Art & Soul Post #44 by guest author Larry Moshell Sr.
Where did youth go when it left me?
Bewildered, I look in the mirror and my eyes see only a reflection,
a faded memory of what I was long ago.
But my heart remembers it so well.
I did the above watercolor painting in 2020, at age 86. I was recently asked why I began the first of four panels with the winter season. It was an interesting question. In terms of aesthetic design, I liked the contrast of winter’s whites, blacks, and grays moving into the vast variety of vibrant colors that characterized spring, summer, and fall. From a deeper point of view, at age 90, in the midst of my winter season, I found there was a story behind the title, “Passage”.
Although my mother saved a few drawings and crayon colorings that I made as a first or second grader, it was not until much later that art became important to me. Music, however, was an important part of my life at a young age. As I share my story, I hope you appreciate the above words of a poet, artist, and my sister-in-Christ friend, Billie LoCicero, as much as I do.
My name is Larry Moshell. I was born in Columbus, Georgia in 1934 during the Great Depression to very young parents and three older brothers. Though God was not part of our family conversations, I wouldn’t trade my family for anyones. So while I may not have lived in a Bible-quoting environment, I was raised by wonderful, loving parents. My father, always encouraging and supportive, never raised his voice in anger. My mother was a tender yet fair and firm disciplinarian who raised her sons to be Southern gentlemen. Together, they greatly influenced my relationships and outlook for the rest of my life.
My three brothers, nine, eleven, and thirteen years older, often my babysitters, were a steady source of love, guidance, and nurturing. When I was 10 years old, my mother took me to audition for a boys’ choir at a large Episcopal church in Jacksonville, Florida. I became a boy soprano soloist, and one of the scriptural lyrics I sang was from Handel’s Messiah:
“Come onto me, all ye who are heavy laden. And I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me. I am meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls.” (Matthew 11:28-29)
My Spring Season
When I sang those words, I was in the spring of my young life, but I had no understanding of a personal relationship with God. I knew about God and I knew He was saying “Come unto me, my burdens are light. Give me your burdens.” But I didn’t truly understand. They were just lyrics to a song I was performing before a crowd. Yet even then, seeds were being planted. However, I did enjoy the praise and acceptance I received for singing in the choir and I was happy that the performances opened opportunities for my parents to enjoy social events and develop friendships.
I was blessed that my father had reached a pinnacle in his business success so I was spoiled financially with more than I ever needed. I prospered in a prestigious private military high school with awards and good grades. Then I foolishly fluffed it all away during my early college years at the University of Florida, majoring more in fraternity life than applying my mind and energy to studying. The spring of youth was a season of both blessings and wasted opportunities.
My Summer Season
Realizing I was wasting my parents’ money, I volunteered to be drafted into the Army in the Summer of 1955. Those seeds that had been unknowingly planted in my spring began to take root. I adjusted well at Fort Jackson in Columbia, South Carolina, made some life-long friends, and found a dancing partner named Jane. We married on July 7, 1957, just a week after my Army discharge.
Our honeymoon was a road trip en route to Gainesville, Florida where I completed my final three semesters of college. Jane worked secretarial jobs while I waited tables, and together we happily managed our meager income. I graduated with honors with a degree in Advertising Design and was blessed to have a wonderful professor as my design teacher. Years later, I passed his wisdom and guidance onto the students I taught part-time for 8 years at the University of South Carolina.
My successful career as either an advertising agency art director or as a freelance commercial artist spanned more than 40 years across Georgia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. Jane and I raised three children: a son and two daughters. Through Jane’s gentle guidance and encouragement, those words I sang as a boy soprano, long-hidden permanently in my mind, started coming into focus. We started attending church and adult Sunday School classes. I finally took God’s yoke upon myself and began learning of His perfect love that brings ultimate “rest unto your souls.” The Holy Spirit invited me to better understand God’s perfect love, mercy, and grace.
While I was still an agency Art Director, my son’s involvement in YMCA soccer in Atlanta eventually led me to organize a youth soccer league in Columbia, South Carolina – a volunteer effort that turned into a 20-year career as Youth Director employee of the YMCA. On the first day of my employment, I offered a devotion at our youth gathering based on the same words I had sung approximately 28 years earlier…
“Come onto me, all ye who are heavy laden. And I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me. I am meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls.”
My Fall Season
The fall season of my life was filled with purpose. I felt privileged with the opportunity to supervise various YMCA programs: soccer, sports clubs, after-school childcare, summer resident and day camps, and a very fruitful father/child program called Y-Indian Guides and Princesses. I became involved in prison and alcoholic rehabilitation ministries, plus I led a church youth group. Jane rejoined the workforce for the first time since my college days to supplement my lower YMCA salary. Together we supported our children through their education and into their own family lives.
