Why does it feel like I never have time to actually write on here? I know, I know -- I could always "write later", but if I do that, I'm completely forget. So, that said, I think I really like this:
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Wheaton tore the Brown House down. But the Brown House lives on in our hearts and now in the blogosphere.
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On a practical note, I'll probably use this in youth group. Thanks, Hannah! :)
I appreciate this post, this article, this pieta for a few reasons. First, it retells the story of Jesus' death in intelligible language that is not watered down. Second, the artist and the church got together and joined forces. Rock on. This needs to happen more. Third, the artist had some form of mission in mind, as evidenced by the quotes included in the article (he was happy that non-church people were walking into the church).
Up until the Reformation, and then in glimpses after (Charles Wesley comes to mind), Christians were artist-extraordinaires. We gloried in representing the creation of the Creator. We gloried in creating because God created. We gloried in creating because God first recreated us in Christ Jesus.
Where is creative expression in the Church today? What has happened in our day that has removed the urgency and desire from Christian circles to pursue the extraordinary and to ask the Lord to empower us to create? "Christian" has become synonymous with "crappy," right, Teetsel? :) When did we give into the world-worshiping mindset that elevates capitalistic venture above God-revealing artistic expression, and how can we reclaim the right to be creative as Jesus-followers?
I don't have any answers. I just know that this pieta will turn WAY more heads than Jesus on the cross, and that means that we Christians have allowed the story of Christ to become stale, acceptable, and even uninteresting. Perhaps the first step we need to take in any attempt to express ourselves as Christian artists is to ask the Lord to strip away the callouses that have hardened us to the "scandal of the cross." Perhaps the first step is to ask God to reopen our hearts and minds to be affected, truly and deeply affected, by the cross of Jesus Christ.
I know that was a random conglomeration of thoughts. It all kind of spewed out before I could put it together coherently. So thank you for reading, and thank you for bearing with the messiness.
Powerful. Can we commission this artist to sculpt Jesus being waterboarded (I think that may be a closer analogy to the cross than the electric chair)?
Perhaps waterboarded and then electrocuted?
For more on Christian art being crappy, see my recent blog re: Doubting Thomas. (Shameless self-promotion)
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