Living Works of Art

Few days are as perfect as the early days of fall in eastern Oklahoma and western Arkansas. The extreme heat has subsided, replaced by a cool, fresh breeze. It makes for what I like to call ‘porch-sitting’ evenings. How well I remember sitting on my grandparents’ front porch in my hometown. Their little brown house with the bright orange door had two wooden swings that hung facing one another across a wide concrete platform. I would sit opposite the two of them, talking about important things and nothing all at once. The conversation would shift from how I was doing to ‘do you know who so and so is and that they’re related to such and such’.

The sweet sound of wind chimes gently striking against one another was occasionally interrupted by the sharp chirp of a bird in a nearby tree, a passing car, or the annoying bark of a dog to which my grandpa replied that he should go get his gun (one of many you can be sure). Of course the only real threat he posed was not to the dog but to everyone else in the vicinity of the crying canine considering my grandpa was legally blind. How I miss that stubborn, funny old man and his outspoken and gentle at the same time wife whose love was as close to Christ's as I've ever experienced.

Looking back, those are the memorable moments I love most; being surrounded by loved ones while seeing the simple sights and hearing the slight sounds of God’s magnificent creation in the background. As one of our teaching pastors recently asked, ‘Who but God could come up with that?’ I firmly believe that all creativity comes from God himself; after all, He is the Creator of everything! Yes, man can take and pervert His perfection, but we cannot create anything that the mind of God has not already conceived. All of our art is merely a reflection of what has already been done.

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. – Ecclesiastes 1:9

Note the wording there: nothing new under the sun. What about from above? God has promised us a new heaven and new earth. His creative juices haven’t stopped flowing. Perhaps one day we will get to see the Master Artist at work. The Great Commission calls us to go into ‘all the world’ teaching and preaching the gospel. Yet, Paul writes in Romans that even without having heard the story of salvation, man cannot be unaware of God’s existence.

For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. – Romans 1:20

Creation itself tells the story of God. His art is alive. Forget about the splashes of paint and charcoal markings on a canvas; forget about the sculptures carved from marble; forget about the actors on a stage attempting to portray something He has already conveyed. We are part of His art. We have a real role to play. Why waste our time worshiping things that don’t and won’t make a difference in eternity?

"Of what value is an idol, since a man has carved it? Or an image that teaches lies? For he who makes it trusts in his own creation; he makes idols that cannot speak. – Habakkuk 2:18

Since a man has carved it… What makes us think we’re so great? Pride has prejudiced us against the beautiful reality that unless we create to reflect His glory, then our work is in vain and our art has no value.