/beauty still. Hardship/peace. Streams/Desert.

These paintings are declarations over my life and yours that we will see this promise come to pass:

“Water will gush forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert. The burning sand will become a pool, the thirsty ground bubbling springs. In the haunts where jackals once lay, grass and reeds and papyrus will grow. And a highway will be there; it will be called the Way of Holiness.”

Isaiah 35