Christian Aesthetic Declaration Revisited

Canvas Conference 2016 and the corresponding Creativity & the Christian Course was an extended weekend of teaching on the relationship between creativity and theology, and a chance to interact with Christian creatives who have thought deeply on this subject. I came prepared, having expressed in a previous essay my own understanding of the Bible's view of art and beauty, along with questions I was seeking to explore further. This new essay is a chance to articulate how this conference has clarified my thinking, along with its implications for my life.

Theological Clarifications

First, I've better understood how God is the source of all beauty. Art Azurdia's sermon on the vision of God's glory, portrayed in Revelation 19, rekindled a view of God as the source of all power, lacking in nothing and foolish to reduce in our thinking. In light of this vision, our own elevation of ourselves and our abilities is as pathetic as the attack of idol worshippers in Isaiah 44.  My idolatry is a self exaltation that is abhorrent in light of the excellence of our King.

A rewritten Christian Aesthetic Declaration would also expand on the effect that the fall has had on our nature. Prior to this event, humankind was united to God and thus at whole with itself. When this changed, what was once united is now shattered. The former wholeness of our mind, heart, spirit, and body, each working together to understand and serve God, was ripped apart, causing frustration and pain to this day. We see effects of this dichotomy in our debates between valuing the "head or the heart" in our worship of God. When we neglect the creative spirit, or when we refuse to engage the mind in thinking about God, our understanding of who God is will be damaged as a result. Christ is the New Adam (See 1 Corinthians 15:21-23), the very image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15). He restores this wholeness that sin tore apart. By being united with Christ, we are being restored back to the whole man that God created us to be. By worshiping God in spirit and in truth, in creativity and in knowledge, in beauty and in thought, we better reflect the God who formed us in our image.

The value I placed on Christ's role in redemption and our creativity has also been expanded. Our Master's use of storytelling and imaginative smilies when teaching, combined with his exquisite intelligence and understanding, give us a clear picture of what this unity looks like in God. Jesus is also the Word of God. No better word has come to us and we should expect nothing more. As Christians, we are priests who point to Him. But like Aaron before the Hebrews, the people demand something else. Our tendency is to give in and offer our own art in replacement, like Aaron and his golden calf (Exodus 32). We must understand that as priests, anything that we divert people to instead of Christ will have no saving power. Our role is to simply exalt Him.

Although my Declaration discussed the infinite beauty of God's Creation, it did not place proper emphasis on the most beautiful of God's acts: His redemption. Aaron Ivey's talk on 'God as the Artist' had me wondering; do I prize God's redemption above all other forms of beauty? We, the redeemed, are in a unique position to honour and celebrate this exquisite beauty. Just as artists have yet to exhaust the complexity and beauty of the human body, so our art should find unending ways to explore  and enjoy this redemption, the greatest art of all. Furthermore, as Christians we have access to the source of all Beauty. Our lives are being transformed as part of the beauty of his redemption. Since our hearts are charged, our lives are a work of art, a beauty that will overflow into everything we do. Some days it can be hard to believe that this beauty is ever visible in our lives, but the best of art takes years to reveal itself and can be the hardest to recognize. Our Gardener's orchard will bear His fruit on His timing, not ours.

Finally, the discussion with Randy Alcorn on the nature of creativity in the New Heavens and the New Earth has me even more excited for our destination. In my Declaration I talked about how in Heaven we will create art for the glory of God without the constraint of sin, but I hadn't imagined what the lack of limitations would mean for our artistic creations. Many masters achieve their greatest masterpiece towards the late middle of their career, before the limitations of the aging body, mind, and eventually death hamper their work. Imagine what they could create as their understanding and craft grows as they go on further and further into eternity! Sin, and the effects of evil and wrong will be conquered, so the pettiness and lack of motives preventing open collaboration will be removed as well. This enjoyment of the new creation and our role in creating it will only increase our worship to its Source and Author.

Randy Alcorn also described how the new Jerusalem is brought "down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband" (Revelation 21:2, ESV). It is a new heaven, but also a redeemed earth. Much like Aslan's Country in C. S. Lewis's The Last Battle contains the good of England that can never be destroyed, it is easy to suppose that the best aspects of our current world will be redeemed and become part of the New Creation. This frees us from having to squeeze out any last drop of enjoyment of this current world before it all gets tossed aside. It also gives us hope that the good of our current creativity will be carried forward into the next. Our efforts at producing quality artwork will have an far reaching impact, going beyond our short lifespan or the life of our planet. (I think Tolkien's autobiographical short story, "Leaf By Niggle", hints at this idea. In the story, the painter's unachieved masterpiece gets little appreciation after its artist died, but in the afterlife, his work, while still being the work of Niggle, is transformed into something with far reaching impact.)

Personal Implications

It was illuminating to hear how the artists at the conference achieved balance in their creative processes. Bret Lott told us how he begins his morning writing session by praying Proverbs 16:3 ("Commit your work to the LORD and your plans will be established") and Psalm 90:17 ("Let the favour of the LORD our God be upon us, and establish the work of our hands"). During lunch, I asked Ekemini Uwan how she manages the incessant noise of her significant social media output. She told me that she begins each day with prayer, ignores Twitter on Sunday, and allots only specifics times for responding and posting.

As long as the church has existed, it has encouraged the spiritual disciplines. When I'm at work on something artistic I tend to invest my entire energy in it, barely leaving time to eat. At the root of this is a fear of failure. I don't want to rest from my work until I trust that I have left something of value. The discipline to take of taking regular time away from the craft in order to meet with God and serve other people is a way of trusting God, showing Him that your identity is not wrapped up in the success or completion of your work. And it is this vision of God's beauty that we gain from time in prayer and the Word that should, as Art Azurdia declared, "compel and control our creativity". He is the source of beauty. Let us take time to connect to Him.

This also applies to how we consume media. How do we avoid the subversive messages that creep under our skin through media, culture, and stories? The spiritual disciplines reshape our souls on a daily basis with a power greater than that which is in the world. Mike Cosper told us that "to become a Christian is to adopt a way of life that reorients you to the Kingdom of God." It means resisting passivity and making decisions that will alert us to the spiritual realities in our lives. Then our art creation and consumption can become a sort of spiritual discipline, a way of paying attention to the world and communing with God. The habits of creativity are also important, including community we keep ("have intelligent, good, honest people around you" directed Bret Lott) and how often we spend time away from our screens (Latifah Phillips encouraged us to seek the company of others and spending time with hobbies that involve the physical, such as gardening.)

This leads us into my questions about the role of the local church in a believing artist's life. Although I saw churches in Portland who are very intentional about how they display creativity and disciple the artist, they explained that this focus is an organic response to the makeup of their city and congregation. A locale that does not have such a high percentage of artists will naturally look quite different. But regardless, the focus of the church should be on "creating healthy Christians over healthy artists" ( in the words of Thomas Terry). As another speaker put it, "the church does not exist to serve artists. Rather, artists exist to serve the church."

Think of Jesus Christ, whose beauty and creative power is the root and cause of all our creativity. He came to earth in the humblest of all forms, taking the lowliest of lives and dying in the most humiliating way imaginable (See Mark 10:43-45 and Philippians 2:3-8). If we are to "have this mind among us", let us serve our churches - through art, if need be, but first through whatever need the church has, from the nursery to its janitorial closet.

Reflecting on encouraged me this week, as last Sunday I returned to my church home after being away for three weeks. I had spent most of my time in Portland observing churches with excellent music and who pay careful attention to their aesthetics. I was worried and slightly embarrassed to return to my humble church, with its sloppy approach to design and visuals and a music team in disarray. One of the most talented musicians in our church, who lead my band had just had moved out of town. My current music team was the lowliest and most awkward in the church. I realized that my attitude stepping into this new environment should be to serve with my gifts in wherever way is most needed by that congregation.

The other night, I told my former bandmate this decision over the phone. He agreed, but he also encouraged me to keep practicing so I could eventually serve the church by leading my own band. This leads me to the final lesson I learned about creating art at Canvas: create good art by working hard to develop your craft. Most artists who do this have a motive of self-glorification. As believers, we shun laziness by recognizing that we, of all people, know the Source of Beauty Himself and should reflect this beauty in our art.

