Sunday Bible School- Creativity and The Kingdom- Oct25

Bible School this month looked at what the Bible story says about Creativity. Meg Nurcombe, who is currently studying for a PhD in Theology and Art, is our speaker

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

It's wonderful to have Megan, who's going to be speaking uh this evening. Uh Megan's been part of our team for a couple of years, was a ministry apprentice, uh, now doing a PhD in theology and art, uh, um, and uh has been doing lots of thinking around the Bible, creativity in the kingdom. Uh so we're really pleased to be leading our uh thoughts on a Bible school uh tonight. So I'm just saying prayer and then I'm gonna hand it over to Megan to take us in this evening. So let's pray. Lord, thank you so much for your word. Thank you that uh it illuminates how to live our lives, so how to live our lives well. Thank you, you put us in a world where uh creativity is just so obvious from what uh you've done and uh how you inspire us to follow in the family business uh to be creative too. And I pray that you'd speak to us through your word and through Megan as we listen now in Jesus' name. Amen.

SPEAKER_01 0:49

Thanks, Tim. Yeah, so we'll basically talk about everything Tim just prayed. I can probably leave Introduction, Tim, uh he pretty much summed it up. Um I have just recently started my doctoral studies in theology and the arts, but before that I started actually um studying fine arts. So I'm an artist, and then I made the transition into theology and the arts, which for me felt like a very natural intro. Um it was actually kind of exploring serenade mattered always felt intrinsically, have the language um to explain that. So that's what I'm I've been doing. Um so really over the past couple of years, actually, I have spent a lot of time through conversation and study and um prayer and everything, thinking about the significance of creativity and art and beauty and imagination in the kingdom of God. Um so over the next in life, and so yeah, that's what we're gonna be um, we're just gonna be looking at a big picture of creativity and the kingdom. So before we start, before we dive in, I want to tell you what we're not gonna be doing. Um so thank you for everyone here who maybe doesn't feel a close affinity to the word on yourself, you don't think you're very creative, maybe talking about tonight, I actually believe to be of incredible significance and relevance to anyone who is a follower of Jesus, not just artists and craftspeople. Of course, if you for the artist or a craftsperson like me, this um so just for those who are thinking, why am I here? Into specific examples of creativity in the Bible. Um, I'm just gonna touch on a few now. If you want to go away and look at them yourselves, then you're welcome to. So obviously, the Bible itself is made up of a lot of literary art. Use metaphors, song of songs, Job, all of this to communicate spiritual truth. So, in themselves, um, their art, and the Bible is made up of a lot of that literary art. But also, there is Bezalel and Holiab, if you can see that in Exodus. They build the people who were filled with the Spirit of God, something that's always been of interest to me. They are the first people in the Bible to said to be explicitly filled with the Holy Spirit for a task. So interesting fact there. Um, of course, there is also King David, who was a master um musician um before he himself Israel's worship, and now ours for millennia as well. And then there's also King Solomon, who designed the temple in Jerusalem, which in its beauty and splendor was Israel's central place of worship and which housed the very presence of God. And finally, of course, there's Jesus who entered a strong rabbinic tradition of telling parables and using narrative and storytelling to communicate spiritual truth. So if you're interested in some of those specific examples, go away, have a look at them. But yeah, that's not what we're going into today. I'm going to be presenting a wider, hopefully compelling case for the place of creativity and making in the life of the Jesus follower in thrite, a divine stamp on us, which is intrinsic to our humanity, and indeed something of vital importance in the coming of the kingdom of God. Okay, of creation. So no surprise, really, of course, the first stop, the first few chapters of big picture of creativity and the kingdom is local narrative, and a three short chapters we cannot skim over or disregard. The purpose of these early chapters of Genesis is to provide an ultimate worldview, to offer answers to the biggest human questions of who is an account, who is God, why am I here? Two is an account of human identity, where people and their purpose and productivity are situated in relation to God, their cause and their creator. Okay, so we don't have time to read these chapters in full, and I know most of you will be very familiar with them anyway, so we're just going to highlight a few particular verses. So the Bible opens with the words, In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. The first five words of the Bible, in the beginning, God created. This is the first thing we know about God. The following verses go on to describe God's creative acts, resulting in the beautiful, ordered, and majestic world we live in, which is teeming with life, and bears the divine affirmation that it is good. We pick up again in verse 26. God says, Let us make man, humanity, in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over the livestock, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing. So God created man in his own image. In the image of God he created him, male and female he created them. And God blessed them, and God said to them, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth. Now in Genesis chapter two, the author retells the creation of humanity, go placing that further poetic