Our daughter gave us a poster of
Christina’s World by Andrew Wyeth. We finally had it framed and I hung it the other day. Wyeth painted the original in 1948. “Christina” was Anna Christina Olson (1893-1968), a friend of Andrew and Betsy Wyeth in Cushing, Maine. That’s her home in the painting. She lived there her whole life with her brother, Alvaro.
Christina had a degenerative muscular disorder that left her crippled. Rather than use crutches or a wheelchair, she crawled around the house and grounds. Wyeth saw her “crawling like a crab on a New England shore” and was inspired. "The challenge to me,” Wyeth said, “was to do justice to her extraordinary conquest of a life which most people would consider hopeless."
Here’s a broken woman. She’s alone in the middle of a field. She’s dragging herself along on the ground by her hands. “Crawling like a crab on a New England shore.” She’s gaunt and bony. Not much to look at. A cripple.
Some of the women I know best are broken. Maybe all women are broken. Bob Dylan wrote, “Ain’t no use jivin’ / Ain’t no use jokin’ / Everything’s broken.” Some women are alone. Many feel lonely. Anita Lustrea, host of a popular radio show and author of What Women Tell Me, wrote, “I sense that loneliness is epidemic among women, especially Christian women, even those who go to church every Sunday.”
The woman in the painting is crawling home. Where has she been? Maybe she spent the morning with her friend. Maybe they drank coffee and played Bridge. Maybe they prayed and laughed together. She may be gaunt and crippled but she’s strong. Nobody’s carrying her. And she’s been somewhere. How long has it taken her? Do her shoulders ache?
There’s real beauty here. And strength in weakness. Maybe even grace. That’s what I like about the painting. It reminds me that God’s grace can make brokenness beautiful. It portrays the attitude of Paul who had learned “the secret of being content in any and every situation through Him who gives me strength.” (Philippians 4:11-13)