My creativity is a gift given to me by my Creator. As a steward of this gift, I am to work at improving it, but I also need to recognize that this gift is not given to me to horde, or as a means to magnify myself. Worshiping myself and my gift will never bring me true lasting joy. Only worshiping the source of joy and gifts will secure that. I am also humbled by recognizing that none of us, not even artists of the highest genius, create out of nothing. We only mimic, copy, and rearrange existing stories, patterns, and designs. It's all been done before, and better, by the Fountainhead of all new things. He invites me to sing along, out of tune and incomplete, but being restored into the perfect image of His Son.

Art and Beauty: A Christan Aesthetic Declaration

 I've been occasionally posting work I did on last summer's Creativity and the Christian course. The following paper was one of the cornerstones of the project. It really helped me think through and articulate my views on one of my favourite topics: the role of art and beauty in the Christian's life. After I attended the Canvas conference, I wrote a follow up essay, which I hope to post soon. Enjoy!

Why is there so much beauty in this world? Why do we humans consistently seek it out, celebrate it, and create more of it, regardless of our context or station? "Creativity is the common currency of being a human being" said Ken Robinson, but it's also one of the most contentious. There are disagreements over what defines beauty, what kind of emphasis should be given to it, and a variety of efforts to either squelch its presence or encourage its fostering. And this is just in society at large. When we turn to the history of the church, we see art and beauty abused, banned, and stripped of its potential, but also playing a key role in responding to God's grace.

Hence there is a need to ask the question: what is a Christian philosophy towards art and beauty? Let's examine what the storyline of scripture says on this topic. We will then ask how these truths apply to our own lives and the lives of our churches. Finally, we shall discuss the implications for myself, along with the areas that I would like to develop further

Art and Beauty in the Storyline of Scripture

Since our world began with God, it is only proper that our thinking on these matters should likewise begin with Him. As the fountainhead of all goodness, "His attributes... have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made" (Romans 1:20, ESV). By examining His handiwork, it is clear that our God is a creative God. From the dawn of human history, scientists, painters, mathematicians, and storytellers have probed the depths of the beauty and intricate complexity of God's creation, and yet everyday is still bursting with further possibilities. Since God's character defines what is good, creativity is something worth pursuing.

Mankind is the pinnacle of all creation, alone distinguished by being made in the image of God. Unlike the animals, man's purpose is to be a representation of God. Since God is creative, we too are called to be creative, in obedience with God's blessing and command that Adam and Eve “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion" (Genesis 1:28, ESV). We create in order to glorify God. It was like He provided mankind with the principles of music, it's vast array of instruments, and the theme of His symphony, inviting us to create variations on it and take it somewhere new.

But bearing the image of God is not the only thing that defines humanity. The fall of Adam and Eve has permeated our blood in an almost equal way. The serpent seduced our ancestors with both the beauty of the fruit and with the lie that through it they too can become like God. ("So when the woman saw that the tree... was a delight to the eyes"; Genesis 3:6, ESV.) No longer content to simply image forth their Creator and give glory to him, they disbelieved their Maker's words and attempted to usurp His role as God. Instead of worshipping God, they wanted to be god, creating their own definitions of right and wrong.

The fall has corrupted our entire race, and the effects of it can be seen everyday in our own hearts. We distort the truth of our God to suit our own inclinations. We find our purpose not in imaging forth him, but from being consumed with our own glory. We view ourselves as God and orient our lives, our art, and our acts of creation around our desires. Instead of finding our satisfaction in God, we seek "our sense of acceptability, joy, significance, hope, and security" (Keller, Timothy J. Center Church: Doing Balanced, Gospel-Centered Ministry in Your City. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2012, 70) from anything else.

The Bible refers to these replacements of God in our lives as idols, and for most of early human history they took the form of art - representational images picturing pagan deities. In contrast, the true God revealed Himself to the Israelites through the medium of words. Man, distorted in his thinking, needs knowledge and understanding of who God is. While this was communicated through didactic writing (the Torah and a good portion of the New Testament), the majority of the Old Testament takes the form of memorable stories, histories both epic and ordinary, and poetry with striking imagery. While we are given information about the nature of God, but the imagination and creativity on display in these other genres of Scripture shows that God recognizes the value of imaginative mediums in revealing Himself.

When God commanded Moses to build a tabernacle where He was to reside, His instructions involved "almost every form of representational art that men have every known." (Francis A. Schaeffer, Art and the Bible: Two Essays Downers Grove, Illinois : Inter-Varsity Press, 2006, 20.) To craft it, God chose an artist named Bazalel and "filled him with the Spirit of God, with ability and intelligence, with knowledge and all craftsmanship, to devise artistic designs, to work in gold, silver, and bronze" (Exodus 31:3-4, ESV). Here again is proof that God places a high value in imagination, craftsmanship, and beauty. Yet God is not worshiped through beauty alone. The details on who God is and how he is to be worshiped are precise and specific. It requires careful thinking and exact actions. There are grave consequences when they are broken and the tendency of the Hebrews was to revert to worshiping through graven images. (They even worshiped that which God used for their redemption. See Hezekiah's smashing Moses's bronze serpent after the Hebrews began burning incense to it {2 King's 18:4}, or Gideon creating an ephod after God's intervention {Judges 8:22-28}, not to mention how quickly the nation fell into the sounding cultures's worship of images.)

These patterns of worship pointed towards something better: Christ, the very "image of the invisible God" by whom "all things were created" (Colossians 1:15-16, ESV). In his life on earth, he became the representative of God that we failed to be, untainted by sin and thus showing God's nature in ways that we could not. It is worth noting that Christ continued the biblical trend of using imaginative illustrations and stories in his teaching. We should also remember how he was described as having "no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him" (Isaiah 53:2, NIV). (Compare this language to that used in Genesis 3:6 to describe the fall: "when she saw that the tree was good... and a delight to the eyes.") Yet through his appallingly ugly death on the cross, he reconciled "to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven" (Colossians 1:20, ESV). He is now the Lord of everything - our bodies, our world, our art - and through Him everything will be redeemed in a new heaven and a new earth. That which was darkest and most hideous has become the most beautiful.

Implications for the Believer and the Church

Although the story of the Bible finds its conclusion in the new creation, we are not yet there but still situated in a different era of redemption. Let us now examine how this scriptural framework impacts us today. How should followers of Christ interact with art that is created by those who are unredeemed? Yes, mankind is fallen and distorted in both thinking and worship (as described in Romans 1:18-32), but we are still created in the image of God. Should we not then be surprised to find truth, beauty, and goodness in the creativity of those whom He has made? "We can't help but cast off reflections of God's glory" (Mike Cosper, Stories We Tell: How Movies and TV Long for and Echo the Truth, Wheaton Illinois: Crossway Books, 2014, ebook edition, chapter 5). In man there is both goodness in being made in God's image and corruption from being scarred by the fall.  As C. S. Lewis put it so memorably, being descended from Adam is "both honour enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor on earth" (C. S. Lewis, The Complete Chronicles of Narnia, New York, New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1998, 284). 

So let's honour our Maker and our fellow men by appreciating their art. Use it to recognize the dignity of man and view it as expressions of man's nature and character (See Schaeffer, Art and the Bible, 53). Let it give you empathy and understanding for other humans, especially those different from you. Allow it to reveal the complexities of life and help you celebrate its possibilities. May it enhance your worship of God! But do all this with the awareness that the greater the art, the more powerful and subtle its message and "the more important it is to bring it and it's world view under the judgement of Christ and the Bible" (Ibid., 66). Although we can recognize the excellence of an artist's work without agreeing on his outlook of life, we must recognize that God has defined good and evil. All men are bound to His Word. Let us be wary of sin, but not forget that Christ has set us free.

What do the scriptures say to the artist who is a believer? We realize that Christ is Lord over every aspect of creation, so we do not need to cower from any aspect of it. Not only that, but because we know God is real, our understanding of the world is anchored in authority. This gives us a bold and joyful confidence that "Christ's insertion into history combined once and for all story and logic, imagination and reason" (Bret Lott, Letters and Life: On Being a Writer, on Being a Christian, Wheaton, Illinois : Crossway Books, 2013, 27). We can "recognize that we are frolicking in the sea of Christendom and not swimming upstream in either of the twin rivers of imagination or philosophy" (Ibid., 28). This gives us the joy and purpose to ask "what do we want to create next?"