detail, describing God created Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And then the Lord God. Part of this working of the garden seems to be participation in God's creative work. Because in verse 19 it says, Be fruitful. Sorry, no, in verse 19 it says, Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was in harmony. Here in Eden, the place where heaven and earth dwell in perfect harmony, the place where things are as they should be, humanity is invited into the creative action of God through acts of naming, ordering, and cultivating. It's not that God needed humanity's participation, he of course could have named the animals himself. It's not a need, but a generous invitation, whereby the creatures, us, are tasked with forming, guiding, and indeed multiplying the creation. So as it says in verse 26 to 28, we are made in the image and likeness of God and tasked with a mission or given a purpose, be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, or as we'll see, create, cultivate, order, make. This is not simply a mandate to marry and have children, although that is included in the meaning. It is what has been termed by theologians the cultural mandate to create culture, to expand Eden into the wilderness of our surroundings, to bring order from chaos, to bring light in the place of darkness, to cause life to flourish in places of death. Pete Hughes, in his book All Things New, describes this as human beings are not only created in the image of God, this is who they are, they are also created our role as the image, and this is their role in the world. It is God creating his kingdom through us, which is exactly what Tim was talking about last month in Bible school. So if you weren't here for that, I'd really recommend going back and listening to it. These talks go hand in hand, really. So the author of Jan 2, where God places humanity in the garden, like we've seen, to work it and keep it, which are the Hebrew words Abad and Samar, which mean to cultivate and keep or care. Here, humanity has been placed in a garden with a task, to care for it and to expand it, to cultivate the materials God has created and placed before them, and to embrace their image-bearer status by extending the work done by God. So, but simply to be made in the image and likeness of God is to be made with a mandate to create and to continue the work of God. In the great plan of God, what we do, how we work, and what we make matters. Now, as we all sadly know, Genesis chapters 1 and 2 are followed by chapter 3, where humanity fails to live into this mandate, chooses their own way, which ultimately leads to separation from God, distortion of the image of God in humanity, and expulsion from the garden. The marriage of heaven and earth breaks down. But God has a plan to save humanity from themselves and to restore us to right relationship with Him and recover in us our original purpose and image, which is to create His kingdom with Him. The Creator steps into creation to set us right with Him and to set us on a new path. We are reoriented completely and we rediscover our purpose in Jesus, where we are now joining in the kingdom work of Christ, working towards a new creation, or more specifically, as we will see later, a renewed creation, where the purposes of God are once again fulfilled, where heaven and earth are really helpful. Now, I find big concepts and an image that um Tim Mackey, um who leads the Bible project, uses a lot. I find really helpful. We are in the kingdom of God, and um, so it's really simple, by no means exhaustive, but helpful to visualize. So Eden, creation, heaven and earth are united, God dwells with man. Then comes the fall, and heaven and earth are separated, and shame enter the world. Then comes Jesus and redemption. Part of heaven comes to earth. Heaven and over heaven and earth overlap again. And with Jesus comes the inauguration, the start of this reunion of heaven and earth. When God will come and live among us, and the world will be permeated by the heaven and earth overlap, but by no means is everything the way it's meant to be. So we live in this age with glimpses of the age to come, and what we're talking about tonight is how we, as followers of Jesus, have been given the more of the age to come into the present. Something only made possible by the power of the Holy Spirit in us, nothing of our own doing. Okay, so how can we understand this new age? Revelation 21 to 22 holds an incredibly powerful and beautiful vision of this new age to come where God dwells with his people and a garden and city come together. Something about Bibles. Again, we don't have time to read these chapters is reading these scriptures aloud, reading them over ourselves. There's something incredibly beautiful and powerful about that. So, although we don't have time to read them all in full, I would encourage you to go and do selves of the beginning. They are very powerful, the final two chapters. Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. For the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. God is with man, he will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away, and he who is seated on the throne said, John, I am making all things new. John's vision of this new is the end to which we orient ourselves, the end we long for, and the end with which our very lives ought to declare through our words, actions, relationships, and work. This brief unveiling God returned future in the words of Revelation, reveal we call new creation. So we're actually introduced to this phrase, new creation, in 2 Corinthians 5, verse 17, where Paul writes, Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Here based on what is to come. This is not just about personal transformation, but it is, as Wright puts it, a sign of what God will do in the future, remaking the world and coming to dwell within it. And saved and made new by God, our calling