Now the Lord
spoke to Moses, saying, “See, I have called by name Bezalel,
the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah. I
have filled him with the Spirit of God in wisdom, in understanding, in
knowledge, and in all kinds of craftsmanship, to make
artistic designs for work in gold, in silver, and in bronze, and in the
cutting of stones for settings, and in the carving of wood, that he may work in
all kinds of craftsmanship. Exodus 31:1-5 NASV
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Exodus+31&version=NASB
+++++++++++++++++
John Wrote on Sunday, December 11, 2016 10:07 AM
Hey Dana
A couple of years ago,
our church had an outside ministry come in. It was Light of the World
Christian Ballet (LWB) http://www.
lightoftheworldballet.com/ That was just at the time that our grandson,
Nick, was heading off to the Nutmeg Conservatory in CT to begin his formal
career training toward being a professional ballet dancer. Of course,
since I came from a salvation background that began in an Assembly of God church,
dancing was almost verboten, especially in church; but as LWB ministered through ballet it was
Godly and the viewer could actually grasp the message. (Before I was saved,
while never the best dancer, I did enjoy a polka at a wedding or the Twist when
I was younger or a close up slow dance with a pretty partner.) Because we gave
money to the secular conservatory, I felt we had to give that much, and
more, to the Christian ballet company. Each time we've given, Ashley Rollinson,
the Director, has taken time and effort to genuinely thank us, and
encourage us spiritually. Each of her
notes has greatly encouraged me.
I
think we should do an initial post on Christians and/in the arts--music, dance,
painting, writing, sculpting, etc. What
do you think?
Yours for the Harvest
+++++++++++++++++++++++
Dana Wrote onTue, Dec 13, 2016 at 2:21 PM
Hey John
You wrote:
"I
think we should do an initial post on Christians and/in the arts--music, dance,
painting, writing, sculpting, etc....What do you think?"
Very interesting subject,
I'll start putting some things
together. If you have any preliminary ideas, e-mail them to me and I'll
use them as a springboard. But, good idea.
Merry Christmas!
"Tidings of
comfort and joy!"
Dana
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Later John Wrote as
a draft
Hey Dana
Years ago, I can't remember if it
was before I started writing, or after, I bought the book Addicted to
Mediocrity, 20th Century Christians and the Arts, by Franky
Schaeffer. This is Francis Schaeffer's son. https://www.amazon.com/Addicted-Mediocrity-Franky-Schaffer/dp/0786103892 Starting with the cover, the theme is
trumpeted by a painting of a hand holding a roller of white paint, rolling
over Michelangelo's famous painting of David on the ceiling of the Sistine
Chapel. In Franky's (note: throughout this post, I refer to Schaeffer by
his first name in the hopes of eliminating any confusion with his well known
father Francis Schaeffer) introduction, he writes, " The area of
creativity therefore is no minor footnote to the Christian life, but is an
essential. The trouble is, much of the church...have forgotten how central this
part of our life is and have therefore wound up poverty-stricken in the
enjoyment of ...above all, God himself." The first illustration in the
book shows a gallows, with a minister as the hangman. Four nooses drape from
the bar above. A noose is tight around 'the neck' of an artist's paint
brush, of a trumpet, of a ballet toe shoe, and of an ink pen.
Franky goes on, on page 16,
"The arts...(have) been relegated to the bottom drawer of Christian
consciousness, despised outright as unspiritual or unchristian." He goes
on to say this attitude "...has caused many problems for individuals--so
many unnecessary guilt feelings and so much bitter fruit..." How he
finishes this thought is, I believe, the crux of the problem, "taking us
out of touch with the world God has made, with the culture in which we live,
and making us ineffectual in that culture."
When I began to write, at what I
thought then, and still believe today was God's leading, I don't remember any
encouragement from my fellow Christians. I did get comments like, "When
are you going to get a real job." or "What are you going to do
for a day job?" I will admit, while it was often interesting, i.e.
concerning the various articles I wrote, people I interviewed, and
things I did to get the story, it was never easy. I used to liken it to
trying to reach down my throat and pull up and out an octopus that had wrapped
its tentacles around my intestines. The octopus was the article I was trying to
write. I was a Christian who was a writer, not a Christian writer. 80% of my
work was for secular publications, verses friends who only wrote Christian
material for Christian publications.