So many artists in our world are driven to create art in order to find meaning and vindication. I think this is what the late German choreographer Pina Bausch was getting at  in her declaration "Dance, dance... otherwise we are lost!" (“Pina,” July 28, 2016, accessed August 4, 2016, https://www.criterion.com/films/28404-pina.) Through Christ, we can rest from having to prove ourselves. Our art is not our salvation. Both our validation and our vindication come from Jesus. We are freed from having to constantly create our own meaning. Instead of being a way to glorify ourselves, art becomes a means to worship Him, the source of all our creativity. In such worship is freedom and rest.

The Christian life is not free from temptations. They are unique to every calling and the artist is not exempt. Finding our value and worth from our art alone is not the only danger. There is also the tendency to elevate the importance of our role as artists over the roles of other believers who are less artistically inclined. This is where the local church, so essential in the storyline of scripture, plays a role.

What is the church's response to beauty and creativity? The church's calling is to disciple the nations (Matthew 31:18-20), which certainly includes artists. This involves encouragement, reminding artists of their value within the world and the kingdom of God. The truths of scripture should be applied to their hearts, killing idols and realigning their vision with the story of redemption. The church also humbles artists. It helps them realize that they are just one of the many types of people in the body of Christ, not to be elevated over  "the one who is not artistically bent but is serving the body in an equally important role" (Thomas J. Terry, personal conversation August 2015). It is in this context of fellowship that art can be returned to its proper place: doxology. Throughout the Scripture are commands to create art and use beauty to worship God.  The artist in the church is to do this with excellence, helping the congregation "sing to him a new song" (Psalm 33:3, see also Ephesians 5:19). In the church, under the framework of theology, we can be guided in using our creativity to know and enjoy God better.

The worship of the church gathered is a foretaste of heaven, something we do not yet experience but that we know is guaranteed. The New Heaven and New Earth described in the Bible is a physical world, where all of God's creation is restored in its proper relationship to Him. It is a place where God's glory is put on full display, including all of the goodness of artistic creation. (See “Yes, New Earth Will Have Movies!,” Christ and Pop Culture, April 30, 2015, accessed August 2, 2016, http://christandpopculture.com/yes-new-earth-will-have-movies-why-our-popular-culture-will-last-for-eternity.) Worship in art and song continues, now in the unveiled presence of our King (see Revelation 15:2-3). Revelation 21:24 describes how by the light of the glory of God "will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it." The goodness of our cultures has been purified and brought into God's presence as a tribute to Him.

Gone are sins like laziness that limit our work. Defeated are the tendencies towards idolatry and the worship of self. Removed are the frustrations and limitations of our mortality. Here is a world rich with endless possibilities to create art that exalts God, for here we see him with hearts untainted and minds set free. Our task is living worship; taking the New Creation into uncharted territory (See The Bible Project, “Animated Explanation of ‘Heaven & Earth,’” YouTube, May 19, 2014, accessed August 4, 2016, https://youtu.be/Zy2AQlK6C5k). Now at last begins "the Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before" (Lewis, The Complete Chronicles of Narnia, 524).

Implications for My Christian Life

Having traced how we are to view art and beauty in light of the Bible, let's examine some of the ways these truths apply to my own personal Christian life. The first the recognition that I am not the source of my creativity. When I realize that my creativity is a gift given to me by my Creator and my very best is only an imitation or variation of His masterwork, than I am less prone to covet the creative acts of others. It also prevents me from being stringent in my attitude as I pass on my gift to others, and from demanding recognition and success from my work. "A gift that cannot be given away ceases to be a gift." (Lewis Hyde, The Gift: Creativity and the Artist in the Modern World, 25th ed. New York: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2007, xix. This work on the nature of gifts and creativity in the modern world has much to offer to the Christian on this topic.) My creativity was given to me. Now let it be passed on to the world, bearing fruit unloooked for and unbidden.

I constantly struggle in where I place my identity. My success in artistic creation affects how I am perceived by the world and how I view myself. When I struggle to find the right words or flounder in ability to communicate, my tendency is to get anxious over my supposed ability and question my role in society. Then when I do publish something, I start counting the page views and Facebook likes, as if that were a measure of my success before God. Myself and my art has become my god.

My need is quite simply to have Christ become my source of satisfaction. If my identity is found primarily in him, then every act of my own creation is way to worship him I have an audience of One. If I am caught up in his beauty, then I'd recognize that nothing else matters. (See “Don’t Write Just to Get Published,” The Gospel Coalition, August 2, 2016, accessed August 3, 2016, https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/dont-write-just-to-get-published.)

This cannot be done by my power alone. I need renewal in my thinking, renewal in my attitude, and even renewal in my imagination. Through the preaching, gathering, and worship of the local church, my heart is reoriented to the proper object of its love, renewed in its understanding of Who that love is, and reformed from the disordered loves that plague my soul. This process continues in one-on-one discipleship, time spent studying God's Word, and through the displace of being brought back to His reality through prayer.

The astonishing thing is that in light of the Gospel, I can find great joy in appreciating the works of culture. With the attitude described above, I can see God's beauty and goodness in new ways, thanks to the creativity of the human mind. I return the good gifts to the Giver (James 1:17), enjoying God and worshiping him through these reflections of Him and His handiwork.

Areas for Further Development

The scope of this discussion is vast. Artists and theologians with much greater experience and gifts than mine have spent their lives plumbing its depths. As mine continues to take shape, there will be new issues and implications to explore. For the next stage of this course and my journey, here are the questions I wish to examine further.

I would like to learn from churches who maintain a healthy balance between creativity and theology. Why are there "currently very few churches who cultivate a community of creativity?" (Humble Beast Video, “CANVAS - A Conversation with Thomas Terry,” YouTube, 2016, accessed August 2, 2016, https://youtu.be/H1_WqisCHas.) How can churches and pastors who fear or don't value aesthetics change their thinking and practice? What role does a local church play in discipling artists? How can a church worship God better through its aesthetics, whether that be architecture, interior design, typography, or music, without becoming seduced and sidetracked by their beauty?

How does this apply to evangelism? When should we be explicitly Christian in creating works of storytelling, cinema, or songwriting, and when should we be comfortable in the knowledge that while our art does not mention Christ by name, it does reflect the worldview of the Gospel?

I would also like to learn from artists who are faithful to both the integrity of their work and the call of Christ. How do they manage the struggle of finding their identity in Christ instead of their art? How do they bring their art under the discipleship of their church? How do they keep the Gospel of hope in their vision and thinking while they create art and interact with the art community? Thanks to the diversity and experience of the body of Christ, I trust that as I explore these questions I will be guided towards a better worship of God through my creativity. 

An Interview with Tim Mackie of The Bible Project

In August 2015 I got to spend a day at The Bible Project’s studios in Portland, Oregon. I wrote an essay describing that experience and if you are looking for an introductory read on The Bible Project, I recommend starting there. During my visit I had the great pleasure of interviewing Tim Mackie, pastor of Door of Hope church, professor at Western Seminary, and co-creator of The Bible Project. We talked for over 45 minutes and only some of that made it into the essay. The entire conversation was so insightful I’m publishing the whole thing, edited for clarity, so that other fans of the project can listen in and learn with me.

Because it’s a long interview, I’ve divided it into 6 sections: Tim’s Journey and the Story of the Bible Project, Portland’s Unique Church Landscape, Doctrinal Balance and Discipling Artists, The Visual Approach of Their Videos and Their Intended Context, What’s Next for The Bible Project, and Bi-vocational Ministry and Other Advice. I’m very thankful for Tim’s interest in my questions and his time. I hope you find his responses as clarifying and encouraging as I have.

1. Tim’s Journey and the Story of the Bible Project

A lot of it is wrapped up in my story. I grew up in East Portland, just a mile away from here. I became a Christian through an outreach ministry to skateboarders. A church had built a skatepark in its backlot and people could come and skate, paying $2 and skating for the whole night. It would be open from 6-9 p.m., but they’d close the park down at 8:30 p.m. and one of the staff would give a Jesus talk. If you wanted to skate the second half of the night, you would have to sit through the talk. It was cool, everybody respected it. So I went to that for years and years through my teens, and then became a Christian when I was almost 20.

I got involved, started teaching Bible studies for the junior high, and I was like “I don’t know what I’m talking about.” So across the street is the largest Christian college here in the city, called Multnomah University, at the time Multnomah Bible College. Jon and I met there. I started going to school and became a Bible geek. I fell in love with all things Bible. 