I retired from the YMCA in April 2002 and Jane and I enjoyed traveling by car through most of the Eastern and Western states and into Canada. We enjoyed cruises and the beach. We were active members at our church, where I taught an adult Sunday School class, and we enjoyed exercising regularly as members of the YMCA. We were richly blessed.
Jane began to have mobility and fatigue problems while we still lived in the home that we had enjoyed for almost 50 years. We discovered that she qualified for assistance through our long-term health insurance policy, so we sold our house and moved into an assisted living facility in 2017, where we spent her final years side by side. As time passed, her congestive heart failure and a series of hospital procedures took their toll.
Jane died on June 4, 2021, just one month short of our 64th anniversary. Our marriage, rooted in the truths of 1 Corinthians 13, the love chapter, was the pattern that we both tried to follow. The wise and true precepts of the beginning verses were goals within our grasp of joyfully striving to fulfill. As our marriage progressed, those last verses, bearing, believing, hoping, and enduring all things, became the keys to understanding the agape love of God. Proof, indeed, that love never fails.
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails… And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”
1st Corinthians 13:4-8, 13
One of my favorite pastimes at our assisted living home was sitting on the outdoor patio, watching the forest of trees across the way as they transformed their colors with the changing seasons. Inspired, I painted one of the trees and its companions in four separate panels, each representing a different season.
When I asked my family for a title, their suggestions had the common theme of Seasons. However, it was my oldest nephew–a very wise and gentle retired science professor–whose heartfelt response brought deeper meaning to the painting. With tears in his eyes, he reflected on how the panels evoked memories of family, generations, and the passage of life itself.
His words lead me to reflect on the wonderful people and varied experiences that have blessed each season of my life. While, Life Abundant would certainly have been a fitting title. I ultimately came to peace with Passage. The painting, after all, is not just about my life–it represents the journey that we all, as mortals, share.
My Winter Season
A week after Jane’s passing, I moved to an independent living community called Harmony. Living alone was a new experience for me, especially having been surrounded by so many people in all of my varied career and volunteer opportunities. Thankfully, I was still surrounded by my loving family and brothers and sisters in Christ at Harmony and at my church, and I was comforted by the ever-present yoke of Emmanuel. Reflecting on my life, I finally grasped that by grace, He has lovingly, patiently, permitted me to make my way through my passage leaning on my own understanding while, all along, seeking His. I hung a framed print of the prophetic words of Jeremiah 29:11 on my apartment wall, a daily reminder of His promises:
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
As I look back, I have a clearer understanding of the teaching of Jesus in the early verses of John 15. God, the Master Gardener, planted a seed in my heart with a song in my SPRING. He nurtured it with His steadfast patience and grace which carried me through my SUMMER. And as I progressed into my FALL, He brought it to fruition by pruning my branches and blessing me with blossoms. Now, in my WINTER, I find joy and rest unto my soul as I abide in His perfect plan. I added a graphic of a turtle to the Jeremiah 29:11 framed quote as a constant reminder to patiently abide in the Lord moment-by-moment; day-by-day in order to continue to joyfully find rest unto my soul. Isn’t that what Jesus was teaching when He concluded in John 15:11…
“These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made complete.”
In Philippians 4:11-12, the Apostle Paul says he learned to be content in all circumstances. Whether rich or poor or in abundance or having nothing. As I now look in my mirror and reflect, I realize that God has had a plan to prosper my passage all along – for His good pleasure. I am thankfully still in the process of learning to be content in all circumstances, and I rejoice that I have experienced life abundantly.
My Hope and My Future
J.I. Packer’s insightful book, Finishing Our Course with Joy: Guidance from God for Engaging with Our Aging, speaks directly to ole’ folks like me. In the fourth and final chapter titled, We Look Forward, Packer begins with this profound statement: “We humans are hopers by nature. Hope motivates, energizes, and drives us. It is natural for us to look ahead and long for any good things that we foresee. That is how God made us. It was always in His plan that we, his embodied rational creatures, should live our lives in this world looking forward to, and preparing for, something even better than we have known already.”
This photo is a selfie I took in Dec. 2021 while enjoying a peaceful week at the beach. I was looking forward to the future then, and I’m still looking forward to it with great anticipation now. Dr. Packer is right on target! We are all “hopers”. Praise the Lord!
I pray you find God’s GRACE, JOY, and REST unto your soul as you journey through your own PASSAGE!
You are LOVED,
Larry Moshell Sr.
Larry Moshell Sr.
Larry was born in Columbus Georgia and currently resides in South Carolina. He was an advertising designer, YMCA youth director, and church volunteer. He is an artist who enjoys painting many things, especially nature.
2 thoughts on “Passage”
Thank you so very much for sharing your heartfelt story! It helped me navigate my current season and also realize that God has been ever present and faithful throughout my life! What a blessing you are Larry!
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