(original image found here)

This semester I’ve been taking a class called “Worship, Culture, Technology.”

As you might expect from the name, the class is about the ways technology is affecting the church and the Christian faith in general.

As you also might expect, as a Christian blogger I’ve really enjoyed the class.

The past couple of weeks we’ve had a visiting professor from Germany sit in on our classes. He stopped by our class originally to talk about an article of his that we read about how the internet is impacting worship. He’s since stayed around as we gave our presentations over the last couple of weeks.

Last night he made a speculative comment that I found to be absolutely fascinating and if it turns out to be true, would radically reshape church as we know it.

But before I tell you what he said, let me give you some context for his comment.

One of the core issues we’ve discussed in class this semester is how the internet has leveled the playing field in the church. Websites, blogs, and social media have allowed anyone and everyone, not just clergy, to preach, teach, and lead the people of God. The term we’ve used for this is “horizontal leadership,” meaning there’s not a hierarchy in the church which the pastor, priest, or bishop stands over and above everyone else in a position of authority. Obviously church hierarchies still exist all over the place, but the internet has made tremendous strides in reshaping who, what, and where lay people look to guide their faith, including taking positions of leadership in that conversation themselves.

Another way to think about this is to look at where the pulpit stands in a sanctuary. Visit an old church (or a handful of new ones) and you’ll see the pulpit or lectern set off to the left and elevated relatively high above the congregation. Since the days of Charles Finney and the Second Great Awakening, the pulpit was moved down to ground level so that the preacher was essentially at eye level and, at least symbolically, on equal ground with the congregation. However, the preacher was still in a place of authority in front of the congregation.

The internet has made everyone an authority, or at least given everyone the sense, if not possibility, that with enough dedication, a dash of good writing, and a halfway decent looking website they can be an authority on whatever they think they’re an authority on.

The downside of this, of course, is the reality that all sorts of misinformation and terrible ideas are spread under the guise that they are coming from an authoritative source when in fact they’re coming from someone who doesn’t know anymore than what they could copy and paste from Wikipedia.

On the upside of this leveling of the church is that the idea of a priesthood of all believers has the chance to be realized more fully than perhaps at any point in the history of church.

Which is what led to our visiting German professor’s speculation.

As he wondered aloud (but in a much more eloquent manner), if the average churchgoer is already getting much of their theology, Biblical knowledge, challenges to live out their faith, etc. from places like the internet and, moreover, if they feel empowered to contribute to that conversation themselves, are we approaching a point where the average churchgoer will no longer be interested in or willing to listen to someone stand up in front of them to preach?

That is to say, are we reaching the end of the age of professional preachers in the local church?

As crazy as that might sound at first, if the historical movement of the pulpit is any guide, this would actually seem to be the next logical step.

The pulpit is, essentially, about authority. It has moved from being over and above the congregation down to eye level. Is it’s next move to disappear altogether to give way to some new form of church in which a priesthood of all believers actually share authority equally?

I’m not sure that day is coming next week, next year, or even in the next decade, if it ever comes at all. But it certainly is something interesting to think about.

If the internet really is leveling the authority of the church and giving much of that authority back to the people, what will that mean for the church?

More specifically, what would a church service look like without a traditional pastor or priest doing the things normally only they do?

Is that even a possibility?

Sound off in the comments section and let me know what you think.

I’m eager to hear what you see in your ecclesial crystal ball.

Grace and peace,

Zack Hunt

According to a recent study, belief in an angry God is “significantly associated with an increase in social anxiety, paranoia, obsession, and compulsion.”

That doesn’t come as much of a surprise to me.

Believing that an all powerful being is constantly ticked off should create some anxiety, particularly if, like Mark Driscoll, you think this ticked off all powerful being personally hates you.

But such is the nature of God for many Christians, particularly those of the Calvinist persuasion who inherited from their theological forefather, Jean Calvin, a picture of God who is constantly angry about one thing or another.

There are, of course, passages in Scripture that speak of God being angry.

Take, for example, the passage from Nahum 1 referenced by the aforementioned study story.

The Lord is a jealous and avenging God;
the Lord takes vengeance and is filled with wrath.
The Lord takes vengeance on his foes
and vents his wrath against his enemies.

Not exactly the warm fuzzy, let the little children come to me picture of Jesus most of us have from Sunday School.

On the other end of the theological spectrum are those who proclaim a God who is always loving, never angry. Borrowing from 1 John, “God is love,” this is a God who never seems to be angry about anything as he is apparently to be too busy doling out hugs and positive energy.

However, if we take the time to read the entire narrative of Scripture, rather than just cherry pick the passages that fit our preferred portrait of God, we see that God doesn’t exactly fit either of these perspectives.

I think where both side of the nature of God debate get it wrong, is that we fail to appreciate the difference between an angry God and a God who gets angry. It may sound like splitting hairs, but it’s a tremendously important hair to split.