is to others and in the world. This verse has incredible personal significance, as we've seen tonight, as people have been baptized and declared their new life, and they are a new creation, but it also has incredible cosmic significance. It's quoting right in length here. New creation. We are to be co-creators. Here are advance signs of God's event restored. United with God, we are called back into our role as co-creators, the role humanity had in Eden at the beginning. But now we are working towards the renewal of creation. We return to revelation. This is an important word to note. Renew. God seated on his cosmic throne, declaring, Behold, I am making all things new, we need to ask what new means. Greek, the language of the New Testament, has two words for new, naos and kinos. Naos means brand new, and kinos means something old, uses the word being made new again. John here in verse 5 and in verse 1. So when John writes that the old heaven and earth are passing away and the new has come, he's not talking about a complete destruction of creation, but a passing away of the old order of things, which included made new. This word kinos is vital to understanding what God is doing in the world, in us and through us. The world God created and loved, and us his children, aren't discarded and replaced with new we and the options. That's not the heart of God recreated into the life-giving purposes of God. The old order of things, the ways we in the world have been marred by sin, shame, and suffering, that passes away. But John's word choices here have caused it significance. God doesn't do away with this, obviously, has incredible implications for us and our own personal journeys with God. But importantly for our topic today, it also has incredible implications for what we as kingdom agents do and create and make. A chap elsewhere in one three over death and our ultimate transformation and resurrection ends with these words. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord interpreted the work of the Lord to be Christian ministry, evangelism, church work. That is all true. But if we go back to Genesis, we know that the work of the Lord includes the work we have been given to do. And God says this kingdom work is not in vain. It matters, it lasts. Under the banner of God's grace and in his power, what we make with our hands, our minds, our words lasts. Again, Peter educated like this. We partner with attainment and the arts. The full glory of that renewal awaits Jesus' return. But every endeavor in line with this vision now will last for eternity. What a glorious, miraculous, mysterious, and loving. God has created and he has invited us to participate in his ongoing work in his creation. He didn't need to, but he has, out of the mercy, grace, and generosity of his character. Dr. Andrew Creation is a gracious and unnecessary gift from God, on whose being it depends and in whose being it participates, has implications for how we are to understand the making which we do in participation with God's creative action. It raises both the dignity and the stakes of our making. What we make, we make by the grace of God. But as it shares in God's bringing forth the new, it is incumbent upon us to bring forth the good in as much as our limited capacities allow. This is a theology of making. We have been invited to participate in the creative action of God in the world. Regardless of our gifts, skills, and abilities, whatever our vocation or life stage, this applies to us. As humans, we create things. We make things because we're made in God's image. So the question is not am I making, the question is what am I making? I wrote down some thoughts I had that people things we might be making with our lives, with our minds, with our hands, ideas, solutions, environments, objects, art, music, food, coffee, beauty, friendships, family, homes, cult cultivating gardens, work using our hands in church, communities, investing in communities. We I I think when you pray, you create something and give it. Back to God, it's a beautiful thing. Even when you're teaching, whether that be in church or elsewhere, you're creating something, you're making something, you're you're forming an environment of learning, and you're creating something in those people listening to you. What about wholeness? Through our words and our actions, are we creating wholeness in the people in the people around us? Justice, social action. That's an incredible sphere of making in line with God's plans, peace, healing. The list could go on. And I'd encourage you to think and add to that list yourself. Think about your life. What are you making? What are you creating? So, as you can see, a Christian's theology of making offers us an understanding of creativity that can be far more expansive than one might have initially thought. Creativity is using what we have been given space, time, matter in its multiplicity of forms, to create something new out of grace and generosity. There is an intrinsic abundance to creativity. It is most often more than what is necessary. I would say creativity is the ability and willingness to act upon what we have to bring about something beautiful and good and reflective of God. Creativity is generous because it flows from a generous God. So to create generously and out of love, that is to truly live in the biblical calling to be co-creators with God. I want to finish by praying for us that we will be given a fresh vision for our work, our making, and our lives, that as God's co-creators, we will be filled afresh, empowered by his Holy Spirit and inspired by his word to build for his kingdom and to orient our every day and every action towards the kingdom of God and the renewal of all things. So pray with me if you would like. So send us out from this place tonight, inspired by your beauty and alive with the task we have been given, empowered by your Holy Spirit. Amen.

