The Problem With Christian Art

First, a disclaimer: This is the first of two posts that I've been agonizing over as I've looked at how to address the issues presented in as strong a manner as possible without being unduly harsh. If you believe this post to be too harsh, I pray that you'll hang with me for the second part which, I hope, will be an encouragement for where we're headed.

I've had a few interesting conversations about music and faith in recent years. Most of these conversations have involved the merit of particular songs or particular artists, but most have also been relegated to the realm of the Christian subculture.

Most Christians that don't know me would assume that I would be a huge fan of Christian music because of my involvement in and love of music for the Church. In a great number of those conversations, people are surprised to learn that I don't care for particular artists that are among the most popular in Christian music. They are often surprised to learn that I'd much rather listen to just about any "secular" hit radio station than any Christian radio station that we get around here or around where we lived in Indiana because, both lyrically and musically, the secular station is going to broadcast a better and broader range of artistic expression.

The thing that has been most interesting in recent conversations is that whether I'm talking with Christians or non-Christians, there's a set of assumptions that accompany conversations about music when faith becomes a part of the dialogue. There's an assumption that Christians should listen to and enjoy Christian music. I played for a youth conference a few years ago where the speaker (a man I admire a great deal) went so far as to say, "I'm a Christian. Of course I listen to Christian music. Why would I listen to anything else?" I wrestled with that statement for some time afterwards and came to the conclusion that it shouldn't be a blanket statement applied to all believers (which was the context he said it in) and, ultimately, it isn't healthy for the creative spirit of Christian art.

I remember when the movie version of "Left Behind" came out. It was a highly anticipated event in Christian circles because of the overwhelming success of the books and the notoriety that they brought in the mainstream media. I admit that I was looking forward to it as well. The studio took a strange approach to the release of the film; they released it on DVD a few weeks prior to releasing it in theaters. The hope was that it would generate positive buzz and that people would see it ahead of time and then invite their friends to the theater to see it. I was fortunate enough to see it on DVD before plunking down my $7 at the theater to see one of the worst movies I have ever seen. In the days leading up to the theatrical release, I was at one of the local Christian bookstores buying some CD's for the church when one of the ladies at the counter wanted to know if she could send some "Left Behind" posters and flyers with me to hang up at the church. I think I surprised her when I said, "No, thanks." She asked me why and I had to tell her that I had already seen it and thought it was a terrible movie, to which she replied, "I thought it was one of the greatest movies I'd ever seen."

There are those that will criticize me for saying this, but there are times that I believe that we will champion just about anything done in the name of Jesus Christ without holding it to the same artistic standard that we will hold just about anything else. Because of this, from my perspective, a lot of the music and other artistic expressions produced by Christian artists leave a lot to be desired from an artistic perspective. While things appear to be on an upswing in this regard, there are still a great number of Christian artists who have successful careers (from a business perspective), but create subpar art.

Makoto Fujimura (New York visual artist and an important voice in faith and culture conversation) in discussing the recent movie "The Chronicles of Narnia" stated that he thought the representation of Aslan was less than it should have been and deserved (and demands) a better telling. He said, instead, that the character of Kong in Peter Jackson's "King Kong" captured a fierceness that was lacking in Aslan and that "Kong somehow manages to create a need for redemption better than Narnia as a film." He pointed out that the character of Aslan is one of the most beloved Christ figures in all of literature and stated that, in terms of the truth behind the story, "where much is given, much is required."

I think that holds true in any realm of art where the Gospel is presented as well. If we compose music, poetry or a painting that lacks quality and creativity, what does that say about the God we serve?

Dwell on that question for a minute.

This is a question that haunts, discourages... and inspires me. It keeps me up at night, makes me dream big dreams and, I believe, is the reason that I am where I am. I believe that God is desiring to see artists of faith equipped and encouraged to create great art that will be incarnational in nature, inspiring people to realize the fullness of His holiness and the depth of our depravity so that we can more clearly see the wonder of His mercy.

