The Christian Imagination

That’s the title for August 29th in my edition of My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers. I’ve always found his words both challenging and encouraging. I was struck by the following:

Every time my program of belief is clear in my own mind, I come across something that contradicts it. Let me say I believe God will supply all my need, and then let me run dry, with no outlook, and see whether I will go through the trial of faith, or whether I will sink back to something lower. Faith must be tested, because it can be turned into a personal possession only through conflict. What is your faith up against just now? The test will either prove that your faith is right, or it will kill it.

I’ll let that quote stand on it’s own…

I took a much needed vacation in the Black Hills of South Dakota this past weekend. Located a mere 5 hours away, it has a wonderful combination of eclectic shops, tourist attractions, and outdoor activities. I’m already keen to go back. The Songbird Cafe is Custer, SD was an especially nice find. The ambiance was brilliant, and I got to hear the music of John Smith while sipping a latte. I decided to have my trip be largely unplanned so I could explore, and do so at a slow pace. The Bandlands were quite a visually diverse, and muddy, as it had rained earlier that day. While driving through (lots of driving in that park), I stopped at a hilly portion that looked quite cool. I stood on the edge, and felt the urge to head down into the valley. There were some kids nearby, and not wanting to set a bad example and have the kids follow me down (following their instincts, perhaps), I waited. After the car left, I quickly descended, and kept going for several minutes, tempted to go further and further. It was then that it occured to me just it was really muddy, and that I was playing in the mud in a sense, and, well, smiling and having fun playing. My adult side soon took over reminding me that no one knew where I was, and should a wild animal or snake bite me, no one would be the wiser, so I climbed back up.

All at once, I reflect on the writings of Madeleine L’Engle and G.K. Chesterton and others who contrast child-like imagination and frivolousness with adult reality and seriousness, and question whether the former isn’t the more meaningful of the two. I recall a statement about how the Western (Protestant) work ethic can sometimes make us, as Christians, take this life a little too seriously. Work and productivity can themselves be a drug, and like any addiction, there is a point of diminishing returns. Rest and play, such as are part of the Sabbath, are rejuvinating, and more than that, are commanded. How easy is it to lose site of that? I just started reading Moltmann’s Theology of Play. Right at the beginning:

To be happy, to enjoy ourselves, we must above all be free. But such freedom has grown scarce. We enjoy ourselves, we laugh, when our burdens are removed, when fetters are falling, pressures yield and obstructions give way. Then our hearts leap within us and we suddenly find it easy to cope with other men and circumstances…But how can we laugh, how can we rejoice without care, when we are worried, depressed, and tortured by the state of the world we live? (Moltmann, 1)

We have many freedoms in the West, freedoms I am personally thankful for. Right now, I’m wondering what it means to be free. Maybe that’s why Jesus failed to be the Messiah that the people wanted. Maybe He had a different definition of freedom…

Moltmann, Jurgen. Theology of Play. New York: Harper & Row. 1972.

In case you don’t know, my church body, Timberline Oldtown, meets in a coffee house on Sunday mornings, specifically, Everyday Joe’s Coffee House, in downtown Fort Collins, Colorado. I’m not always excited to go to church services. Sometimes I get lost in them. Sometimes I don’t feel like I can give the right answer to ‘How are you?’ Sometimes I’m anti-social. Sometimes I’m not feeling all that loving. Sometimes I miss how much God loves me. Sometimes I don’t go to worship, and the whole ordeal takes effort.

That day was not today. Today, I went to church to worship a God I love, a God who I desperately need, a God who loves me. I felt loved today. It was a delightful surprise to find out that Aaron Strumpel would be leading worship this morning! If you don’t know Aaron, he is wonderful, he is family, and if you haven’t heard his album, go to his website, and listen, and buy. At Timberline Oldtown, we used to have a worship leader. About a year ago, he left for a new adventure, and so we started having various friends of our community lead worship in the interim. We’ve been doing that for about a year now. I like it. I like the variety of music. I like seeing different people’s hearts. Today Aaron led a few of his own songs. In the next few weeks, we’ll hear a variety of choruses, maybe even some hymns. The spectrum of songs is beautiful to me. There’s something quite profound, after all, about singing a song that people have worshipped to for 500 years.

Worship, of course, is about more than music, more than singing and song. Still, singing praises to God is quite mystical when our hearts are worshipping together in community…

Here’s a clip of Aaron playing his song ‘Family’ at Everyday Joe’s a few months back:

Makoto Fujimura is the Creative Director of the International Arts Movement in New York City. Their stated vision is: IAM gathers artists and creative catalysts to wrestle with the deep questions of art, faith and humanity in order to inspire a community to engage the culture that is and create the world that ought to be.

If you are interested at all in faith and art, Fujimura is a person you should be aware of. He was recently mentioned in an article published in Forbes:

“I am a Christian,” says Fujimura, 46, who founded the nonprofit International Arts Movement to help bridge the gap between the religious and art communities. “I am also an artist and creative, and what I do is driven by my faith experience.

“But I am also a human being living in the 21st century, struggling with a lot of brokenness - my own, as well as the world’s. I don’t want to use the term ‘Christian’ to shield me away from the suffering or evil that I see, or to escape in some nice ghetto where everyone thinks the same.”

By making a name for himself in the secular art world, Fujimura has become a role model for creatively wired evangelicals. They believe that their churches have forsaken the visual arts for too long - and that a renaissance has begun.

A few more quotes from the article:

These artistic evangelicals, though still relatively small in number, are striving to be creators of culture rather than imitators.

“The Bible is full of abstraction,” said Fujimura

They sense a disconnect worshipping in churches bare of anything that’s visually arresting.

“The very parched nature of evangelical visual culture is making people who have grown up in this culture thirsty for beauty,” he said.

“If we as Christians believe that creativity and imagination is a gift from God, why have we neglected it for so many years?”

Fujimura and the others quoted in the article certainly echo my heart, to engage culture, to even create culture. As a creative Christian myself, I don’t want my art relegated to some safe Christian sub-culture, nor do I want my art reduced to a purely utilitarian purpose in worship. I want to engage the culture at large with my expressions of creativity. I want to be a voice heard round the world. It’s great to see Makoto Fujimura and the International Arts Movement on the forefront!