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Drunk on Beauty

Drunk on Beauty

by | Aug 2, 2023 | Featured, Headlines | 0 comments

It was early in the afternoon, my body was tired, and I was feeling dizzy. My body was desperate to recover all the water and electrolytes it lost during the morning hike through the Amazon jungle. I had been invited on this mission trip to Colombia, and our assignment was to offer personal prayer and encouragement to the ministry staff stationed at the base in Leticia, a city in the southern tip of the country. While there, we also visited the staff in El Puente, a sister base located in the Amazon jungle. Hiking to El Puente was quite an adventure, but what I remember the most is the heat. The Amazon was hot and humid even by the standards of the Puerto Rican sister writing this blog! On our way back to the boat that would transport us to Leticia via the Amazon River, I could feel my body crashing, desperate for even one drop of water. 

I wonder if that desperate sensation, that frantic desire that makes every cell in one’s body scream of thirst and yearn for water, resembles what David’s poetry conveys in Psalm 63.

 

O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you;
My flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. 

Psalm 63: 1


David was desperate, not for water, but for God! According to its title, this psalm reflects a moment in David’s life when he was in the wilderness of Judah, running from either Saul or his own son Absalom. In the arid desert, where water is hard to come by, David must have experienced extreme physical thirst. He was well acquainted with desperation, and allowed his bodily experience to inform his desire and pursuit of God. Isn’t it interesting how our moments of deepest need often point us to the only One who can satisfy it? 

After our hike through the Amazon, another team member brought me a much-coveted bottle of water and a pack of electrolytes. Every cell in my body screamed for joy! But if someone had brought water to David, he would have remained desperate and thirsty because what he wanted (and needed) was not only to quench his physical thirst, but the steadfast love of God, which is “better than life” (Psalm 63:3). As James M. Hamilton, Jr. terms it in his commentary, Psalms, he wanted to be completely “high on God” and wholly satisfied in him. When was the last time we were that desperate? When was the last time we desired God with such intensity and yearning that we sought him earnestly? If the answer to these questions is “never” or “a long time ago,” our most urgent question ought to be why, why are we not desperate for God? Why is our spiritual life stale and stagnant? Before we can answer these questions, we must read further down in David’s poem.

 

So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary,
beholding your power and glory.

Psalm 63:2

 

Gaze on God and drink Beauty

David’s intense thirst and desire for God leads him to stare at God. Other translations render the Hebrew as “So I gaze on you…” which better reflects David’s intent on fixing his attention on God because he is the only remedy for his thirst. This language is reminiscent of another one of David’s psalms, where he communicates his one desire.

 

One thing have I asked of the LORD,
that will I seek after:
that I may dwell in the house of the LORD
all the days of my life,
to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD
and to inquire in his temple.

Psalm 27:4

 

In contemporary vernacular, David’s Gatorade was to feast on the beauty of God. He gazed upon God in the sanctuary, where his presence dwells, in order to see what God does (his power) and who he is (his glory). No wonder David’s immediate response was to worship the object of his gaze! He had no choice. He was contemplating the very source of beauty, the One who is all perfection and excellence. How could he keep quiet? He was drunk with the steadfast love of God, which according to David’s bold claim, is better than life. David was in the desert, surrounded by miles and miles of beige and brown shades, but his spiritual, contemplative life was anything but dull. In David’s mind, there was nothing better than feasting on the beauty of God. In other words, God’s beauty was David’s chief preoccupation. 

Now, let us return to our initial question, why are we not desperate for God? Why is it that some of our spiritual lives are stale and stagnant? Perhaps, the reason why reading our Bibles feels like dragging heavy luggage rather than energetic delight is because we have found something to stare at in our screens and electronic devices that is seemingly more beautiful than God. Perhaps, the reason why prayer feels as dull as talking to a telemarketer rather than talking to a dear friend is because we have exchanged the privilege of basking in the beauty of God for the hurried and frantic journey to wealth, to “success,” to power, to visibility, to…whatever. 