That’s where you met Jon.

“We lived at the intern house and that’s how our friendship began.”

That’s right. I was interning at the skate ministry and so was Jon. We lived at the intern house and that’s how our friendship began. Then I went to Western Seminary here in Portland, and from there shipped off to the Midwest to do a PhD in Hebrew at the University of Wisconsin.  My Hebrew teacher at Multnomah had gone there to head the program. It was a great, great program.

Was it a Masters and a PhD?

That’s right, a combined degree, 7 years. And I loved it. I loved it and learned a lot. I had a year in Jerusalem studying at the Hebrew University there.

Is that where a lot of your Hebrew and Jewish elements comes in?

Yes. I was fluent in reading Hebrew by the time I went, but for me this was a whole journey of discovering Jesus’ Jewish identity. I just fell in love with Hebrew scriptures and… the whole deal. I’m just a Bible Geek! No two ways about it. 

But as I was finishing my degree, about 2 years prior to finishing I started doing student teaching at the university, teaching classes. And I… didn’t like it. 

Really!

“And I realized that for me, the Bible is a living thing and the whole point about why I care about this thing is the way that it shapes people and communities for the Kingdom of God. ”

Yeah! I didn’t like the environment. I loved the university environment but I found that the students I was teaching just didn’t care. The courses were required Judaism or religion classes. And I realized that for me, the Bible is a living thing and the whole point about why I care about this thing is the way that it shapes people and communities for the Kingdom of God. 

So I thought, “Okay. That was a good learning experience. I’m going to finish the degree and then figure out a way to bridge my passion for the Bible and learning the Bible as an artifact of history, but also as a living Word to God’s people. I need to find a way to bridge those two worlds." So I stayed in Wisconsin and came on staff as a pastor of the church we were attending. I just began by teaching Sunday school classes, and then started tutoring the senior pastor Hebrew! He wanted to resurrect his Hebrew, and then he invited me to start preaching. That came pretty naturally and then they brought me on as a pastor. 

We moved back to Portland 4 years ago, because my family is here and my wife Jessica’s family is in Seattle. I came back to Portland with a 3/4 time role at Door of Hope. It was a young, 2 year old church that was meeting about two blocks from where I grew up.

Wow.

It has since moved locations. When I arrived, I was their second pastor. I wanted an experience of what it’s like to be at the ground floor of a church. I wondered, is any of that church leader guy in me? And I discovered that it’s not. (Laughs.) I’m definitely a teacher and I love being an elder, but as far as actually building teams and running a church… I kind of suck at it. But that’s okay! You learn by failing and doing.

And it’s great that you can have a context where you can excel without doing that.

Yes, that’s exactly right. So when I moved back I thought, “All right. I’m either going to be at Door of Hope and then I’ll teach adjunct at Western Seminary,” which is my alma matter so I have relationships there. That just came out naturally. 

Then Jon and I were hanging out (this was back in Wisconsin when I was planning to move back to Portland) and he pitched me this idea. 

Really!

“Then Jon and I were hanging out (this was back in Wisconsin when I was planning to move back to Portland) and he pitched me this idea. “What if we did some Bible theology videos?””

Because he had been making all kinds of videos. “What if we did some Bible theology videos?”

So we started meeting a morning a week in the Fall of 2012. 

Wow. So this goes back much further.

Yeah! And so we worked on Genesis and Heaven and Earth for a year and a half, before we even started making them. 

Were you just developing it?

We were working on the script. Trying to figure it out. We recorded all kinds of stuff, but they were all 20 minutes long. But at a certain point we got some money and threw it at developing storyboards for Genesis Part 1.

Through the church or… ?

Yes, actually we did. Door of Hope has a creative non-profit arm for music called Deeper Well.

I love their stuff!

Yeah, Josh Garrels has done some stuff through them. So we just put it under Deeper Well as “creative video”. Then we just sat and we worked. We were also trying to think of the crowd funding idea and how to build all of that. It was a slow build!

Yeah! But it sounds like you built the groundwork to make the visual style and the form of communication consistent, so you had that in place before you were ready to go.

Yup, that’s true. We were developing the style, everything, and then we just launched the videos and it’s just gained momentum from there. 

That’s exciting!

“Door of Hope’s basically been letting me donate a day a week for the last two years.”

Yeah! It’s been really fun to watch it. So the way my life’s set up now: I just started half time at The Bible Project back in in April. So it’s new! Prior to that, Door of Hope’s basically been letting me donate a day a week for the last two years.

Okay. So it was under their budget essentially.

Yes. So just in the last couple months have I shifted to part time at Door of Hope and part time here.

2. Portland’s Unique Church Landscape

I don’t know if this is just a perception that is wrong, but the reason I came to Portland is actually because there is so much creative, gospel, truthful, stuff happening here. 

Yes!

I love the arts, but I find so many creative, faith-based institutions tend to get slippery on the doctrine. But I think of Humble Beast, which I’m visiting tomorrow…

Cool, those guys are great!

“It was something significant. It was part of a new wave of younger, more innovative church planters who were really trying to engage the culture of the city. ”

…I think of Josh Garrels and I think of you guys, your church, and The Bible Project… and I don’t think Portland! I’ve always thought of Portland as this West Coast, spiritually vacant place. So, what is it, do you see a common thread tying this together? 

Hmm, yeah that’s interesting… 

Is it the healthy churches?

For sure. To be honest, I think it is a huge piece of it. It’s that Door of Hope is one of a network of churches planted in the core of Portland during the last decade… well more than a decade. Jon’s church, ever since he stepped away from being a pastor, has been Imago Dei, right up the street, which started in 2000. And it was something significant. It was part of a new wave of younger, more innovative church planters who were really trying to engage the culture of the city. 

Okay! Where did that spark from? Was it a Tim Keller thing, were all these churches reformed?

“There’s been a whole wave of these churches. It’s unique! I think it’s something the Spirit is doing here in Portland.”

No no! It’s very… I mean, it just happened! Rick McKinley planted the church. Rick is adjunct at Multnomah University and Seminary. He runs the D.min of their cultural engagement and church planting program.

Where is Multnomah in terms of their theology?

It’s an orthodox evangelical school. Within the reformed tradition but classic, not neo-reformed. Same as Western Seminary. Western is a very centrist seminary,.

And is Trinity Church of Portland, Art Azurdia’s church, based out of Western?

It’s not. They meet at Western and they use their building. And the guy who started it is also professor there, but it doesn’t represent Western or anything.

Right, got it. The first time I attended my church in Calgary was for a conference and it was Art who was preaching.

No way!

Then about two years later I started going to that church full time. When I started digging into Humble Beast I realized “hey, I know this guy!” 

“And among all of us there’s a common focus on discipling people who are engaging, through their careers, the culture of the city.”

So that’s one church.

That’s one. But there’s been a whole wave of these churches. It’s really… it’s unique! I think it’s something the Spirit is doing here in Portland. There’s A New Wave, Door of Hope, a church called Bridgetown, Bread and Wine, Evergreen, Theophilus… I could probably name about a dozen, in size ranging from large to medium to small. But there is a collegiality. All of us pastors, we either all went to school together or know each other, from skate church or…

So there is a commonality there.

Yes! We are all friends. And among all of us there’s a common focus on discipling people who are engaging, through their careers, the culture of the city. And so, 15 to 10 years in…

You start to see fruit.

… you see the fruit of that and it’s through a business like Epipheo or Sincerely Turman or Humble Beast. I mean the coffee industry in Portland is riddled with really, really committed followers of Jesus.

Really!

Among the main, significant roasters there is a core that are owned or managed by Christians. It’s really interesting. Same with the creative industry. 

“Among the main, significant roasters here in Portland there is a core that are owned or managed by Christians. It’s really interesting.”

So it’s really about the Gospel taking root… 

Yeah, I think it’s a movement of the Church. 

And then another unique thing is that Luis Palau, who’s a Latin American evangelist (something of a Billy Graham to the developing world), has his headquarters based here in West Portland. His son, Kevin Palau, rallied and became kind of a a spokesman on behalf of the local churches of Portland and approached the Mayor about how the churches can serve the city. 

Oh I heard about this! Redeemer City to City had an interview with him.

