Fri, Mar 14
It’s becoming too regular of an occasion when my chin buries into my chest, digging back and forth testing the strength of my sternum. If I could just hide. From the embarrassment. I’m ashamed. Ashamed of the priority (or lack of priority) the church has placed on creativity. Art. Design. Ashamed that we no longer strive for excellence in the areas that are often people’s first contact with the church. When did this happen? How did this happen? At what point during this world’s existence, from the creation of man, the fashioning of the blue skies with lush clouds, the formation of sharp mountains piercing the heavens until now, March, 14 2008, did we as divinely created people lose our God given desire for beauty. I really do believe that every human given the breath of life was made as an original. Unique. Capable of being creative and artistic, able to recognize beauty and too distinguish the opposite, ugliness. Are we truly looking over our work, our sermon series graphics, our bulletins, our church websites and “seeing it as good?” Some churches get it, some don’t. Some people get it, some don’t. I really don’t know where this passion came from or why my stomach cringes every time I see an announcement slide during the Sunday announcements that was designed in PowerPoint or a bulletin designed by the church secretary. I have attended many churches across the country where this is reality. The easy answer that most people would conclude too is that I am “creative.” I have an “eye” for it. Maybe because I graduated with a Fine Arts degree or I work as a designer in the creative industry. Or … Yeah. Surface level, those seem like legitimate reasons. I suppose. But it’s something deeper than that. It’s something that lies deep in my soul, in every Christian’s soul, whether we acknowledge it or not. A desire to present our Creator as beautiful, to preach the Gospel and “if necessary use words.” Most people associate that quote with spoken word, but I believe it transcends to much greater depths. We all love to write pretty lyrics and sing songs with epic crescendos, trying to express our love to God. The heart behind that is great. But, what gospel are we preaching with our clip art Jesus? Spreading the love of God is just as important and arguably more important. But what adolescent is going to walk through the church double-doors to experience that love if their invitation (website, bulletin etc.)looks like crap? Is the world’s largest religion, missing the boat with a savvy-younger generation by appearing old fashioned and out of touch. It’s either stubbornness or negligence to assume that there is no need to “market” the Church. It’s true. Sorry. For the Church, effective marketing and design are vital in telling their Story. The greatest story ever told. If we are expecting this generation and the ones to come to usher in the Kingdom of God, effectively, how can we disregard that which takes custody of our generation’s attention? Design, and more specifically good taste, isn’t going anywhere. The standard has been set, so why are so many churches and in so many of our lives do we allow less than our best to be the Gospel we preach? 12 Comments / Leave a Reply |
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March 14th, 2008 at 7:53am
yesir!!! preach brotha
March 14th, 2008 at 9:02am
Amen! You go into an art museum, and you can see that there was a period of time where the best paintings in the world were of Biblical subjects. You go into old churches, especially in places like Europe, and the beauty of the architecture and stained glass is overwhelming. Christians used to lead the art world, but we somehow got seriously lost along the way and now it seems we’re at the bottom!
March 14th, 2008 at 10:25am
Your just Creative!! J/K man I really dig it!
March 14th, 2008 at 10:54am
Wow, man. I’ve felt this for a long time but you just laid it out beautifully. No wonder they say you’re dapper.
March 14th, 2008 at 11:32am
I experience the Stomach Cringe as well when viewing poorly designed churches or church products. Yet is is very interesting to study the ‘Great’ Christian works throughout history and discover the sick and godless life the designers lived. And over time, a backlash occurred. And the focus and finances were poured into effective ministries to reach people with the Gospel. (and I experience this financial strain as I manage a ministry budget) I have hope, however. A Hope to see creativity emerge in excellence to our King. Hope because I see individuals, such as you Tyler, who step forward first with a love for the Lord and give their talents of creativity as an offering to Him.
March 14th, 2008 at 11:35am
How true that is.
March 14th, 2008 at 1:46pm
I must say I resonate with you upon the viewing of a Microsoft Office Template slide or graphic. At best, I believe it hurts the cause for those who are new to the church, as it does make the church (whichever it may be) seem out of date and style. However, I do wonder whether or not the church needs to be marketed. If so, then assumingly there are bussiness elements in the church, and that too can make me cringe… Definately a great post though, really made me think. One of the best originals yet :)
March 14th, 2008 at 2:55pm
I think it’s more of a matter of putting forth our best for God as a community instead of marketing the church. I think things such as bulletins and powerpoint slides get delegated to people who may not necessarily have the right talents for design and art. And there are people in churches who do have this talent, but aren’t involved - I think a lot of talents go unused in the church. You rarely hear an announcement from the pulpit “We’re looking for talented typesetters to lay out our newsletter.” But yeah, once it crosses over from being creative to honor God to wrapping the church up in a slick package to market it, it does start to become a little disingenuous.
March 14th, 2008 at 3:30pm
This is so true. We’ll never be effective in reaching our generation unless we speak the same language . . . creative excellence is a huge, huge part of that. Great post.
March 14th, 2008 at 11:31pm
That is so true! It has me really thinking. You said it best. If we don’t do something as young people who will? When babies and kid’s of today get our age, will we have done something about it?
Jamid Towers
March 15th, 2008 at 9:13pm
Yes, I think that you are so right- creativity has not been encouraged in our churches for far too long. I think that this is why others look at our churches and think that we all act the same, dress the same, and think the same. In our culture that is centered on individuality this comes across as something that many can not understand and want no part of. And, though we are to be united as believers, our seeming suppression of creativity makes us come across as bland when we should come across as dynamic.
Also, the church in America is influenced by the educational system. As someone who teaches music in public school I have found that in many classrooms children are not encouraged enough to create, but more to conform to someone else’s presupposed ideals of what is beautiful and what is not. This creates a mentality that tells people that perhaps they are not ‘talented’ enough to create. This is a shame because actually all people were created with God’s breath of life, and all people, like our creator, have the ability to be creative. So here too, creativity is suppressed. And the result is a large group of people who have never learned, or were told not to, express themselves creatively. And of course these people make up the community of our churches. If nothing else, what the church can do is work to correct that.
August 15th, 2008 at 8:37am
Your blog is interesting!
Keep up the good work!