Certainly there are seasons in our Christian discipleship when our relationship with God feels dry and distant. But there is an important distinction between such seasons and the contemporary, distracted, and beautyless journey some of us are on. Whereas the former is characterized by awareness and a longing for things to change, the latter is marked by ignorant “bliss,” distraction, and complacency. The former draws us closer to God, but the latter keeps us at arms length from the One who is Beauty itself. 

In this psalm, I hear both a word of admonition and an invitation. David’s desperation for God and our lack thereof confronts us with the reality that many of us have deemed other things better and more beautiful than the steadfast love of God. We are walking around like Christian zombies, numbed by wealth and dulled by constant scrolling up and down the screens, unaware of our dead walking. But, there is good news! Things do not have to be this way. David invites us to get drunk on Beauty by gazing on God, by looking intently upon his awesome deeds and attributes. 

Friends, the compelling and tempting pictures we see in our computer screens, tablets, and phones have nothing on the One who sits on his throne in heaven surrounded by brilliant light, listening to the unceasing worship of the heavenly creatures who cry Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is, and is to come (Revelation 4:8). Michelangelo could never paint anything remotely close to God’s beauty, and the cleverest of song writers will always be without sufficient words to describe him. He is like jasper and ruby (Revelation 4:3), wholly other and yet so near to us. Yes! The preacher’s pen will never run out of material! Let us hear David’s invitation to get drunk on Beauty, for only in him will our deepest longings be satisfied.    

 

My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food,
And my mouth will praise you with joyful lips,

Psalm 63:5

 

Meditate on God’s beauty 

By now you may be thinking, “Ok Nydiaris, I get it. I ought to stare at God.” But how does one do that? How does one gaze on one whom we cannot see? David was clear on his method; he meditated on God. 

 

… when I remember you upon my bed,
And meditate on you in the watches of the night…

Psalm 63:6

 

Meditating is remembering and dwelling on what God has said in his word. Lean into the beauty displayed on page after page, chew on his words, read it again, think on it, journal about it, put a Post-it note on your desk, tell Siri to read it to you and Alexa to repeat it, and… PRAY God’s words back to him. If we make this a habit, we will be held captive by his beauty, completely enthralled by his excellence, alive to him and his work in the world. Let us make the beauty of God and his presence our chief preoccupation, everything else can wait, for his faithful love is better than life.

 

Let the beauty of God ground you

Gazing at God and saturating ourselves in his beauty fills us with confidence. Note David’s assurance in God’s deliverance in verses 8-11.

 

“My soul clings to you;
Your right hand upholds me.
But those who seek to destroy my life
Shall go down into the depths of the earth;
They shall be given over to the power of the sword;
They shall be a portion for jackals.
But the king shall rejoice in God;
All who swear by him shall exult,
For the mouths of liars will be stopped. 

Psalm 63:8-11

 

Hamilton’s commentary notes that David’s gazing and meditating filled him with confidence because the contemplation of God’s beauty reveals his character and power. He knew that as he fiercely clung to God, the strong arm of the Lord would sustain him. He knew that the God he contemplated was all powerful and kind, zealous for his glory and defender of the lowly. He knew that what God had done for his ancestors in the past, he could do again. Thus, even in the midst of the desert while being hunted down by his enemies, David could confidently declare that “those who seek to destroy my life shall go down to the depths of the earth.” His confidence flowed from God’s beauty, not arrogant self-reliance; he was grounded in the truth that gazing at God’s beauty had planted and rooted in the depths of his soul. 