That’s right! So that guy, Kevin, has became kind of this convener of the churches of the wider Portland area. And so there’s been a lot of the churches teaming up. So there has just been all these things creating this sense of the Church of Portland that I think is unique. One of the fruits of that is that in Portland there’s a lot happening in the tech, creative, arts, and communication areas. It is a city filled with lots of Christians who are a part of the unique thing that’s happening here. So stuff happens!

“There has just been all these things creating this sense of the Church of Portland that I think is unique. One of the fruits of that is that in Portland there’s a lot happening in the tech, creative, arts, and communication areas. It is a city filled with lots of Christians who are a part of the unique thing that’s happening here.”

Amazing.

Really! I think it’s kind of unique. So those are all of the various pieces. Josh Garrels is a good example. They moved here because they wanted to become part of Door of Hope and to make this their home base. 

Okay, so they heard of the church.

Yes! I forget exactly, they told me the story. They were going to move here, or to Seattle, or to somewhere in the South - because of family. They had been to Door of Hope and felt that this is where they were supposed to land. Now he’s an elder at Door of Hope! God is doing cool stuff in his life and there is lots of… There’s probably a million things that we can’t even think of that are also happening. 

It’s neat to see the fruit of that Gospel work that is going forth, even in Canada where I am. I’ve been broken by Humble Beast’s music during very dark moments. Same with Josh Garrels. His music has been there at the right time and you can see the fruit of that.

Right! So there you go. As much as I can put in a nutshell that would be part of my response. I really think it’s fruit of the 'Capital C Church' here in Portland.

Wow.

3. Doctrinal Balance and Discipling Artists 

There are two aspects of that I’m curious about. One is: when you have this greater community of churches, how do they keep their distinctions while still being unified? Were there any sacrifices that were made or things they had to watch for? And then on a similar note, I think of Door of Hope and just the amount of artists that are based there — which has an effect that I feel when I visit. The music is outstanding, the visuals are beautiful, there’s great coffee. But there is also a depth there. I was listening to the song they played on Sunday towards the end and I loved it so I looked up the artist’s music.

Yes, Wesley Randolph Eader!

Yes, Wesley!

Oh, he is insane.

His lyrics are beautiful!

He is a modern John Newton or Isaac Watts. 

He reminds me of Indelible Grace’s music.

He is so good. Yes.

I find it very tricky for people who love the arts to maintain their orthodoxy. It’s often a very slippery slope. 

Yup.

But your church seems to be maintaining it with their artists. So I’m curious; how do you maintain unity in the churches, what sacrifices are made, and then how do you maintain a unity of doctrine and arts as a church?

Well, I can only speak for Door of Hope. Imago has a really big emphasis on discipling artists as a part of their ministry.

Okay, so they are actually discipling them!

Yes, Paul Ramey is their Pastor of Worship Arts, but really he sees his role as the pastor of the artists in their community.

Hmm, so there’s respect. An artist would feel the encouragement, but also be corrected.

Yes. So for every church it’s different. 

At Door of Hope, everything for us revolves around what we call the four pillars and everything we do filters through those. The first one is Gospel, specifically of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus and the Spirt being this central thing. We don’t have many doctrinal distinctive other than classical orthodoxy, We’ve had to make certain distinctions as we go, just around how to operate as a church and leadership stuff. But this approach is true of many these newer wave of churches. We have a real classic evangelical centrist position theologically. 

What happens when contentious issues come up, maybe the role of women in the church?

Our elders came around it, we weighed it all, made a majority decision, formed a paper, and then some people left the church. It’s all just typical church stuff. 

But that’s different than your question around artists maintaining their orthodoxy…

Sorry, those are really two separate questions. I should have split them up but they were formed together! 

No, I hear that. I think that… A healthy church that really is centred around Jesus is always going to call everyone in the community to that centre.

To be discipled.

“A healthy church that really is centred around Jesus is always going to call everyone in the community to that centre.”

Yeah. Now, I don’t have any illusions that the majority of artists in Portland are even remotely interested in Jesus.

No.

Even though we have a lot at Door of Hope, it’s just a tiny sample. 

But I think of Image Journal (who I respect in many ways). I’m not saying they are not believers, but they don’t have that solid weight and I think discipleship maybe is what comes in. 

Yes. Well, I think it just depends. In terms of what’s happened at Door of Hope with our emphasis on music, it has been a really unique thing. It comes out of the guy who planted the church, Josh White. He’s the other main teaching pastor and he is a musician, so that’s been his thing.

That helps!

And also if he wasn’t a pastor his other career would be interior design, so he's got a thing for aesthetics and design, and it shows, and it’s awesome! He was meant to plant a church in Portland. It was just perfect. 

Of course. He is part and parcel of Portland’s culture.

4. The Visual Approach of Their Videos and Their Intended Context

I have another question that I’ve been wrestling with as I look at your materials at The Bible Project. Something that my church talks a lot about is that as Christians and Evangelicals, we are people of the Word. The Word is what unites us and the Word is our life. So something that my pastor brings up is how many offshoots in Christianity become quite image centred. You look at Eastern Orthodox streams or even Catholics. And so, coming out of the Reformation, we are people of the Word, even in our Jewish roots. 

So then, think of how our culture used to be word centred (think of the majority of our past’s media and entertainment). But today I would say that about 80% of our media is visual. Our culture communicates in a more visual style. I think that’s one of the secrets to The Bible Project is that you communicate that way too.

Yup.

Do you see a conflict there? How do you maintain a Word-centredness while using a visual language?

That’s a good question.

We’re not trying to replace people’s experience with the Scriptures. I think we are trying to provide a tool that makes them coherent, understandable, and approachable. If anything, one of my goals for the videos is that someone watching them goes, “Oh, I want to go read the book of Genesis!” But at the same time, the Scriptures are united to living church communities that are themselves being shaped by the Scriptures too, so there is that ecclesial element of encountering Scripture within the web of relationships of other disciples. 

“We’re not trying to replace people’s experience with the Scriptures. We are trying to provide a tool that makes them coherent, understandable, and approachable.”

How do your videos point to that?

We want to make them accessible and easy and that churches would want to adopt and use. 

Okay. So even if you are throwing them up on YouTube for some guy to find all by himself, the intent is for communities to use them.

Totally. They are getting airtime in churches all over the planet. It’s really cool! 

I’m a huge fan of people not trying reading the Bible on their own. I think you can do so, but we only stand to be enriched and helped when we read them in community. So I think the videos are a way of reading the Bible in community and helping give people tools. Nothing replaces a community of disciples learning to follow Jesus, immersing themselves in the scriptures, and being a people of the scriptures. That’s an irreplaceable factor.

It comes back to discipleship, just like with the artists.

Yes, that’s exactly right. So in that sense, we are creating a tool that helps people do what is the most important thing, but it’s also a form of outreach. 

“Nothing replaces a community of disciples learning to follow Jesus, immersing themselves in the scriptures, and being a people of the scriptures. That’s an irreplaceable factor.”

Oh yes. An amazing form of outreach!

We are trying not to use any Christian lingo in order to make it understandable to anybody.

So you’re not using lingo. What are other approaches that are in the back of your head when you plan these videos that give them such broad culture speak?

Well it’s just… I use the words that I would use to explain it. Laughs. And again, part of that’s my story.  I didn’t grow up with the Bible. I was a young adult really encountering this as new world and was really, really thrown by it. I loved Jesus, but the Bible was challenging for me!  So I had to reconcile myself to it and work with it and I ended up finding it beautiful and amazing.

Challenging in its approach or challenging in its implications?

Oh, challenging in its content! And like why… what is this?

So you’re having that experience at the back of your head as you are planning and teaching.

Yes, just my own journey. What do I do with sacrifice and atonement? What is going on here? How I explain it to myself, alongside everything I’ve learned and read, is then what makes it into the videos. I’m making the videos partly for myself, to use! Or they come from materials I worked out in classes I taught that I’m now putting into videos. And then Jon helps, because he's got that gift of making things concise and boiling it down. So he’s another layer where theological jargon gets removed to make it just very approachable.

When you’re doing a video, whether it’s a theme video or a book video, do you have a certain audience in mind? The other half of that question is when you look at the whole scope of The Bible Project, is there an overarching Gospel or message you are trying to communicate?