At the back of his book Franky has a
Q and A. On page 69 one questioner asks if this addiction to mediocrity is only
found as a pervasive attitude among “middle-class evangelical churches and
people, or does it cut across all of Christendom?” He answers, “This
utilitarian view of the arts by Christians in our century...led to the idea
that unless one was writing a hymn (or other Christian materials or
articles)..., one could not be serving God with one’s art.”
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Dana,
after a time, answered on Fri, Feb 17, 2017
Hi John,
For a while we’ve been kicking around the
idea of doing a blog about the arts. In
our most recent round of emails regarding Hymns, (as I understand it) you
brought up a song leader who wanted to “jazz” up a traditional hymn a la this
particular musician’s style.
Your thought was, if I might paraphrase,
“Leave it alone! If you want to play or sing one of this particular musician’s
songs, do it, but don’t mess with the hymn.”
I feel your pain.
The same thing bothers me about the
singing of the “Star Spangled Banner” at sports events. It is irksome to see some pop star du jour go
out and completely personalize [aka butcher] the song to their particular style
of entertainment to the point where it is almost unrecognizable. Maybe it’s just a generational thing, and I
have lived long enough to have become a grumpy old man. OK, granted, but it still bothers me. With you I cry out, “Leave it alone,” and,
with Elvis, I’m looking for my horse pistol so as to shoot out the TV
screen. But that’s just me.
All that aside, our e-talks got me to
thinking about the arts, and how they relate to Christianity, or how should
Christians relate to the arts? That I’m
entering a potential mine field is not lost to me, as my views may seem to
others, a bit controversial. While it is
not actively debated very often, what is art and what is not, and what is
Christian art and what is secular art are subjects that can liven up any home
Bible study group, if not outright start an argument.
In my opinion and it’s just my opinion, we
(the Church) put way too much stock in the line dividing what’s sacred and
secular. We’ve got strange notions about
what’s right and what’s wrong with art in the popular culture. One of the 800 pound gorillas in the room is
rock music. Ooooooo, cue the “Twilight
Zone” theme, rock music. Rock music is
evil, ooooooo. Is it?
Well, I’m not so sure about that. Music is music. Music is a combination of sounds generated by
human or mechanical means in repetitive, mathematical order. Of course, if we get to hear angels sing in
Heaven, then it would be a combination of sounds generated by supernatural or
mechanical (at least one angel has a trumpet) means in repetitive, mathematical
order. It is not a living, moral
entity. It’s a thing, not a life form,
hence devoid of either good or evil intrinsically.
We in Christian circles have historically
tended towards assigning moral values to inanimate objects—sort of a reverse
pantheism, if you will. Think of some of
the rhetoric used in the pre-prohibition days.
There was talk of the “demon rum.”
Really? Rum, the distilled
essence of fermented molasses is of the devil?
Did the devil create it? We must
be careful here, no matter what our stance on the consumption of alcohol may
be, in that we do not assign creative abilities to the devil. He creates or has created nothing. He himself is a created being.
In more modern times we speak of the
“devil weed” marijuana. Wait a minute
one more time, didn’t God create all the vegetation on this planet? If we believe God did indeed create all
living organisms on earth, then why are we crediting the devil for marijuana?
Perhaps we might try to phrase things a
bit differently. First we must recognize
that inanimate objects are not imbued with moral qualities—they are morally
neutral. It’s what man does with them
that points to the good or evil light in which they are cast. The old 2nd Amendment argument,
Guns don’t kill people; people kill people.
There is an interesting passage in Mark
7:14-23, where Jesus says:
14 And
he called the people to him again and said to them, “Hear
me, all of you, and understand: 15 There
is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the
things that come out of a person are what defile him.” 17 And
when he had entered the house and left the people, his disciples asked him
about the parable. 18 And he said to
them, “Then are you also without understanding? Do you
not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him,
19 since it enters not his heart but his
stomach, and is expelled?” (Thus he declared
all foods clean.) 20 And he said, “What comes out of a person is what defiles him. 21 For from within, out of the heart of man, come
evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, 22 coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy,
slander, pride, foolishness. 23 All
these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.” (ESV)
Now I’m not advocating adding to the
Scriptures, or changing them, for yea, I have read and do clearly understand
the very end of Revelation when it comes to so doing, but could one interpret
the line “(Thus he
declared all foods clean”) as perhaps pertaining to all substances in
general?