Unless we make it a priority to be God-gazers and recover a sense of the excellence and goodness of God’s love above everything else, we will be like chaff in the wind, without roots that hold us steady in the hurricane force winds of culture and the trials that followers of Jesus will surely face. Grounding ourselves on Beauty protects us from questioning God’s care and goodness every time a difficult situation arises. The beauty of God, deeply rooted in our hearts, is a scaffold that protects us from falling apart every time we lose a material possession, watch the market crash, or the car breaks down, because we know that the object of our gaze holds the universe (and us) in the palm of his hand. So, let us drink deeply from the beauty of God, starting with prayer. 

 

Let us pray…

Lord,

We confess we have been distracted, deceived into thinking that other things are better and more beautiful than you. Forgive us for letting our imaginations be held captive by worldly narratives of “beauty” and success. Resuscitate us with your beauty oh Lord! Breath life back into these dry bones and awaken our souls to your love, for it is better than life itself. Lord, let that truth be tattooed on our hearts and let us be satisfied in your faithful love, so that we are spoiled for lesser things. Stir our spirits, make us desperate with longing for you, move us to read your word with delight and to pray with fervency. Make your beauty our chief preoccupation. Earnestly we seek you! Hear our cries of thirst. Amen.   

Three Things I Learned from Tim Keller

Three Things I Learned from Tim Keller

by | Jun 28, 2023 | Featured, Headlines | 1 comment

The first time I heard Tim’s voice was on a pair of cheap earbuds in a noisy Caribou Coffee in Deerfield, Illinois. I was a first-year seminary student and was there studying with some friends. At some point, I took a break from studying and that’s when my friend Josh waved me over to his table. “You ever heard of Tim Keller?” he asked. “No,” I replied. He all but forced me to sit down and put his cheap, and not super-clean, earbuds in my ears. “You’ve got to listen to a few minutes of this sermon!” So after wiping off the earbuds, I put them in and started listening. To be honest, I don’t remember what sermon it was or what it was about. Part of me was just thinking: How long do I have to listen before I can take this guy’s earbuds out of my ears? What struck me in that moment was Tim’s thoughtfulness and winsomeness. 

I didn’t know it then but that borrowed-earbud moment introduced me to someone who would profoundly shape who I would become as a pastor and preacher. Apart from Tom Nelson, our Senior Pastor at Christ Community who I have known for over 20 years, no one has more profoundly influenced my pastoral ministry and particularly my preaching, than Tim Keller.

Tim died on May 19, 2023 after a battle with pancreatic cancer. In appreciation for him and his impact on me and so many others, I want to share three things Tim taught me through his writing, preaching, and teaching.

 

The Gospel: The A-Z not just the ABCs

First, Tim taught me that the gospel is not just the ABCs of the Christian life. It is the A-Z. He taught me that we never get beyond the gospel, we only go deeper into it. He writes in his book, Center Church: Doing Balanced, Gospel-Centered Ministry in Your City:

The gospel is not just the ABCs but the A to Z of the Christian life. It is inaccurate to think the gospel is what saves non-Christians, and then Christians mature by trying hard to live according to biblical principles. It is more accurate to say that we are saved by believing the gospel, and then we are transformed in every part of our minds, hearts, and lives by believing the gospel more and more deeply as life goes on.  

The work of discipleship and spiritual formation is engaging practices, habits, and routines that remind us of, and shape us with, the gospel in every facet of life. 

 

The City: An opportunity not just an obstacle

Second, Tim opened my eyes to the reality that city centers are not obstacles to gospel ministry. They are incredible opportunities for gospel influence. Growing up in a suburb of St. Louis during the 1980s and 90s, I typically thought of “downtown” or the “city center” primarily as a place that was difficult to navigate as well as potentially physically dangerous and spiritually detrimental.

In fact, if you had told me as a high school student that my first permanent pastoral position after seminary would be leading an effort to plant a church campus in downtown Kansas City, I wouldn’t have believed you.