I think it depends. Book videos are trying to unpack each book by its own literary design, themes, and message, and then how it fits in to the overarching story. And so that is just what it is. Hence, we don’t mention Jesus unless he is mentioned in the book. I am bringing out a lot of the messianic themes. We haven't yet done that many Old Testament books in the sketchbook series, but when we do that it will become more clear. But even for the Passover video, we bring out elements like the cross and blood dripping down, so those kinds of things.

“In as much as the story of the Bible is the story of the Gospel, then yes, every video is unpacking the Gospel from these different angles, as sub-themes throughout the Bible. Whether people realize it or not, we are trying to reframe how the people think about the story of the Bible, how this includes, well…everything!”

And the theme videos?

For the theme videos, that’s where the action is. Every one is structured as we run it through the biblical narrative, so the prophets are pointing forward to the messianic kingdom and Jesus’ realization of that kingdom is the pivot. In every video, that’s the pivot. So in as much as the story of the Bible is the story of the Gospel, then yes, every video is unpacking the Gospel from these different angles, as sub-themes throughout the Bible. Those are fun because they are synthetic, big synthesis projects. Whether people realize it or not, we are trying to reframe how the people think about the story of the Bible, how this includes, well… everything! The Bible is pretty encompassing. It is training that will mess with your mind. So those are really fun. To put those concepts into accessible language, I know it is really helpful for me. 

 5. What’s Next for The Bible Project

I’m thinking about how The Bible Project came together and I see God’s hand at work through the right people, with the right background, at the right time. I see how the church provided a financial and pastoral influence on it. Then obviously, there is the huge stage of planning and just putting a lot of hard work and thought and being very deliberate about it. And now we have the crowd funding element keeping it alive. So when you look at what’s going on here, if you had unlimited resources, time, people, and money, what else would you do? What other potential is there for churches and the body of Christ to do stuff that your doing?

Well, yes, that’s a good question. Right now I’m still a deer in the headlights for what we need to get done by next September!

Is that the deadline?

For this phase of the project, yes. We’ve broken it up; we are going to do every book of the Bible in the sketchbook style by next Fall. We’re going to crank out a theme video every month and a half, we have all those lined up. And then we’re prototyping — actually this week we launched the design phase — a series we are going to do on how to study the bible. It will be a 15 part series with skills in reading different the literary genres, that kind of thing. It think it will be awesome! So, once that phase is done… I mean, we have a lifetime of theme videos we could make. So we’ll just keep turning out those. I want to do a series on the history and the making of the Bible — the cannon, the manuscripts, stuff like that, it’s a big interest of mine. And then Jon wants to do a Holy Land series where we do a hybrid of animation and onsite filming, going to different places.

My dream would be that the channel has just hours and hours and hours of content that is free, that someone could walk away with. Another phase of it would be, not that I want to do this, but creating experiences with the videos and shaping it into a curriculum that is free. Like a free online seminary education. And then that is paired up with the translation phases that Ken has his mind around. Making it all available for free! So that a seminary in, say, Kenya, that doesn’t have a huge library but the videos could be available in Swahili, and they could take pastors through it. You know what I mean? They could read through the Bible in one year, while working through the videos with the interactive materials we would create.

How does that change culturally?

Oh that’s a great question and I have no idea. Laughs. But, I’ve thought about that.

“My dream would be that the channel has just hours and hours and hours of content that is free, that someone could walk away with.”

But you’re keeping it pretty… it’s just the text. 

Sure. But even the way that I would think about doing it is shaped by the fact that I grew up here. And the questions that I think need answering aren’t necessarily the questions that a Kenyan Christian would need answering. And so… I don’t know the answer to that one. I’m just making them. Narrative is a universal language, there is something there that is universal. And the Bible is universal that way. But there’s probably lots of how we are framing itthat would feel very Western to, say, a Chinese christian. 

Yet it is the story of the Bible. When you look at guys like the folks in EE-TAOW, where they go off to some culture and they learn the culture, but they still tell the narrative of the Bible.

Right, tell the story. Yes, EE-TAOW! I remember that.

6. Bi-vocational Ministry and Other Advice

Well, thanks so much.

Yeah, Daniel. I think my biggest encouragement is, if biblical theological education is exciting to you, just go for it, man. It’s so fun. And I think the other piece is that if teaching is your passion, the way to get better at it is just to do it, especially if you are given opportunities. I remember when I would teach anything. I would teach a Sunday School class with 8 people in a church in Vancouver if I could get the chance. Doing so also forced me to develop materials. When you can start developing materials, over time you you can morph and adapt and grow and pretty soon you realize, “Holy cow, I could teach a class with this!”

And in fact, that’s where the materials you are using now came from. 

Right. Very little of the content for any of our videos are being made from scratch. It’s almost always adapting something that I’ve done, perhaps a sermon series.

Which keeps the workload a little easer.

“There is a value of weaving your life into the culture of the city, but having it overlap with the culture of the church, as opposed to being very separatist or distinct.”

That’s true. It’s also born out of its context, which is in the church. 

And you know that it is going to work in terms of teaching.

I don’t know if you’re seeing it here in your context of Portland but something that I’ve seen at Calvary Grace, my church in Calgary, is that a lot of the staff are bi-vocational. And it’s something that I actually really appreciate, having come from a church that wasn’t at all. Because these guys aren’t in the office all day, talking to Christians. They know the trials of life and the struggles. 

My life is very different now than I thought it would have been four years ago. I thought I would have had an English liberal arts degree under my belt, but that’s very expensive now especially with the dollar changing. Now I’ve been working in technology for a while; I’m learning what work is and how to appreciate it, I’m learning about the culture more, and so I’m very thankful for what God done. But also thinking, how I can build skills? Would you see that bi-vocational approach continuing?

That’s interesting. I think it depends on the context. There is just a basic reality to the fact that if you can give more time to thing, then it will benefit from the more time you give to it. But a lot of it is built up in the philosophy of ministry and mission that a particular church would have. So if the value is that we want the personal lives of even our pastoral staff to be as woven into the community… But you have to compensate for that in some way. Because somebody’s got do stuff to make the church operate, even at the basic level. But I think there’s something to it.

For example, the way we’ve done it at Door of Hope is that, myself, Josh, and Evan, we all have significant creative projects on the side, or for me now, half of my job. These projects keep us engaged in our areas of interest. For example, Evan has a band that is quite successful here in Portland and he tours regularly. He just fits that into his life.  He’s full time at the church, but built into that he can take off these weeks and a lot of show time. And half of the people he pulls into his band are musicians in the church, so it’s all connected. There is a value of weaving your life into the culture of the city, but having it overlap with the culture of the church, as opposed to being very separatist or distinct. So that’s another way to do it. Find a way for vocation to overlap inside and outside the church. I think it just depends. I think by-vocational, in many setting, works because of its financial stability! It’s easier to float a church financially that doesn’t need full time employees.

So then in closing, having had this chat, do you have any recommendations in terms of how to do school? Would you do a communications degree at the local place and then do Bible?

I don’t have lot’s of great advice. Everyone is different, depending on the season of life. The game is changing where you can gain skill-sets in lots of different ways outside of the traditional university system, and then if you have job experience and relationships… But there is something in biblical theological education that is irreplaceable; where you have a season of life where you just focus and you get to be be around folks who have done that for a long time. That is rad. It was such a privilege to sit with some of the professors that I did and work with them. That is something that is unique that you can’t get from online courses.

It’s that community we talked about. The discipleship.

Exactly.

It’s been really encouraging to hear your story. God led you down this path and he will do it again, just in different ways. 

That’s exactly right.

Tim shares with Jon an insight on the book of Proverbs as they prepare the outline for an upcoming video. You can learn more about this process here.

An Exposition of Mark 4:35-41

During the summer of 2015, I took part in a course held at my church called Understanding God's Story. Its goal was to teach the basics of biblical hermeneutics, a fancy word for understanding what a passage of the Bible means and how to apply it to our lives. As an assignment, we were given a short story from the Gospel of Mark and were asked to prepare a Bible study or talk unpacking the passage's context, message, and application. 

It was satisfying to take a passage of Scripture I have heard or read a hundred times and get under its skin and better understand what it was trying to say. I thought it would be fun to post the finished results here. (The picture I included because it's kind of epic and comes from my childhood picture Bible.)

