Sunday Sermons
The Christian and Art
In the book The Christian, The Arts, And Truth, the author Frank E. Gaebelein noted, “To take the Bible seriously, to submit ourselves to its authority as the infallible rule of our faith and life is not, as some seem to think, a hindrance to the practice and use of the arts. No, it’s a tremendous asset, because the single greatest influence on the arts we as known them in our cultural heritage has come through Scripture; because in Scripture we have the great truths about man and God and the unending conflict and tension between good and evil that are at the well-springs of art; because Scripture gives the arts their greatest themes and highest motivation. Moreover, we must never overlook the fact, so often forgotten by Christians, that God’s inspired Word is itself a supremely great piece of art” (pp. 69,70).
God the artist
In the first chapter of Genesis repeatedly the Scriptures speak God “creating” (Genesis 1:1), or “making” (Genesis 1:7 “God made the expanse”; 1:16 “God made the two great lights”; “God created the great sea monsters” (1:21); “God made the beasts of the earth” (1:25); “Let us make man in our own image” (1:26); “God saw all that He had made, and behold it was very good” (1:31). This chapter declares that God makes and creates, and this is something, on a limited level that we have in common with God. We too are makers. Art and creativity originate in God, “our capacity to make and enjoy art—to look at it and find it ‘good’ is a condition of our very humanity. As G. K. Chesteron said, ‘Art is the signature of man’. No animals practice art any more than they worship. Subhuman creatures may make beautiful things, but only by instinct. The things they make—such as coral or honeycombs, spider webs or multicolored shells are not their own conscious deliberate creation but an expression of God’s thought” (Gaebelein p. 73). In addition, bees and spiders do not sit back and appreciate or admire what has been made. “As Francis Schaeffer has said, ‘Made in God’s image, man was made to be great, he was made to be beautiful, and he was made to be creative in life and art” (p. 73).
“It was very good”
The expression, “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” has been used to justify all sorts of things that are not beautiful. When it comes to art or the study of any other topic we need to remember that we presently live in a “bent world”, a world marred by sin, and sin has affected every field of human endeavor. Sin has bent families, governments, biology (the theory of evolution), morality, marriage and art as well. Not all manifestations of creativity are “good”, as when Aaron constructs the golden calf(Exodus 32:4); or the construction of the tower of Babel). Gaebelein reminds us that everything that might appear beautiful is not necessarily true, the Scriptures note that even Satan himself is able to “disguise himself as an angel of life” (2 Corinthians 11:14). In a similar vein, Solomon warns, “Do not look on the wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup, when it goes down smoothly” (Proverbs 23:31); and then again, “Do not desire her beauty in our heart, nor let her capture you with her eyelids” (6:25). “Despite Keats’ famous line, truth is not to be completely equated with beauty. While in the deepest sense truth is beautiful, because God is absolutely beautiful in perfection, nevertheless the two—truth and beauty are not synonymous. The reason is that, although beauty can communicate truth (Psalm 19:1; Romans 1:20; Psalms 8:3 “When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained, what is man that You take thought of him?” (Psalm 8:3-4); “I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, and my soul knows it very well” (Psalm 139:14), it can also communicate a lie. Ethically, beauty can be deceptive and downright evil. There are various works of art which are decadent and at the same time beautiful (the lust of the eyes); there are those which are corrupt and seductively appealing” (Gaebelein p. 47). There is a greatly needed lesson in the above section. People simply tend to believe that what is true is what sounds good to them, actually what sounds good may be the total opposite of good (2 Timothy 4:3). In like manner, some will say, “How can something so beautiful be evil or what can something that feels so good be so wrong?” Yet God informs us that evil is very appealing, it appeals to our pride, it appeals to a desire for immediate gratification, and it appeals to our senses (1 John 2:15). In fact the Hebrew writer notes that Moses made the decision to choose “rather to endure ill-treatment with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin” (Hebrews 11:25).
The arts are inescapable
“As free time has increased, the arts are demanding our attention as never before. In a real sense and whether we like it or not, we live in a context of the arts—and that not of the best. Through millions of radios and television sets, the paperback explosion, the electronic recording and amplification, through advertising, through the insistent, subtle persuasion of taped music in shopping centers, on airplanes, in dental offices—the arts are conditioning us as never before. So we are confronted with the necessity of discriminating (Hebrews 5:14; 1 Thessalonians 5:21-22) lest we become smothered by the second rate and vulgar. We Christians have an obligation not to submit passively to the cultural environment that surrounds us, but to develop standards for judging it. The quality of our minds and thought is being determined largely by what we do with our free time. We can’t escape the arts; they won’t let us alone” (Gaebelein p. 67). In our culture, music, pictures, and so on, are constantly bombarding us, and it is so easy to let all these images shape our perception of reality (Romans 12:1-2). More than ever we need to carefully guard what we allow ourselves to believe (Philippians 4:8). “To identify beauty with what is immediately pleasing or captivating is to have a superficial view of beauty” (Gaebelein p. 96).