My point is, if one purchases a bottle of
rum (I’m not advocating such—this is just an illustration, bear with me here,)
and takes it home and puts it up on a shelf in the very back of the closet, and
leaves it there unopened, does it (the rum) have the power to violate the
purchaser’s will, and entice him or her to open it and drink it? To think so would be silly. It has no powers and it has no voice. It is inanimate, neither good nor evil.
That is not to make light of the devil’s
ability to beguile, deceive and tempt—he is a real and malevolent force. But we must be clear about who is doing the
tempting—Satan or the bottle of rum up on the closet shelf? And, we must
refrain from assigning moral value to things that are not living beings,
whether human or non-human.
Perhaps the point is over belabored, but
the same principle applies to the arts.
If one speaks of good or bad art, in reality isn’t the one speaking
referring to the quality of the production?
Music, film, TV, theater, modern dance, you name it, is neither good nor
bad morally, it’s either of good quality or bad quality, but none of them
possess inherent moral qualities.
Let’s take music. There are songs which magnify the Lord, and
there are songs that magnify the devil.
But the songs are, by their very definition, neutral. It’s the intent of the artist expressing it
that is in play here. The song or the
artistic medium is not the problem.
In the 1980’s there developed something
that took the Evangelical Church by storm—the “Rock n’ Roll is of the Devil”
seminars. Well- meaning churches invited
hot shot hucksters into their churches (and I’d bet not for free) to scare the
daylights out of their young people by playing clips of every rock song ever
recorded, and showing the subtle or not so subtle influences of Satan.
Honestly, they were a bit of a stretch, foisted on the gullible.
At the close of every one of these
seminars, there was a story expounded about a missionary who went to minister
to some primitive heathen culture in the deepest, darkest jungles of Borneo, or
some place, and when their teenage offspring played one of their rock records
on their stereo, the chief or the shaman of the tribe approached the missionary
and asked, “Why is your child summoning demon gods?” It was something about the rock beat being
identical to the drum beat used in evil incantations. “ Oh, Puh-lease.”
If anybody can verify that story, I’d like
to know. Never once was the name of the
missionary ever mentioned. Frankly, I
think it was a dishonest story used to frighten children (and their
parents). Rock music, was the new boogie
man.
Let’s revisit the definition of music (all
music) once again. Beat is a part of
music—it is essential for keeping time.
Beat cannot in and of itself be good or bad—it’s just a beat, with no
life force behind it.
That said, is there good and bad rock music? Of course.
But what determines its goodness or badness? Might it have something to do with the intent
of the artist? Definitely. But that is
only one aspect. To me what makes a song (rock or otherwise) good or bad is in
the thought behind it, and its execution.
Is the song well written? Are its lyrics literate and interesting? Is it well performed? Does the use of the instruments display
virtuoso musicianship?
There is some rock music that I like, and
there is some I do not like. The late
Larry Norman, a rock musician and a Christian put out a record entitled “Why
Should the Devil Have All the Good Music?”
He wrote and performed rock and roll music with a definite, unmistakable
Christian bent. On the other hand the
rock band AC/DC did “Highway to Hell.”
Was one Christian and the other of the
devil? I would say no. The artist, yes, perhaps. The music, no. Strip both songs of their words, and just play
the music, and they are both just a series of notes and beats repeated in
sequence. The music is not moral. It is neither good nor bad.
One of the songs (by Larry Norman) was
used in his way to witness the Gospel, and to glorify God. The other aforementioned song, took on a
different meaning altogether, but it wasn’t the song’s fault. It was the intent of the artist (however I
know nothing about the true intent of AC/DC’s musicians’ hearts, so I’m not accusing
any of that band as being Satanic.)
The point being is that we make judgments
about what is Christian and what is not.
I’m saying that any artistic medium employed is neutral in and of
itself. Music as a thing has no
intrinsic moral value. Some Charismatic
Christians dance in their worship services, as King David is reported in the
Bible to have done. Voodoo practitioners
dance to be possessed by supernatural entities.
Two expressions of the same thing expressed in completely different ways
and to different ends. So is dancing right
or wrong? Is it good or evil in itself?
Again, the intent of the performer, and not the thing itself is the deciding
factor.
So let us be careful in how we
view the arts and what values we assign to them.