“On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us go across to the other side.” And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. He said to them, “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?” And they were filled with great fear and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”          

~Mark 4:35-41 (English Standard Version)

From the very first phrase of this story, “on that day, when evening came”, we are forced tounderstand its context. Which day is Mark referring to? The author, in his quick-paced, fast-cut storytelling, makes it tricky to discern when exactly this day began, but a glance back through Mark 4 tells us that Jesus, after a busy season of miracles and interactions, had spent the day teaching to a very large crowd gathered around the sea of Galilee, followed by private explanations of these teachings to his disciples. That day has now ended and Jesus is clearly exhausted, so he asks his disciples to take him across the sea in their boat. As professional boatsmen, the disciples set about this ordinary task, allowing the exhausted Jesus time for some much-needed sleep on the boat's cushion (probably a heavy basalt-type bag). 

Sudden windstorms are common on the Sea of Galilee and one quickly appears. The disciples would have been used to such waves, but this storm quickly grows beyond their control. They are now fearing for their lives. Waking Jesus from his deep sleep, they accost him in verse 38 (“Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”) There is sense of irony to this accusation. Isn’t Jesus a guest in their boat? Aren't they the professional sailors? Yet here they are, demanding from their passenger perhaps not a solution, but least some wakeful sympathy.

Jesus wakes up and “rebuked the wind and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!”  The word “rebuke” is an odd one to use in this context. One rebukes a child who is acting immature in front of dinner guests, not the wind and the sea for showing their power. The word used here means to “express strong disapproval of someone; to warn.”  It is as if Jesus were the master of an estate chiding his dogs after they’ve terrified his guests. “Be quite! That will do!”. Once ferocious, the animals are now in submissive control.  And indeed, at Christ’s command "the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.” 

“Calm” is an appropriate phrase to describe what must have followed. One can almost picture the silence in that moment; the crashing waters slowly returning to an evening ripple, the boat’s wild plunging replaced by a gentle rocking; the disciples catching their breaths and then staring wide eyed at their master who now asks a simple question. “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?” 

By asking these two questions Jesus seems to imply that the disciples should have known that he had this power and should have trusted who he is. Why should the disciples have known this? Specifically, why does Jesus use the word “still”? Flipping back through the earlier chapters of Mark, we see that Jesus had already revealed his wisdom and authority through his preached word, by healing many who were sick, and by casting out many demons (whom he warned not to reveal his true nature). And regularly Jesus would hint at his identity, most clearly in the healing of the paralytic in Mark 2. We are still four chapters away from Peter’s definite statement that Jesus is “the Christ, Son of the Living God”. But Jesus has already revealed his power.

Jesus’ rebuke in verse 40 implies that the disciples were missing something. Taking a closer look at the long portion of Jesus' words that precedes this story, we see Jesus explaining to the crowd, then in fuller detail to his disciples, the nature of the kingdom of heaven. Again and again he talks about hearing; “listen!” in verse 3, “he who has ears to hear, let him hear” in verse 9, “hear the word” in verses 16, 18, 20, and “pay attention to what you hear” in verse 24. The definitive statement is to his disciples in verses 11 and 12: “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, so that

“they may indeed see but not perceive,

and may indeed hear but not understand,

lest they should turn and be forgiven.”

With this context in mind, how can we interpret the disciples's behaviour? They have been around Jesus enough to see his power and authority. They have been chosen by him and are committed to following him. During their time of teaching on the shore of Galilee they were warned to pay attention, but when on the surface of that sea they did not see, or remember, in Whose presence they were in. They saw but they did not perceive. 

This awakened realization is driven home by the next sentence. “And they were filled with great fear and said to one another, ‘Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?’” Earlier the disciples were described as “afraid”, using a word which means “lacking confidence, cowardly, timid.” Now, in the safety of the tamed environment they are filled with “great fear” (meaning “the product of an intimidating/ alarming force”) because of their new understanding that this man in their presence rules and controls the wind and the sea. 

Later the disciples and those around Jesus would learn more reasons to fear him. There will also be more examples of how the disciples would continue to “see but not perceive” whom they were with and the purpose for which he was amongst them. But in this story, Mark’s point is clear. The disciples who spent time with Jesus heard but did not understand. It wasn't until they saw his supernatural power their eyes were opened and they were very afraid.

What application is there for us today? I think we learn to believe, fear, and trust.

We see that belief requires more than just hearing. The disciples were exposed to Jesus day in and day out, yet even after his teaching they failed to understand who he was. Do we, who are exposed to Jesus’ words again and again, believe and understand? Do we recognize this distinction and how it applies to both our lives and the lives of those with whom we share God's Word?

We also see that the proper response to the presence of God amongst us is fear. Do we fear the God who rules this world more than we fear this world that he rules? 

Despite his followers's lack of faith and despite his power, Jesus cared for his disciples and calmed the storm. As his followers, do we trust him in ways the disciples did not? Since he has opened our eyes and given us a new nature enabling believe, let us trust him and fear not. As it says in Romans 8:15: “For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear [the same word used in Mark 4], but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’”

A Found Poem from the Book of Second Chronicles

I've been reading through Second Chronicles this month and was struck by the banality of evil in the face of the righteousness of the few. Listed are the so many evil kings who forsook the Lord, but they are spoken of and forgotten, the writer focusing instead on the deeds of those who sought the Lord. And amongst the many names and years, the drudgery and repeatedness of our lives, comes the constant nature of our Lord. 

Recently I came across a found poem that used lines extracted from a Focus on the Family movie review. I thought it would be an interesting challenge to create a found poem using only phrases found in 2 Chronicles. I hope it captures a bit of what I described above. 

And he did evil and abandoned the law of the Lord,
Crushed
             Burned
                        Detestable whoredom
                                                  Complete destruction 
                                                                           He made them an object of horror 
For a long time.
He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. 

He reigned for three years in Jerusalem. 
The Lord struck him down
So he died and they buried him. 
He reigned and they buried him. 
The Lord stuck him down and he died.

He did what was good and right in the Lord
The spirit of God came upon him.
And they set their hearts to seek the Lord
That the Lord had chosen.

The noise of the people praising the king, for they listened to the word of the Lord.
He sought the Lord
They humbled themselves
The word of the Lord came.

The word of the Lord came. 
The word of the Lord came.
The Lord is righteous 
The Lord had chosen
And the land had rest for ten years.

For the Lord.

                                       For the Lord.

                                                                                    For the Lord. 

Noah (2014)

This review was originally published in March 2014. The images are from the film and are not my own.

One of my earliest memories is my dad reading to me from Ken Taylor's Bible in Pictures. The images seared in my early memory were far different than the cartoon images in other children's Bibles. They were vivid and realistic, men with muscle and woman with grace. These images were my earliest encounter with the Noah account and one particular image stood out as I watched Darren Aronofsky’s Noah. It was of a wooden ark, tightly sealed, mounted on jagged, painful rocks. Water poured from the sky and gushed off the these stones while desperate men and woman clung on for life while others slipped into the encroaching waves.

Any time Hollywood takes a beloved story and illustrates it on the big screen, scores of angry fans of the book will tear apart any time the adaptation commits infidelity to the text. But if such is the case for a work of fiction, the response is intensified when someone tries to adapt the Bible. It's disappointing that there is such backlash from Christians who have historically had a close relationship with the arts, especially religious art. So it's no wonder recent adaptations safeguard themselves from such response by creating tame and boring films of biblical texts, like the recent Son of God.

So I was rather intrigued when it was announced that Darren Aronofsky was directing a large budget version of this beloved story. Aronofsky is first and foremost an artist who is bound to use his greatest gift, his imagination, in telling this story. And, contrary to what many devote Christians are raving against it, Aronofsky is treating the text with great seriousness, both in details, like the measurements of the ark, and the human themes contained in the account.

Immediately apparent is a distinct visual style. The antediluvian world is depicted as far different than our own. Barren, expansive landscapes are paired with crude ancient clothing, architecture, and artifacts. Of course Aronofsky gives us the expected stunning visual moments that draw us, the audience, in with anticipation - animals surging towards the ark, water springing from the ground and pouring across the earth. Less expected but equally appreciated were the small imaginative details like stop motion flow of time passing while the creator creates and the reoccurring figure of Cain killing Abel as a symbol for man's propensity to violence.

But these broad brush strokes also lumbered, much like the ridiculous and unnecessary fallen angels turned rock giants. Part of the challenge is that this story is so familiar and linear that the director almost has to add extra drama, drama that ultimately weighed down the flow of the film.

