The Artist: Opening Eyes and Enlightening Hearts

I started a small group in our church recently, serving creative people and artists. After searching for an avenue of Bible study, I chose to delve into the area of creativity and the Arts as they relate to the Christian and faith. 

I find that the Bible pays an extraordinary amount of attention to creativity. Its not just as a wonderfully written piece of literature, but contains stories loaded with characters and artistic archetypes for us to study. David and Solomon are two of the Bible's most famous artists. The Bible is filled with poetry and drama; visual arts were such an important part of the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem; music was huge in Hebrew culture; Psalms is a big collection of prayers and songs.

In Ephesians 1:18 the Apostle Paul writes- "I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, (NIV)" As Paul encouraged the church at Ephesus, we as artists have a wonderful opportunity in God's Kingdom to help "open eyes" and enlighten hearts to behold the glory of God. I believe this is the primary goal of the Christian artist.

As we discover His plan for our lives, its no stretch that God placed us in an environment as a child, where we would be influenced by the visual arts, cinema, drama,  music,, dance, poetry and literature. Our path in life brought us to this point where, along with God-given talent, we choose to serve the people of God and glorify Him with this wonderful creativity.

Look for part 3 of The Artist series in my next blog installment. Thanks again or reading!