But Tim’s teaching on the city captured my imagination and transformed my affections. In my beat-up, well-worn, spiral-bound copy of the Church Planter Manual from the Redeemer Church Planter Center, Tim writes:

Because of the power of the city, it is the chief target of the forces of darkness, because that which wins the city sets the course of human life, society and culture. …if the Christian church wants to really change the country and culture, it must go into the cities themselves, and not just into the suburbs or even the exurbs. Three kinds of persons live there who exert tremendous influence on our society.… They are: the elites who control the culture and who are becoming increasingly secularized; the masses of new immigrants who move out in the mainstream of society over the next 30 years; the poor, whose dilemmas are deepening rapidly and affecting the whole country. 

This, along with Tim’s compelling teaching on Jeremiah 29 as a vision for Christians seeking the flourishing of the city, transformed not only how I thought and felt about city centers but gave me a picture of what sort of church was possible in the city. 

 

The Church: Evangelism not just formation

Third, Tim showed me a “third way” between “seeker-sensitive” church services and “believer-focused” worship gatherings. Tim challenged church leaders to always speak and act as if non-believers were in the room. The goal isn’t to make the service comfortable for those who don’t yet believe, but rather to make it comprehensible for those who don’t believe. He wrote in Center Church:

Contrary to popular belief, our purpose is not to make the nonbeliever “comfortable.”…Our aim is to be intelligible to them…. Seek to worship and preach in the vernacular. It is impossible to overstate how insular and subcultural our preaching can become. We often make statements that are persuasive and compelling to us, but they are based on all sorts of premises that a secular person does not hold. …So we must intentionally seek to avoid unnecessary theological or evangelical jargon, carefully explaining the basic theological concepts behind confession of sin, praise, thanksgiving, and so on. In your preaching, always be willing to address the questions that the nonbelieving heart will ask. Speak respectfully and sympathetically to people who have difficulty with Christianity.  …Listen to everything that is said in the worship service with the ears of someone who has doubts or struggles with belief. 

Tim didn’t just write about this as an ideal. He lived it out in every sermon he preached. Through his preaching, I learned from Tim that there is a way to engage people who are skeptical about Christianity while continuing to encourage and equip those who are followers of Jesus.

 

Conclusion

When I heard the news he had died, tears welled up in my eyes. I knew that he was sick. I knew that he would die soon. But I was still surprised by the emotional impact on me when he actually died. While talking to one of my best friends about the impact that Tim’s had on us, he paused and reflected that there are thousands of other people across the country and around the world who are having similar conversations about Tim’s impact. I’m deeply grateful to Jesus for the gift of Tim Keller. I miss him already. Thank you for all you taught me, Tim.

The Other Half of Discipleship | Why We Learn Life-on-Life

The Other Half of Discipleship | Why We Learn Life-on-Life

by | May 17, 2023 | Featured, Headlines | 0 comments

The people we spend time with profoundly shape us. I was reminded of this truth recently at a small gathering of seasoned Christian leaders, focused on forming flourishing pastoral leadership.

Seated next to me was a surgeon who had spent many years training physicians in a prominent teaching hospital. We all listened with rapt attention as he made the compelling case that while the classroom of medical school was vitally important, it was inadequate to give the wisdom, skill, and competency needed for surgery. What was absolutely essential was lots of time at the scrub sink.

He went on to describe the process of scrubbing up for a surgery alongside more inexperienced surgeons. At the scrub sink, they talked through what the surgery would involve and what they might anticipate. Leaving the scrub sink, they rolled up their sleeves and did the surgery together. Afterward, as the team cleaned up back at the scrub sink, the lead surgeon would debrief with the rest what had taken place and what they learned during that particular surgery. Then they would go to the break room for some refreshments and more conversation.

The surgeon went on to say that in preparing a new generation of surgeons, extended times at the scrub sink were not optional. They were essential. In a similar way, he advocated for more intentional scrub-sink discipleship in the church at all levels, including in the preparation and formation of pastoral leadership.

