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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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!”?
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!”