How will this happen? More later.

A Night Off

I managed to pick up a flu bug from Xander over the weekend and could really feel it when we got home from church yesterday. Yet again, it would have been a beautiful day for a bike ride, but there was no way I could have done it. I pretty much melted into a puddle on the couch where I stayed most of the day.

Five hours of sleep later, Monday hit and I still was feeling pretty poor. I decided to not infect the office and take the night off. I've been fairly medicated all day, so I feel draggy, but not as bad as yesterday. By staying home I had the chance to see my sister Rena and her girls, Cassie and Lexie. Rena and Lexie are taking piano from Amy and I would normally miss them by the time they come at 3:30.

Since I had a little time on my hands, I updated my teaching resume, sent out my registration for the teaching exam and even applied for a teaching job. I wanted to start looking now as the teaching carousel gets started. There should be one round of openings for the next 4-6 weeks and then another round in May and June as people jump from one school system to another. I'm looking forward to the prospect of being in the classroom and think that the time spent at my current job has been very beneficial in giving me incentive to teach. I also got in touch with a few contacts in the area to let them know that I'm looking and to have some more feelers out as positions become available.

I feel fairly peaceful right now and, as much as I'd love to move on vocationally, I'm content to do what I'm doing until a position comes along. I think I'm a better candidate now than I was when I applied for a teaching position in the fall. I must have reeked of desperation as I thought that job was something of a lifeline for me at the time. I'm much more peaceful, which is manifesting itself in the form of confidence. There was a time when I considered myself a very strong teaching candidate and had a lot of other people telling me what a great teacher I'd be. I may be ten years farther down the road, but I have to believe that I still have the same potential I did then. Hopefully, I'll get the chance to give it a go.

A Great Day for Cycling (except in South Dakota)

Today is a great day for cycling with some great races on the pro cycling calendar. I'm keeping up with Omloop Het Volk, an early season race in Belgium, on cyclingnews.com and will be able to follow today's stage in the Tour of California later today where most of the best American and international riders have been duking it out for the last few days. I love this time of year for cycling because the racing is generally pretty gritty and uncomfortable with cold, the occasional rain and lots of cobblestones to make life interesting.

Unfortunately, even though we have had one of the warmest winters on record so far, I have yet to take to the road myself in 2006. It's frustrating because there have been any number of great riding days (including two this week), but none on the weekends. I would have to skip work to ride on an agreeable day which just isn't happening. I have to hope that life will loosen up enough to allow me to sneak out one of these days or I'll have a hard time getting my early season conditioning going in time for the Tour de Kota in June.

They're in the last 20 km in Belgium, so I'm off to the virtual races.

(Picture by Eddy Van Laere of the Official Het Volk Site (http://omloop.sportwereld.be/omloop/nieuws.html)

The Home Stretch

When I get back from break, I'll only have about 90 minutes left in my work week. Tonight has been absolutely brutal and mentally exhausting. I was running on fumes when I got here tonight. Since then, the price of fuel has soared and I can't afford to pay. I'm hoping I've got enough momentum to just roll to the finish of the week.

Tonight I find myself longing to be able to do something else. I finally got the trumpet out of the basement and filled out my teaching exam registration stuff. Two steps closer to the classroom. I'm beginning to enjoy the thought of it. Especially at 10:30 pm on a Friday.

As for those other posts I promised, they are on their way, but I'm not sure when I'll actually have the mental energy to expend on them. Amy and I are leading worship on Sunday while Hal speaks which means I've got a little more practicing to do tomorrow since several of the songs I've never led before and am just learning. It should be fun, but I don't think I'm going to get a day of complete rest for at least another week.

Back to it.

Wocket Powered Thought

Earlier, Maia and I were reading Dr. Seuss's "There's a Wocket in My Pocket!" which is a book that I've read approximately 8,476,231 times in the last six years, when Maia did something that made me think of it in a new way: she turned the book upside down on the page with the Geeling on the ceiling. This is nothing new. Approximately 2,937,576 of the 8,476,231 times that I've read the book have been in the inverse position. But for whatever reason, this time it meant something else.