 

Scrub-Sink Discipleship

The scrub sink is a helpful metaphor for more intentional and transformative discipleship and church-leadership preparation. For it is in a hands-on, life-on-life scrub-sink experience where needed tacit knowledge is transferred and obtained.

What is tacit knowledge? It can be defined many ways, but the basic idea is that tacit knowledge is the kind of learning gained through personal experience and relational connection. Tacit knowledge is implicit knowledge. It is a kind of knowing that goes beyond mere words. Learning to ride a bike, for example, requires a good deal of tacit knowledge. To gain the knowledge and skill necessary to ride a bike, a bike-riding manual may be helpful, but it is far from sufficient. We need to actually get on the bike, and in most cases, we need someone else there who knows how to ride a bike to guide us and cheer us on as we learn.

The twentieth-century philosopher Michael Polanyi (1891–1976) thought deeply about the important dimension of tacit knowledge. In his masterpiece work, Personal Knowledge, he writes, “By watching the master and emulating his efforts in the presence of his example, the apprentice unconsciously picks up the rules of the art, including those which are not explicitly known to the master himself” (53).

“Shared experience is the heartbeat of the tacit dimension.”

Polanyi realized that while the classroom and curricula are effective conduits of propositional knowledge, they are limited when it comes to gaining tacit knowledge. The tacit dimension of knowing transcends words and flows from personal relationships in the context of real-life togetherness and experience. Shared experience is the heartbeat of the tacit dimension.

 

Jesus and the Tacit Dimension

When we reflect on Jesus and his discipleship methods, we observe a strong tacit dimension. Jesus invited his inner circle of disciples to what could be described as a three-year scrub-sink experience. Yes, they heard him preach and teach great propositional truths, but they also lived daily life with him, observing his sinless life, his miracles, his skills, his wisdom, and his spiritual practices.

Following the resurrection, Jerusalem’s religious aristocracy were in awe of Jesus’s disciples’ brilliance and boldness. “Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus” (Acts 4:13). How do we account for the astonishing transformation of Peter and John? Clearly, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost emboldened them, but I also believe the disciples’ three-year life-on-life experience with Jesus, where a much more tacit knowledge was transferred and obtained, is a large contributing factor. Don’t minimize the profound transformation that occurred in the life of Jesus’s closest disciples as a result of their personal experience with him.

Through the words of the religious aristocracy, Luke includes the pregnant sentence “and they recognized they had been with Jesus.” Is this mere historical observation to further the Acts narrative, or does it also give us something of pedagogical importance as we reflect on discipleship?

 

Taking Jesus’s Yoke

In our discipleship and church-leadership development, we would be wise to emulate Jesus’s life-on-life apprenticeship model, so rich in tacit knowledge. Jesus invites all who would follow him into his highly relational, highly transformative yoke of apprenticeship: “Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke on you, and learn from me, for I am gently and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matthew 11:28–29). In this great invitation from Jesus, he calls all who would follow him to take his yoke of apprenticeship. Entering his yoke in obedience and submission, we encounter a highly relational apprenticeship where we learn how to live as Jesus might if he were in our place.

“The tacit dimension of discipleship embraces both the precepts and the practices of Jesus.”

The tacit dimension of discipleship embraces both the precepts and the practices of Jesus. In grace, over time, and by the power of the Holy Spirit, apprentices of Jesus increasingly are formed into greater Christlikeness. Jesus put it this way: “A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone fully trained will be like his teacher” (Luke 6:40).

Emulating Jesus, the early church adopted an apprenticeship model of discipleship that was highly relational, rich in tacit-knowledge transfer, and embedded in the local-church community. Writing to his protégé Timothy, who was serving in a pastoral role in Ephesus, Paul gives this grace-filled instruction: “My child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also” (2 Timothy 2:1–2). While entrusting sound doctrine to others has a strong propositional element, don’t miss the highly relational environment of a vibrant local church and discipleship. Paul’s description seems a lot like scrub-sink discipleship. Transforming discipleship is both taught and caught.

