Art and Worship

Last night at our home fellowship, we listened in and watched the 11th session of the Truth Project dealing with the subject of LABOR. When we look at our work from a biblical, God-centered perspective, it brings so much life and creativity to the tasks of six days.  The presenter, Del Tackett, saved an interesting perspective on creative art for the very end of the lesson. In an interview with Makoto Fujimora, this amazing contemporary abstract artist who happens to be a Christian, Mr. Fujimora explained to us the importance of art and of Christians working as artists.
Tonight I found this interview with Mr. Fujimora at patrolmag.com (never heard of this mag before). His intelligence and understanding are very high, so his answers are very deeply thought out and explained, but very abstract (like his artwork).  I particularly resonated with this response to the question:

You speak of “proper worship”—how is the propriety of our worship determined? And, to apply it to art, how is the revelation of something holy evaluated in art?

By “proper worship,” I mean a distinctively Christological way of looking at God, the world and ourselves that is driven by understanding and experiencing God’s grace. I am not merely speaking of liturgical elements, denominations, or traditions. If you follow Tim Keller’s reasoning in Prodigal God, you see that Christ saw the world in grace-filled and extravagantly compassionate ways.

So that means that the enemy of expression is not just waywardness of culture but also legalism of culture, and this often starts at the church. For Christ, we are (and the universe as it pertains to us) the object of affection, his masterpieces. So we need to bring people in to see that we are far more beautiful and transcendent to God as the best of the arts do are to us. But the arts train us, make our hearts and mind more aware, of things excellent and beautiful.

Olana - Matthew Six by Makoto Fujimora

I am inspired. Maybe its time to bring out the brushes again.