When Free State artist Loezytha Maritz saw a photograph of three men exuberantly embracing one another she “immediately knew” she wanted to paint it as her contribution to a prophetic art exhibition at an upcoming Time2Rise event outside Bloemfontein.
“I always want to capture emotion in my paintings. I want to give people hope and when I can capture an emotion in a painting it makes it much easier for people to relate to it. And that photo had so much joy on it,” she said of the photo that evangelist Johnny Louw showed her at a women’s event in Bethlehem where he was the guest speaker.
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With Johnny’s permission, she did the painting but it was not ready in time for the Time2Rise event over the first weekend of October. “But it was really a privilege for me painting that incredible photo.” As she usually does, she added small touches to the painting as led by the Holy Spirit — in this case painting the words “unity” and “Time 2 Arise” on two watch faces.
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“So for me, the meaning of the painting is about brothers in Christ that arise with joy because the glory of the Lord has risen upon them. And so they stand together in unity,” she said.
Johnny, who also happened to be one of the speakers at the Time2Rise weekend gathering told Gateway News the story behind the photo that inspired the prophetic painting.
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He said that after he was invited to speak at the Jeffreys Bay Mighty Men Conference the Lord told him to invite his cousin Pieter Louw from Namaqualand who he had led to the Lord in 2008. And when Jopie Fourie, the owner of a big Free State chicken farm where Johnny works and ministers heard of this, he said he was coming too. At that time Pieter and Jopie, who Johnny has been a mentor and friend to since 2007, had not met but both of them had heard a lot about the other from Johnny. The photograph that Loezytha painted was of a moment at the Mighty Men Conference when he was praying on his knees after walking off the stage “and these two brothers just grabbed me and in that moment the photo was taken”.
He said the photo captures the heart of his ministry, which is “to gather the brothers”.
He sent Gateway News the following detailed explanation of the symbolic and prophetic elements the artist saw in the painting:
Johnny explained that the “relay stick” mentioned in the summary above is a baton that farmer-evangelist Angus Buchan handed to him in 2009, saying: “Johnny run with this baton. And that baton is to bring unity in Christ — to spread he goodness of God and to gather the family of Christ.”
The painting is now hanging in Johnny’s sitting room at his home in Cape Town, after Loezytha gave it to him saying the Lord had placed it on her heart to do so.
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