I think she looked at the Geeling and saw that something wasn't quite right about him sitting on the ceiling and decided that the way to remedy that was to turn the book upside down so that it looked like the Geeling was sitting on the floor. Of course, the narrator was then sitting upside down, so the success of the experiment was mixed at best.

So, here's the thought that was inspired (I will leave it to you to determine if it was actually an inspired thought or not): If someone were to sit on the ceiling, would they be "sitting up" instead of "sitting down"? Carried to other positional descriptions, would lying on the ceiling actually mean you were lying up? Would standing on the ceiling mean you were actually standing down? How did our more commonly, and gravitationally law abiding, terms come to be in the first place?

Okay, goofy musing at best, but I still kind of enjoy turning words, terms and phrases on their heads to see what I might learn about them.

I am working on a couple of other, more serious posts, but I'm taking some time with them and chipping away at them here and there. I can't guarantee when they'll actually be read by anybody else, but they are in the works.

The Week Thus Far

It's been a different week at work and at home. At work, Kim (our manager) has been in Mexico with her son and passed the baton to me to coordinate scheduling issues with our workforce management team in Jacksonville. It's been kind of fun, but a bit hectic. The beginning of the week I was having to tell them who wanted what time off and when (we have had VTO available all week). By Tuesday, they wanted us to make our own individual VTO requests online which meant that I then got to check in with Jax to make sure that everything was going okay. We've kept that system up the rest of the week and have had other system glitches that have had me on the phone frequently with them, but I've rather enjoyed the sense of responsibility. Hopefully, I haven't behaved as though I am mad with power, but you'd have to ask my co-workers.

At home, we've been without the kids since Wednesday afternoon. They're at my folk's while Amy's been doing jewelry parties tonight and in the morning. Yesterday, Amy took Xander to the eye doctor for a checkup and took Maia which gave me the chance to finish spending my Valentine's money. We had decided a few weeks ago to buy jeans for each other (I know, romantic) and went out on VD morning with the kids. Amy found what she wanted, but I was hoping to squeeze a pair of jeans and a shirt out of the $30 that I had and couldn't seal the deal that day. So, I went again Wednesday and wound up with jeans and two shirts courtesy of the $4.77 prices on the clearance rack at Penney's. I told Amy that I've actually gotten to the point where I enjoy clothes shopping. I'm stuck wearing nicer clothes than I could get away with at the church for work, and I've gotten rather bored with what I've had, so the two shirts will give me a bit more to work with.

Since the kids are gone and Amy will be doing a party in the morning, I'm hoping to do a little recording and writing. I'm hoping to record the content of the sermon that I did in Sheldon last month to make available as a podcast. I've never created a podcast before, so it may take a little while for me to get that to the point where it's available. I'll be sure to include any news about that here.

I've also got a few short segments of songs for our CD project with Hal, but they are far from resembling a complete song, so I'm hoping to do a little crafting of those. If those don't seem to be working, I may just try to write some lyrics without worrying about the melody, shop them around to Hal and Amy and see if between the three of us we can make something useful out of them. Hal has been working on a song that he played for me yesterday that I love. He had part of it done the week before, but reset the harmonies and style of the song in a way that I absolutely love. He's got a great palette with melody and harmony and I think he'd do a better job with any text I could come up with than I can, so I'm thinking about trying to contribute more lyrically and allow some cowriting to happen.

I should probably get some sleep or I'll be too tired for either project that I have in mind for the morning. Hopefully I won't get bogged down in technical junk and will be able to fully explore both of the things that I have in mind for the morning, but somehow I suspect nothing will be as easy as I'm hoping.

