Blog #009 - On Being Creative

Created in the image of the creative God, humankind also creates. This creativity oozes through life in many ways, sometimes finding its expression through the arts. There are some who are especially gifted in this realm of artistic expression and have an amazing ability to create art that powerfully touches deep emotions.

What is the value of artistic expression? Art enlightens and deepens our understanding of life. This artistic expression can also soften our hearts, enabling us to understand and embrace truth about God through image, sound, or movement.

Both of us have a passion to encourage artistically gifted individuals. We want to nurture the creative expression placed within them by God, that through them a wider ministry might take place within the hearts and minds of those who gather to worship the triune God of the Bible.

To say it again, our passion is to pastor and offer support to artistically gifted believers, nurturing them to express their understanding of God and truth in ways that encourage and strengthen the Body of Christ.

There is a difference between embracing God’s giftedness and using spiritual sounding words to attribute divine importance to one’s artistic expression.

Take, for example the phrase, “God gave me this song.” Did he really? Maybe in his sovereign running of the universe he let you view a beautiful sunset that became the subject of your latest poem. Maybe he opened your eyes to see it in a fresh way, but you wrote the words, you chose the notes that made the melody.

Creating is a powerful, emotional, and vulnerable experience. It is tempting to elevate the importance of what you have created by saying, “God gave this to me.” It’s a kind of false humility.

Let’s celebrate the artistic expression within our faith community. But, please, be honest and humbly take the credit for what you have created. Don’t attribute more to it than this.

God will do the work He needs to in the hearts of those who hear and see it.