The artist and accountability
Many passages remind us that everyone, even the most talented and creative, will equally stand before God at the final judgment, “And I saw the great and the small standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds” (Revelation 20:12). At times it seems that our world has always believed that “great” men are somehow excused, or that heaven is so impressed with their gift, be it a voice, or whatever, that they will be allowed entrance into heaven because of their talent. Gaebelein reminds us that the Christian artist, “must know his responsibility to God who gave him his talent, and he must also know the misuses to which beauty is prone. Beauty is not exempt from the consequences of the fall. Like money or power, art may become an idol. Apostasy may assume angelic forms. This is why the Christian artist stands so in need of humility; he must never depart from the priority of seeking to glorify God in all he does” (p. 96). Passages such as Ecclesiastes 12:13-14 and Matthew 5:16; 6:33 equally appeal to everyone who has been given a tremendous talent. The poet, songwriter, painter, sculptor or actor needs to remember that God gave them their abilities, and that such abilities always need to work toward the goal of obeying and glorifying God.
Art and Truth
Jesus noted, “Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth”. The Bible is the standard and collection of all moral and spiritual truth (John 16:13). Yet, seeing that God is the Creator, He is equally the author of truth in the realms of mathematics, physics, architecture, farming and so on. He is the author of all the laws that govern this world, whether they are physical or spiritual(Colossians 1:16). Max Reinhardt once said that “the supreme goal of the theatre is truth”. Dorothy Sayers added, “Right in truth is right art; and I can only affirm that at no point have I found artistic truth and theological truth at variance”. This reminds us that every artist does have an obligation to the truth. Paul noted in Philippians that the Christian needs to dwell upon “what is true” (4:8), which includes the ideas of that which is honorable, right, and pure. Allow me to make the following applications:
· Do we adhere to this verse when it comes to the type of the music that we routinely dwell upon? Are we listening to songs that convey what is true and right, or what is conveying that is false?
· Do we read books that present truth? Even when reading fiction, are we reading books that are at variance with moral law that honors God?
· How about our television or movie preferences? What I am saying is that when it comes to our tastes or preferences in entertainment, is “truth” or “purity” a major consideration?
· When it comes to fashion and how we dress are we being truthful? Remember, what is true must actually be what it purports to be. In our clothing choices are we trying to present our Christianity to the world or are we trying to hide it? When someone sees us do we look like we know the answers to life?
“The Christian artist (and the Christian viewer) is in a position to tell with integrity the whole story, to go beyond where so much art stops, and to signify the full picture, not only of man’s alienation and lostness, but of what God has done to redeem him. In a letter written about ten years after his conversion, C.S. Lewis said, ‘One of the minor rewards of conversion is to be able at last to see the real point of all literature we were brought up to read with the point left out’. Willa Cather says: ‘Artistic growth is, more than anything else, a refining sense of truthfulness’. That principle applies to our own day-by-day response to art as well as to the ‘creation’ of art” (Gaebelein pp. 91-92). The Christian matures as a result of studying the Scriptures; their senses will be exercised to tell the difference between what is God’s truth and Satan’s lies (Hebrews 5:14).
The debasement of taste
Our modern culture runs from the word “censorship”, and yet censorship happens all the time. “Of recent years the public sense of propriety has been chipped away under the ceaseless impact of literature, entertainment, and advertising that have gone further and further” (Gaebelein p. 110). It is sad as I previously noted that much of what is presented as “art” presently comes from “the culture of the ugly”. The Christian cannot force the world to change, but it remains the obligation of Christians to declare God’s truth to the world (Mark 16:15). In addition, we live in a time when it seems that people argue that they can watch or observe something that is immoral but that this does not mean that they are immoral themselves. The Bible does not agree (Proverbs 4:23; Matthew 5:28; 15:18-20; Titus 1:15). What Jesus said remains true, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8). So much for the argument, that “I can write evil lyrics, make evil movies, or take evil pictures, but that does not mean that I am a bad person”. You are what you do; Jesus noted that all deeds and words come from the heart (Matthew 15:18-20). Paul noted a category of depravity that the Holy Spirit labeled, “inventors of evil” (Romans 1:30), this includes people who are very creative when it comes to sin. “In Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Edward Gibbon gives as one of the main causes of the growth of the early church in the decadent empire the pure morality of the Christians, who, by their steadfast nonconformity to the world around them, shone as lights in the darkness and worked as salt in a pagan society. The principle has not changed. Purity, goodness out of conviction, self-restraint motivated by love for God and man, have not lost their winsomeness. In this secular society, as in imperial Rome, Christlike living still has its active power” (Gaebelein p. 114).
