Creative Creations

How’s this for a quote?

” The creator who created us, created creations that live to create!” Pastor Ray, Celebration Life Family Church

When I visited Cliff and Andrea’s church in Maine this is the word their Pastor preached over me!

Many years ago God gave me a life mission. It was to “create a culture of worship”. My life is about inspiring others to turn to God and to lay their gifts and talents down before Him in worship.

It’s not about singing songs people! It’s about surrendering all we are to the One who made us in the first place.

So many things get in the way of that, though….Am I right?

This world makes it so easy to put God on the back burner…so easy to take our talents and use them for anything other than the Creator who created us.

In one of our conversations a few months ago God told me His artisans were having trouble finding time to give their gifts to Him amidst the hubbub of life. Time…busyness…distraction: These are all things I struggle with on a constant basis. If I allow it, they keep me from spending myself on the Savior.

I am convinced that there are artists of all different persuasions out there who just need an opportunity to come away from the world for a time to practice their artistry. Intentionality is hard; Sometimes we need God to come along and to help us set aside our lives for His purposes.

     Tomorrow our church is opening up its doors to provide artists with time and a space to work in their mediums. We are calling it Cornerstone’s Artist Community Day Apart.

Painters, sketch artists, actors, vocalists, instrumentalists, writers, and wood carvers have all set the day aside to create for Jesus!

I’ll let you know how it goes!

What is the biggest hindrance to your creativity?

Retirement…Vacation…Sabbath!

     Yesterday I wrote, “celebration is a necessity not an option.”  That may not seem like much of a lesson to you. But I grew up in a family where the protestant work ethic was king and most celebration was considered frivolous. I highly doubt we would have attended “moxie day”.

     If the truth is told, we probably would have worked “moxie day”. Dad would have cooked for the crowds; Mom would have driven the moxiemobile; My sister and I would have been dressed up in costumes throwing cans of moxie at the cheering crowds.

     I guess there is nothing wrong with that. I love to work and to serve. In fact, growing up as I did I learned that it is truly more blessed to give than to receive.  The satisfaction from a job well done has proven to be one of life’s greatest joys. But admittedly it has made me a little unbalanced when it comes to life and work.

    So last weekend I learned that celebration is not an option for me it is a necessity. But I learned something beyond that. I was reminded that not only is celebration necessary, so is rest. 

     Here in the nation of 24/7 we generally make light of rest. We say things like: “No rest for the weary!”; “I’ll rest when I’m dead!”; or one of my personal favorites “Time to coffee up and get back to it!”

     Yet for a culture that really doesn’t value rest we certainly have a lot terms for it: chilling out, kicking back, retirement, vacation, holiday, respite, nap-snacking, long-weekending, beaching it, hittin’ the hay, taking a break, taking a breather, pacing ourselves,mental health day, sick day… sabbath…. Oh wait! that’s right we don’t actually use the word sabbath in our country anymore do we? Do you find it odd that the biblical word for rest is the only word we don’t use for taking a break?

      Now don’t get me wrong, I like the concept of retirement…and I really like the concept of vacation. Should the church suddenly decide to take away my 28 days I would be really….really….REALLY sad. 😥 Still I have to admit, I really don’t see “vacation” in the Bible. I like it. I just don’t see it.

       I do see sabbath as a concept everywhere in the Bible. I don’t see it in our culture. I like vacation. I like retirement. But they cannot replace sabbath.

I was reminded of this truth as I rested along the rocky coastline of Maine last weekend. God showed me I was there to rest, not to do, to listen not to speak.

     My brother-in-law spoke to his pastor about me before I went. Cliff told him who I was but also told him I was there to rest not to minister. I really appreciated that.

     We were built to work…just not all the time. Our lives require rhythm. We were meant to live according to a theme:  work… then rest…work…then rest. Six…then one…six… then one.

     I’m not religious about sabbath but I am beginning to realize that the pattern cannot be done away with without consequences. The sabbath routine might stand up to some stretching, but only so far before our lives begin to short-circuit. We cannot go 351 days of work then 14 days off and hope to remain healthy.

     We also cannot replace rest with celebration. I discovered as I lounged at Cliff and Andrea’s that I needed to recuperate far more than I needed to celebrate. I needed sabbath more than I needed “Moxie Day”.

    I came away from the weekend feeling I was going to change some of my vacationing routines.

    I am going to break my vacation up into sabbaths for rest. I think I am going to take a few days more frequently rather than a lot of days all at once.

Tell me how do you view sabbath?

Hold The Fort: I Don’t Want To Be a Cylon!

     We watched a lot of T.V. growing up. Sunday night’s for instance was Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom, Jacques Cousteau, and the Wonderful World Of Disney, which we usually watched while eating macaroni and cheese with cut up hot dogs.

    I think Battlestar Galactica was a Friday night show shoved somewhere between Wonder Woman and The Six Million Dollar Man. I loved watching Starbuck and Apollo blow up cylons. In my little kid estimation the Cylons were only a little better than Darth Vader and only because their armor was cooler.

       Turns out though that according to the new Battlestar mythos I can’t be Apollo or Starbuck. With my belief in absolute truth, One True God and the fallen sinfulness of mankind I am definitely Cylon material. Hmm that’s a problem because…I don’t want to be a Cylon! I want to be the hero of the story, but somewhere along the way what’s heroic got redefined.

     I suppose a detailed analysis of how things got twisted around like this in our culture is a little large for one post. So maybe we should break it down a bit.

     Let’s start here: If you were in Battlestar Galactica would you be the human or the Cylon? Why?