 

Churches as Teaching Hospitals

What might a more intentional, tacit-rich dimension of discipleship mean for the local church? While our ecclesial context shapes how we answer this question, let me suggest a couple of thoughts. As good as classrooms and discipleship curricula can be, perhaps more emphasis needs to be placed on the importance of life-on-life community lived out in small groups over longer durations. This also could include a greater emphasis on multigenerational mentoring.

More than that, pastors and church leaders would be wise to focus discipleship efforts where congregants spend the majority of time throughout the week: the paid and unpaid workplace. Both pastoral care and pastoral-discipleship efforts in the church where I serve include regular workplace visits. These visits deepen relationships and become rich in the tacit dimension of discipleship and spiritual formation.

What might a more intentional, tacit-rich dimension mean for preparation of church leaders? While I am a strong proponent of the classroom and seminary, I believe we need to be more intentional to create learning environments outside the classroom that offer opportunities for obtaining and transferring tacit knowledge.

One of the most effective ways to create these environments is to establish ongoing pastoral residencies in our local churches. After completing seminary training, inexperienced pastors ideally would have a two-year immersion in a healthy local church where they learn, from more experienced pastors, the spiritual formation, proper self-care, and pastoral skills that will serve them well for a lifetime of ministry. In a sense, the church becomes a teaching hospital, where inexperienced pastors get time at the scrub sink.

 

*Reposted with permission from desiringgod.com

Vocational Discipleship in a Bulletproof Vest

Vocational Discipleship in a Bulletproof Vest

by | Oct 27, 2021 | Featured, Headlines | 3 comments

At least once a month I do something I never imagined myself doing as a pastor: I put on a bulletproof vest. The vest is part of the uniform I wear as a chaplain for the Kansas City Missouri Police Department (KCPD). 

As a local church pastor, one of my primary responsibilities is to equip the people of God for “works of service”—and for most people the place where they do the majority of their serving is in their workplace, through their occupation. 

So when the Kansas City Missouri Police Department approached me about joining their chaplain team, I eagerly accepted the role. 

First, it was an incredible opportunity to extend the local church’s mission of vocational discipleship into a dangerous, difficult, and draining vocational field. Second, because as the child of a police officer—my dad served as an officer for 25 years — I’ve experienced firsthand the joys and challenges that come from being part of a law enforcement family.  

So what does a police chaplaincy involve? That was a question I asked a lot during the extended background check and vetting process that took place before I was officially “sworn in” and joined the team in November of 2018. What I’ve learned serving in this role is that there are three main aspects. 

First, chaplains serve in a ceremonial role—performing invocations (prayers) at formal department events and meetings (e.g., police academy graduations, board of police commissioners meetings, award ceremonies). 

Second, chaplains are available to serve officers for weddings, funerals, and pastoral care in times of need. 

Third, chaplains are a faithful presence with the officers as they do their work—cue the bulletproof vest. This faithful, persistent presence is the heart of the chaplain role and where most of the time is spent. During regular ride-alongs with KCPD officers, I get the chance to hear their stories, see what they see, and experience firsthand the realities of law enforcement work.

I’ve been on ride-alongs where hardly a single call came in, and on others when the radio didn’t stop the whole time, and the officers went from missing person calls to liquor store brawls to domestic violence situations. 

But it’s the moments in between calls— talking while patrolling a lonely street or pausing for a quick bite to eat—where the real work of friendship, listening, care, and vocational discipleship occur. 

In an interview Matt Rusten, the executive director of Made to Flourish did with David Kinnaman, president of Barna Research Group, David explained “vocational discipleship” like this:

Vocational discipleship is a means of helping people understand what they’re called to do, made to do. A sense of how their work matters….[It] is the process by which we would help someone understand they are made in the image of God to do things in the world…to bring God glory and to do good, and to push back the broken parts of creation in doing your work and doing it well.