SPEAKER_02 26:13

How has the ideology of creativity affected your art and your work as an artist?

SPEAKER_01 26:20

That's a great question. I think, like I said, I felt in my spirit that what I did mattered, but I couldn't explain that to anyone. I couldn't really explain that to myself either. Having studied this and it's it's changed how I view my art, but it's also changed how I live my life day to day. It's changed how I see my life, my purpose. Um, and if I don't have time to get in the studio and paint a painting, you know, it it changes how I set a table and eat dinner. You know, it's that's something, it's that actually there's beauty in how I talk with my friend and the encouragement that we can give one another in that. It actually that's why I said I didn't want to focus too much on art in this. Obviously, of course, that is what I do with my life. That's sounds so passionate about that, but I wanted to show how this changes everything. So it has it has definitely changed my art, but it's also changed a lot more than that.

SPEAKER_00 27:26

I love I love Megan's um view on that. I I'm if you ask me to draw anything, I'm just rubbish. But I do love my garden, and and the pots in my garden are just arranged really nicely. And so um Megan, one of the things that we've talked about is that um when it looks to kind of more traditional art, uh, quite often um it looks back, it looks back, and obviously the art that's been produced over 2,000 years quite often looks back to Jesus, his death on the cross. Um, how do you think art could look forward rather than looking back and saying how do you think maybe people who pick poetry, that kind of thing?

SPEAKER_01 27:58

Yeah, that's a great question. Of course, in a sense, and this is what I'm gonna be doing more of in my doctorate, is looking into, in a sense, nothing we really make is new because it's all given material. Very rare if it's already given it all all to us, and the same before, but I think that for me, when I paint, I think I think this is a very personal question because it comes to aesthetics then and everything. For me, I think breaking out of tradition and breaking out of what that look like on the surface for things, and and as makers, as humans, we can kind of in our creative journey bring out of what is given, what is in front of us, bring out something new from that that actually isn't new to God because God's already thought of all those things. But the world we live in has potential to be moulded in some really invent of the English language. Um average person's probably not gonna do that for a word that sticks around anyway. But with poetry, with prose, you you take what you've been given and you craft it into something new, not new to God, but something that He rejoices over. Um, because you have taken your birthright as a creative to mould reality in a certain way, mould material. Absolutely, I think when your generativity is the Holy Spirit is in the room working in you and in through them, and and it's obviously it's incredible. I've heard you um yeah, give some of your poems, they're incredible, but there is the Holy Spirit in us, the world bringing responding shared, and I think that's a beautiful thing and a gift from God that blesses many people as a church community. We're really blessed by that. But it's some if you think about the Trinity and the love, it said productive, you know, it's that out of that love came all of creation in an incredibly generous, unnecessary active things we shouldn't be surprised when the Holy Spirit turns, where or it could be me alone in front of a canvas. Something just flows out of me, like, why on earth did that come from? And then why am I surprised that God is such a generative God, such a generous God? So, yeah, it's a beautiful example.

unknown 31:07

Great.

SPEAKER_00 31:07

Another round of applause for Meg. Thanks so much.