Tests of Sanity and Trains of Thought

This morning has been a true test of sanity. Amy had to leave early for a friend's house early before Bible Study and Xander and I have been listening for Maia cry almost non-stop for the last 90 minutes. No reason other than a generally ill tempered disposition. I finally put her back to bed for a little "Maia time" which may lead to an early nap. Sometimes she just needs to be removed from the stimulus of the rest of the house to get a grip. Unfortunately, she's driven my mood straight into the crapper on a day that is often a challenge of my mood to begin with. I'm hoping there's enough time before I go to work to get myself back on track, otherwise nine hours will feel like nine days.

I have a tendency to struggle with my mood at this time of year anyway. Cabin fever, cold temps and an approach to winter that borders on hibernation all make keeping my mood up a challenge. I thought I was doing a little better as evidenced by what happened when my iPod decided to reset on Friday a few hours before work. Normally, this would have sent me in a downward spiral that would have brought those cartoon angry clouds over my head for days, but it didn't really phase me much. Never mind the fact that I was now left with the prospect of having to reload over 3600 songs back on the iPod, most of which I would need to reload from the CD's as I opted to not store the 15 GB or so of music on my hard drive. This test of sanity was passed with flying colors which is what makes my reaction to this morning's test all that much more frustrating.

I've had several times over the last week where I've found myself thinking about things that I normally would have written about, but I can't seem to ride the trains long enough to have concrete lines of thinking or even nuggets that I could return to for later exploration. I've thought about spiritual life as journey, salvation theology, predestination vs. free will and other topics that are of little practical use, but are good stretching exercises. Unfortunately, I keep having to pull away from the thoughts to do other things and by the time I'm ready to return, the train is a thousand miles away and all I'm left with is the memory of their sound on the tracks.

It's been frustrating because I find myself really wanting to write and really wanting to have something to say, but I'm left with having to document thoughts that are seldom connected other than by their residence in my mind.

Another Monday

The pacing of my week since my schedule change is taking a little getting used to. Monday is Monday, Tuesday is like Friday, Wednesday is like Saturday (even though I work four hours), Thursday is Monday again and Friday, Saturday and Sunday get to star as themselves. This means that today is my second Monday of the week. I hope it's better than Monday proper was at work this week. I had a really slow, tired day and don't wish for a repeat performance. The good news? Tomorrow is Friday again.

Wednesdays are filled with social occasions surrounding my four hours at work (which by the time you factor in my break and clean up time is really only 3.5 hours). I've got lunch with Hal and a few other guys from church and get to play guitar for a few hours after my shift is up, so it's kind of hard to think about it as a work day.

We got home at about 9:30 last night and discovered that we were missing the Grammys (a huge night for U2) and had failed to tape "Lost" yet again. I'm hoping that Eric Tivo'd it so I can borrow a tape, otherwise it's another missed new episode that we'll have to settle for reading about. I had some thoughts of watching my U2 "Rattle and Hum" DVD (which I got at Wal Mart for under $5 last weekend) in celebration of U2's night at the Grammys, but we turned in earlier than usual instead.

Half Speed

I feel like I'm moving at half speed tonight. I'm tired, have a slight cold and can't convince myself that I have it in me to concentrate the way I need to. I also can't afford to take time off and go home, even though VTO was offered (yet again).

I'm at the halfway point of my shift and have managed to hold it together thus far, but I keep finding myself staring at mail as though I was actually reading it, but comprehending nothing that is on the page. The easiest tasks are requiring me to re-read a letter two or three times to see if I'm understanding it correctly.

Nights like this don't happen often, but when they do they seem to last forever. That would pretty much sum up tonight. I've already sent a pretty solid salvo of caffeine after the problem to no avail. Not sure how long the next 4.5 hours will take in "Mattland".

Break's up. Back to it.

More Human Than I Mean to Be

I found myself say to Tory last night at work that I wish I could stop being so schizophrenic. I seem to be on a never ending roller coaster between having great days and horrible days with very little in between. My life reads like the Psalms right now with great occurrences where God is incredibly present and depressions that suck the joy out of anything that I encounter.