There was a book around long ago by
Christian thinker and writer, Os Guinness, the
title of which I cannot recall at
present, or perhaps it was the Franky Schaeffer book that you referenced. But
the point I remember walking away with was, if I build a house out of brick,
and the bricks I use were made by a Christian manufacturer, does that somehow
make the bricks and my house a Christian house made of Christian bricks? If the manufacturer had not been a Christian,
would it have made my house somehow unholy, made of devil bricks?
The above premise is absurd; I’d think we’d
all agree. So why do we use the same
premise in judging the arts? And we
do! Perhaps we would do better in
relating to our world, if we didn’t look down our noses at anything the
non-Christian world produces, and assign evil meaning to it because it is not
patently or overtly Christian in nature.
There are some great movies that aren’t about Jesus or Christian
occurrences. Conversely there are some
movies about Jesus and Christian occurrences that, quite frankly, are so poorly
executed, that as a Christian, I would be embarrassed to say that they are
“Christian movies.”
We, as Christians, should engage the arts,
and judge them fairly, based on excellence of content and performance, as
opposed to judging them according to something some itinerant preacher told us
at a seminar on how to find Satan under every rock.
And, as Christians, if we produce art in
any medium, we should strive to execute said art with absolute
magnificence. Just because we say “Jesus”
in a movie or a song doesn’t qualify said movie or song as art. Trash is trash and bad art is bad art,
whether it invokes sacred names and themes or not.
Here I might get into trouble, but when I
hear a song on the radio that is neither Christian in content, nor performed by
an artist claiming to be Christian, and that song is well written and
performed, I see it is giving due glory to God.
What? How can God get glory from some heathen rock and roll performer
(although rock and roll performers have no corner on the heathen market)? Oh! Heresies of heresies!
The way I figure it, even if the song or
the performer doesn’t intentionally give glory to God, didn’t God give the
talent? Cannot that be appreciated? A musician (or film maker, or, or, or….)
may not choose to glorify God with their artistic medium, but there’s no
mistaking the talent. And I do not think
God minds us having an appreciation for good art, whether it intentionally
glorifies Him or not. And, I’m not
referring to “art” that is blatantly evil or vile in its artist’s
intention. I’m not saying that. But if the art is good, then God should get
the glory for having given the talent and ability to the performer, and if that
performer hasn’t bowed the knee to Christ, then that is something with which
that artist will have to deal. It
doesn’t make his art bad.
Dana
+++++++++++++++++
On
Sat. 2/18/17 John Responded
Hey
Dana
I wish you had not started this
subject off with music, especially after our previous post dealing with hymns
and contemporary Christian music in the church. There is much of what you wrote
with which I can agree. However I’ll save my disagreements for another post.
But I believe several other things
Franky Schaeffer writes aligns with much of what you’ve written. One is, on page 62, Franky writes, “There are
only two kinds of art, good art and bad art. There is good secular art and bad
secular art. There is good art made by Christians and bad art made by
Christians....”
To close this particular post, and
to try and tie it in to what you were saying, Franky on page 110, when asked by
a Christian in the arts if he or she should work in the secular world or the
Christian world, answers thus, “Let me answer, once and for all, there is no
secular or Christian world. There is only one world (and God made it)....The terms
‘secular’ and ‘Christian’ are only words. Reality cannot be compartmentalized.
If we Christians have lost our influence in some part of the world’s activities
we must reclaim it.”
The
Harvest is near ended, in Christ
John
++++++++++++++++++++
PS For any Christian either going into the arts
or currently in the arts, I suggest you buy Franky Schaeffer’s book. So far, this is the only one I’ve found
to encourage people in this endeavor.
++++++++++++++++++++
John
Added on Sun. 2/19/17 at 5:25 PM
Hey
Dana
Here is, I believe, an example of
what you are saying above. I drove to the shore today. On the way down, an FM
radio station I was listening to in the car was playing two hours of Beatles
music. When they played “Yesterday” filmed and recorded during an Ed Sullivan
Show performance back in 1964, I remember watching that on television. Who
didn’t? I think over 70 million Americans watched that performance!! As I sang
the song I remembered the good times I was having in high school back then and
the people I was having them with and I got weepy. While to my knowledge, none of the Beatles
were or are Christians, God did give them talent and their music is good.
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