Aronofsky’s is deeply concerned with the humans that are at the centre of this story, particularly Noah and his call to obey a God he doesn't understand and isn't quite sure he hears. This was a clear departure from the text in scripture, where God’s message to Noah is explicit and allows many opportunities for the rest of mankind to repent and take refuge in the ark. But this departure results in a fascinating dilemma to materialize. Man is pictured in this film as fallen to his very core, both in his actions and the intent of his heart. It accurately depicts the root of the Fall as wanting to be like God and refusing to allow His word to rule.

At one point, Noah, having seen the extent of human evil in the hoards that surround the ark, comes to realization that this same fallen nature is rooted in him too. His wife insists that he and his children are good, listing off their attributes until Noah interrupts her. “If their lives were at stake , wouldn't you kill others for them?” In coming to this honest realization of his personal propensity to evil, Noah (and his screenwriter) have been more accurate as to the state of humanity then many other recent films.

Noah is left with an intense internal dilemma. Why has God chosen him and his family to continue to live? What has made them so special when the Fall as ruined them too? Don’t they and their innocent offspring deserve death, the same death brought upon their neighbours by the waters around them?

Aronofsky is creating this movie from the perspective of a Jew-turned-athiest, and he doesn’t give an answer. He hints at a possibility through a drunken, naked, and broken Noah on a beach, restoration and reconciliation through new life, and the unspoken promise of a rainbow pulsating from above.

But it is through redeemed eyes that we look back on the story of Noah, seeing grace from judgement offered through one man. We see a God who himself shut the door of the ark, giving many plenty of time to get onboard. We see a family, themselves just as broken as their neighbours, offered mercy through a second chance but we also see a means for this grace to appear. Noah is allowed to live, but his wickedness did not go unpunished. “By faith Noah…” says the writer of the New Testament book of Hebrews. By faith he trusted in the God who saved him and by faith the punishment that he deserved was passed on to another, an innocent man, the God-man made flesh, Jesus Christ. That is my answer to the very important dilemma put forth in the film.

So is this movie perfect? Far from it. Is it an artistic accomplishment? Absolutely. It engages an age-old text, raising serious questions that will result in fascinating discussions; therefore it deserves be seen.

Job: Reflections on a Suffering Servant

This post was originally written in February 2014. 

I just finished reading through Job, a chunk of scripture found towards the middle of the Bible. Job is fascinating from a literary perspective. Forty chapters of rambling Hebrew poetry sandwiched between two chapters of sparse narrative. It's an unusual context. Job, an ancient Middle Eastern patriarch, was 'blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil" (1:1) and God blessed him with offspring, livestock, possessions, and respect from his community. He was utterly exemplary in his behaviour but in verse six the curtain to the heavens is pulled back and we, the audience, are given a rare glimpse into the heavenly courts. "The sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them." Satan, ever the accuser, challenges Job's exemplary behaviour. "Stretch out your hand" he says to the Lord "and touch all that he has and he will curse you to your face."  God gives Satan permission to do this and in swift, relentless strokes, Job is stripped of his servants, oxen, donkeys, sheep, and camels (struck down by Sabeans, fire from heaven, and Chaldeans respectively). But before the news-bearer has finished giving a report of this to Job, another runs up announcing that Job's children, having gathered together in celebration, were killed when the house they were in collapsed. Soon after, Job's health falls apart, his wife urges him to curse God, and he is left covered "head to toe" in sores in an ash heap and scraping himself with broken pottery. But "in all this Job did not sin with his lips."

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The narrative portion of the book ends when Job's three friends come to weep over him. After a weak of weeping, "for his suffering was very great," Job opens his mouth and forty chapters of poetic dialogue begin. The contrast is immediately apparent. Gone are the swift strokes of storytelling and the heavenly perspective. What follows is verbal violence and mud-slinging between the grieving Job, who upholds the claim that he did not sin and that's God's actions towards him are unjust, and his friends, who maintain that God is just and Job is guilty of sin.

The fact is, both these human opinions are incorrect. Job is not being punished for his sin (we know this from the prologue) and yet God's actions are always just. Endless chapters of back and forth dialogue, in which these opinions are hashed and re-hashed, end when God Himself answers Job "from the whirlwind,” accosting Job's understanding. "Where were you when

I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding" is the thrust of his argument. God uses examples of his awesome and intricate power demonstrated in his creation that literally leaves Job with his hand over his mouth. In the face of such intimate and transcendent power and knowledge and such management of the world of nature, what response can Job give? In two short speeches he demonstrates repentance and humility. 

There is plenty to learn from the book of Job and many of written on Job's response to both suffering and the character of God. But there were two aspects of the book that really stood out to me this time through. 

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The first was how the frustrating and messy dialogue between Job and his friends, despite the many wrong ideas and outspoken temper, still resulted in progress in Job's thinking. Much of what Job says is wrong. But through it all, he makes more and more statements that are humble instead of arrogant and express humility and faith in God's fairness. He begins to become aware, especially in chapter 28, that he himself cannot solve his problem through his own reasoning but rather "the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom."

The takeaway for us? Conversations with friends over important issues are worth having, even if wrongheaded ideas are frequently spouted. Working through these issues may grow and mature our understanding, but nothing like the perspective of God himself. 

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Yet there is a second thread running through the book that gives even more hope to the reader who notices it. Hidden between the long and often arrogant speeches are phrases that sound extra familiar to our ears, none of which are as explicate as 19:25-36 when Job declares "I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God." 

These are hints and foretastes (especially chapter 22) of the Redeemer that Job does not see and yet will one day sanctify him. Christ is the one who suffered unjustly far more then Job did, for Job was still conceived in sin and Christ was not. And it is Christ's suffering that makes ours bearable. In the words of George Macdonald "the Son of God suffered unto death, not that men might not suffer, but that their sufferings might be like His." 

Not only is God's wisdom so much higher then ours, but his empathy is routed in the suffering that Christ himself received on our behalf. And if we can learn this from an ancient book of Hebrew poetry, reading it is worth our time indeed. 

Fretting and Resting in 2014

This post was originally written in January 2014.

My friend posted a video on his blog detailing his plans for 2014. Not New Year’s resolutions, (which he labelled as) “bullshit”, but a list of goals he would like to accomplish. They includes things like finishing his book of modern day fairy tales, increasing his average YouTube vieo view count to 300, and shooting a short film. All of them significant yet all of them achievable. And were he to achieve half of these goals, his year will be more influential then my past three.

The end of a year is a time to take stock of the last one and make plans for the next. My goals are less ambitious then Kyle’s. Over the weekend I made a list of books I would like to read in 2014. And looking back over 2013, certain value statements can be made about how I used my time. For example, I read 39 books (three more then what I read last year, 63 less then 2011), watched 72 movies (31 more movies then books), and posted 188 photos to Instagram (leaving 177 days when I posted nothing).

When I stare at these numbers my year looks pretty useless. To hide my guilt  I try to congratulate myself on the difficult course I completed with success, the advancements I achieved in my career, and the new friendships I have formed. But there were friendships left stagment too, time that could have been better spent completing more courses, and money better saved.

Such is time. Regret and loss. Achievement and possibility. I suppose trite lists like the books I have read say little and the lists that I used to keep -highlighting memories savoured and graces given - speak more accurately to time's passing.

Today one of our pastors preached on Matthew 11:25-30. He paused on the opening phrase “At that time, Jesus…” At that time.

The incarnation that we celebrate at Christmas was a space and time event. Again and again in the gospels we are reminded of the particularity of the events they record, events in space and time that reverberate to this day.

So in that context it is interesting to note the last couple verses of that passage. “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

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Our pastor emphasized that this rest is not exactly a rest from our work in this world and our labours against sin, but a rest from our own efforts to achieve salvation.

This salvation is salvation from sin and judgment, but it also includes salvation from our self-worth being bound up in how we spend our time. How fitting it is that we celebrate the space-time event of the the Incarnation (Christmas), which brought about our rest, just before the dawn of a new year.

The rest that has been achieved for us does not mean we rest from our efforts to set goals, to read well, and achieve in 2014 things that give God glory. Yet it does mean that we do all this knowing that our efforts in our space and time are ordained by the same One Who established our salvation in past time and space. And it means that looking back over 2013 we can have peace that what happened happened well. As our pastor said, “Look back on 2013 with rest. Look ahead with rest. Strive to enter this rest and rest in His, our King’s, great work.”