Thankfully, today was a good day. Good days are always better for me to reflect on our current situation to get a better scope of the terrain. You see a lot more from the mountain top than the valley floor. I've decided that I'm glad I'm as human as I've been feeling lately. At least people that see me and know about my faith get the picture that Christian living doesn't make me into some species that doesn't resemble who they are. I've seen too many Christians that seemed to spend every waking second of every day in some sort of Stepford stupor that just reeks of inauthenticity. I try to be nothing if not authentic.

Amy had a great day today. She got to go to one of the local high schools to "audition" with one of the teachers who might recommend her for voice lessons for some of her students. Amy received rave reviews and got a much needed ego stroke out of the experience. I told her that if they thought she sang well, they should be even more impressed with her teaching. Even if she wasn't my wife, as a musician I would go on the record as saying that she is a great voice teacher. I thought when she taught at IWU that she was better than anybody they had there. She gets more out of less than almost any teacher that I know. Of course, she learned from great teachers like Brad Dighton and Frank Aiello and does them proud to carry the torch.

I really think that the studio is going to pick up for Amy in the weeks ahead. She's added a few new students this week and, with the contacts she is making, should be able to pick up more as contest season approaches. I'm excited for her. I'm also relieved, because finances have been very tight.

Work ran the gamut of emotions this week. We had a lot of people gone this week with a lot of voluntary time off offered due to a lack of mail for us to work. It makes for a more relaxed atmosphere when there's less people and less activity. I was the only person on the team to actually work a full 40 hours this week (not a judgment against anybody else who took VTO since I wish that I could have joined them). Eric showed up with Mr. Pibb and Red Vines tonight, which, as anyone who has ever tried really knows, equals crazy delicious.

The low point at work came when Patricia came in on Wednesday afternoon after having an MRI done the night before. She's been having some problems and they were able to confirm that she does have a tumor. As she described it, it reminded me a lot of when Christal Helm (our Pastor's daughter and great friend from Hanfield) had a tumor a few years ago in high school. Christal had the surgery and is doing great now. I find myself believing that the same will be true for Patricia, but I just don't know. My heart breaks for her as I think about the uncertainty of what she's facing right now. I'm glad that I've been given the opportunity to work with her, to be her friend and to, hopefully, bring hope. I don't think she realizes how much she is loved or prayed for.

God, do what you desire. Move in this situation in Patricia's life and be glorified in it. May she have a truer understanding of who she is in Your eyes while she walks through this. Bring comfort. Bring peace. Bring hope. Be who You are and give her a glimpse.

Amen

Workshop Ideas

Amy and I have talked a little over the past few days about the possibility of putting together some ideas for different workshops that we could do for churches regarding worship ministry topics. The thought is that we could potentially do workshops around the area with churches looking to start, tweak or revamp their worship ministries or for groups of churches either within denominational districts or in conference settings. It would help scratch our ministry itch and also bring in a little extra income.

We've done enough of this kind of thing and received strong enough feedback to think that we'd actually be pretty good at it. We've talked about worship planning (especially thematic planning), worship evangelism and vocal workshops including basic vocal skills and worship leading techniques among others. We'll have to do some more intentional planning in order to get the word out and I don't know how long it will take to get a few workshops set up. It's the kind of thing that I think could generate pretty decent word of mouth and keep us fairly occupied, but time will tell.

In the meantime, I'm still plugging away at the job; looking for another, but content for the time being. Amy is seeing an increase in her piano and voice studio and hopes to pick up some more with her jewelry biz.

We're also in the process of trying to rent our Indiana house. We've had a few calls about it. Amy said that one lady called and seemed a bit less than honest. When Amy asked her for a reference, she said, "Well, I suppose you could call my current landlord, but he probably wouldn't be too happy to find out I'm breaking my lease with him." Takes all kinds. We did have one that asked about the possibility of rent-to-own, but she hasn't even seen the place yet, so we're not going to get our hopes up too much. Amy was in bed when I got home, so I don't know if we had any other calls about it tonight.

Speaking of bed...