In every interaction with a member of KCPD, that is the goal I’m working toward—helping them to have a deeper understanding of what they are made to do and how their work is pushing back the broken parts of creation as they accomplish their work well. 

So whether it’s in the pulpit on Sunday morning or in a patrol car on Monday night, vocational discipleship is at the heart of my role as local church pastor.

Why We Need the Visual Arts in Our Formation

Why We Need the Visual Arts in Our Formation

by | Aug 25, 2021 | Featured, Gallery, Headlines | 0 comments

What can get 50 men and women from across the metro to come together midweek for three hours after working all day? Two words: Ecclesiastes and art. 

Let me explain. 

Ecclesiastes Came to Life

On Wednesday, August 11, some 50 people came together to explore the complex themes of the book of Ecclesiastes through the lens of the art exhibit, Geheimnis, created by our Four Chapter Gallery curator, Kelly Kruse. 

During the time together, we feasted on food and artwork. Kelly spent time teaching Ecclesiastes and sharing her creative process, and then we engaged with her work through small and large group discussions. 

Equipped with a journal, each person was invited to process the artwork through guided questions corresponding to the themes of Ecclesiastes and their visual representation in Kelly’s work. The questions invited us to contemplate our mortality, compare texts within Scripture, and share our experiences of her work. The whole night was a deeply personal experience with the biblical text and ideas of Ecclesiastes illuminated in vibrant color. 

Art as a Catalyst

While this isn’t the first time the arts have been a catalyst in my faith, it highlighted afresh three ways the visual arts can be a catalyst for spiritual formation within the church.  

  1. The visual arts invite stillness. 

We can listen to our podcasts twice as fast. Our highway speed limits are merely suggestions often ignored. New movies are available on-demand for at-home release. Everything is fast, immediate, and hurried. This may sound cliché, but this fact seems even more clear now: we’re addicted to hurrying. It’s astounding how even a global shutdown seems to have been more like a bump in the road rather than a change in pace. This state of affairs is worrisome because we cannot become like Jesus in a hurry. 

What is helpful about good art is that it invites stillness. Artwork invites you to stop in your tracks, stay awhile, and even stare. Everything slows down. Some studies show that engaging in particular kinds of art can even decrease stress and lower blood pressure. 

We need more spaces of stillness if the Spirit is to do the slow deep work of forming us into Christlikeness. The visual arts can help. 

  1. The visual arts demand contemplation.

So often our faith formation paradigms revolve around getting information merely to regurgitate it later. While that is helpful at certain stages of development (especially catechesis for children), it is not sufficient for spiritual maturity. Otherwise, when the questions change due to the changing pressure points of culture, we will find ourselves ill-equipped to converse thoughtfully with our neighbors.

In the stillness of engaging visual art, we are able to be present. We are able to pay attention to one thing instead of being distracted by a thousand things. We can even pay attention to what we’re paying attention to. We can do more than ask “what am I noticing?” We may even lean into asking “why?” This kind of critical thinking in contemplation is a skill in itself to help in our journey of growth.

The visual arts demand contemplation. You cannot merely memorize the answer. You must marinate in the images, the colors, the textures, and shapes. It can be frustrating in its own right when all you want is to “know what it means” so you can move on. But art doesn’t want you to move on. Art invites you to experience what it means so you can move in.

This practice shapes us into the kind of people who can also engage the Scriptures better. If we merely come to the text looking for a proof text (a quick answer to a big problem), we may misrepresent what God is saying in that particular text. Hurried minds often lead to mindless hurry. Instead, Scripture invites us to study and meditate allowing the Spirit of God to illuminate God’s timeless truth in our specific lives. God doesn’t want us to move on but to move in with Him over time. 

We need more spaces that demand we contemplate rather than just consume. The visual arts demand contemplation.

  1. The visual arts extend the joy of discovery. 

As we sit in stillness and contemplate the work before us, over time we are extended the joy of discovery. Like an archeologist carefully digging for weeks on end, when the discovery is revealed, the joy is that much sweeter. So too with the visual arts and our study of Scripture! 

On that August night, I watched as people shared their experience of the themes of Ecclesiastes through the artwork with tears in their eyes. I heard exclamations of wonder as people sat in one particular work until it came alive to their imaginations. As Christians of various vocations have engaged with this art show throughout the summer, I have heard story after story of truly fascinating experiences that will stick with me for a lifetime. The joy of discovery after the contemplation was palpable and personal.  

Still Growing

Now, I say all this as a pastor. I was taught to love the Word of God, to teach with clarity, to communicate for change in the listener. I still believe all that is true. Simultaneously I’m growing in my experiential understanding that the arts are crucial to our discipleship today. In a world that may distrust what’s true, be disgusted by the good, often there is still a hunger for the beautiful. 

Even when not explicitly religious in themes – the visual arts are a catalyst for the kinds of rhythms necessary for our growth in Christ. When the visual arts are married to biblical ideas or even explicit texts and given intentional structure for conversation, it is a dynamic experience that shapes while it informs. 

How You Can Engage

If you want to experience this in your formation, here are three ways to engage.

1) Engage the artwork around you. It’s honestly astounding how much artwork is in our city. As you happen upon a local artist’s work, stop and stay. If you have other items on your list to do, then set your alarm for five minutes. Sit in the stillness. Contemplate and see what you discover! 

2) Join us at the Four Chapter Gallery. We would love to have you join us on any of our First Fridays, or better yet, come for one of our open gallery hours throughout the month. We often seek to create space for stillness so that you can contemplate the work outside of the activity of First Friday. 

3) Gather with others who want to do the same. If you want to go even further, curator Kelly Kruse is gathering a group of artists to meet twice a month starting in September to explore themes of art and faith. You can join the mailing list as well as communicate your desire to join in at [email protected]. 

Our creative God is working. He’s working through His Word expressed and illuminated in the arts. Come and see for yourself.  

Church for Monday

Church for Monday

by | Jan 2, 2019 | Featured, Headlines, sermon series | 0 comments

“Thank God it’s Friday!”

These words capture a common cultural sentiment that the life we long to live is found not in the regular work rhythms of the weekday, but in the recreational rhythms of the weekend.

But what if this view of the good life is deeply impoverished? What if the truly good life is not merely experienced in the recreational opportunities of the weekend, but also experienced in the paid and non-paid work we do each and every weekday? What if we truly woke up each Monday morning and with a joyful heart declared, “Thank God it’s Monday!”?

What if the truly good life is…experienced in the paid and non-paid work we do each and every weekday?

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In the last several years, our church family has been exploring a more theologically robust understanding of how the gospel speaks into every nook and cranny of life. While our disciple-making mission has not changed, we have been growing in our understanding how apprenticeship with Jesus transforms our everyday life at home, at school, and at work. What we do on Monday is what we do with most of life.

Even though we continue to place a strong emphasis on creating meaningful and beautiful Sunday gatherings and fostering small group community, we are giving more attention to how we can better equip our growing multisite church family for life on Monday.

But what does being a “church for Monday” really mean?

In our series entitled “Church for Monday,” we press into this question. This eight-week exploration of whole-life discipleship will be highlighting seven marks of a growing disciple of Jesus. We will be learning more of what it means to be a Spirit-empowered apprentice who lives fully into the intimate and integral life Jesus offers us each and every day.

It is our hope that we will increasingly see our callings as a primary way we worship, are spiritually formed into Christlikeness, live out and proclaim the gospel, and further the common good of all fellow image-bearers of God. It is my heartfelt prayer that as apprentices of Jesus each one of us will roll out of bed on Monday mornings with joyful expectation and praise-filled lips declaring,”Thank God it’s Monday!”