My predecessor at Yale, Jonathan Edwards, is the poster child for the former, for the belief that God is an angry God. Edwards famously preached the sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” Particularly when compared to the homiletical stylings of, say, Joel Osteen, it’s a rather frightening portrait of God and our relationship to him.

The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked. His wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else but to be cast into the fire. He is of purer eyes than to bear you in his sight; you are ten thousand times as abominable in his eyes as the most hateful, venomous serpent is in ours.

Not very warm and fuzzy.

It’s hard to imagine such a God bothering to forgive or extend grace, let alone put on flesh and die for all mankind.

Now, when Edwards, or anybody else speaks of an angry God it is likely, hopefully, that at the beginning they only mean that God gets angry from time to time. However, what has happened, whether intentionally or not, is that over time this repetitive and never ending emphasis on God’s anger has become so ingrained in our minds that we can’t separate God from anger. An angry God becomes the dominant narrative of faith, and anger, rather than love, becomes the core characteristic of God’s nature.

Worse yet, this God seems bound by his anger, as if he has no choice but to constantly be angry at mankind. But the diversity of God’s interactions with humanity in the Bible, not least of all the story of Jesus, shows us definitively that anger is not God’s fundamental nature.

In other words, God is not an angry God.

God is a God who sometimes gets angry.

And for that I am truly thankful.

Now, I know that might sound strange coming from someone like me who talks so much about God’s love and grace, and who over and over again rejects the sort of rhetoric that paints God as hateful and petty.

But I believe in a God who gets angry.

Not an angry God, but a God who gets angry when anger is needed, like we see in Isaiah.

Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom; listen to the instruction of our God, you people of Gomorrah! “The multitude of your sacrifices — what are they to me?” says the Lord. “I have more than enough of burnt offerings, of rams and the fat of fattened animals; I have no pleasure in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats. When you come to appear before me, who has asked this of you, this trampling of my courts? Stop bringing meaningless offerings! Your incense is detestable to me. New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations— I cannot bear your worthless assemblies. Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals I hate with all my being. They have become a burden to me; I am weary of bearing them. When you spread out your hands in prayer, I hide my eyes from you; even when offer many prayers,

I am not listening.

Your hands are full of blood!

Odd though it may sound, we need a God who gets angry.

We need a God who sees oppression and poverty and injustice and hunger and disease and homeless and heartache and loneliness and all the other unloving things we do to each other and gets angry because this is not the way he created the world to be.

We need this sort of God because there is hope in a God who cannot abide the way things are and chooses to change the world for the better.

There is hope that this God’s holy anger will not allow injustice and pain and oppression to continue forever, but will one day come and dwell among us forever. We will be his people, and God himself will be with us and be our God. He will wipe every tear from our eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away. For God will have made all things new.

This is what God’s anger leads to.

Not wrath, abuse, oppression, and injustice.

But liberation, hope, and life eternal.

Because God is not an angry God who wants his people to suffer.

God is a God who gets angry when he sees his people suffer.

Subtle though it may seem, this distinction makes all the difference in the world.

Literally.

And it makes God truly worthy of our love and adoration.
 
 

Grace and peace,

Zack Hunt

It’s been a little while since I’ve shared the private revelations of one William Tapley.

It’s not that The Third Eagle of the Apocalypse hasn’t had anything to say.

He has.

But when you denounce the demonic phallic imagery at an airport, you’re setting the bar pretty high for apocalyptic zaniness.

Now, I’m not saying Tapley has reached that bar in this video. He hasn’t. But it’s pretty wonderful nonetheless.

In a fantastic followup to his analysis of Gangnam Style, the Third Eagle explains that Psy’s new song which Psy himself named ‘Mother Father Gentlemen’ is really called ‘Mother F****** Gentlemen.’

If that sounds ridiculous, it’s just because you don’t understand the basic rule of biblical prophecy – if something doesn’t work for what you want to claim, just completely change it so it does.

Otherwise, claiming that Psy is really playing the antichrist and the old men are the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse just sounds like crazy talk.

Anyway, there’s a lot to love about this video.

Like when Tapley ponders the significance of Psy’ place of birth,

“I’ve always been interested that Psy comes from Seoul. Does that means as the antichrist Psy has lost his soul?”

Wonderful though that is, this may be the one of the best lines The Third Eagle of the Apocalypse as ever uttered,

“Of course the antichrist is a mother f’ing gentlemen.”

So sit back, relax, and enjoy the show….

This semester I’m taking a class held in a building called Linsly-Chittenden Hall.

It stands at the south end of Yale and makes up what is known as “the old campus.”

It’s called “the old campus” because the oldest building dates back to 1750. If those long dormant history class nureons are firing in your brain, then you know this means that building, Connecticut Hall, is older than the country it stands in. Of course, so is Yale. It was founded in 1701, three-quarters of a century before there was a United States of America.

Linsly-Chittenden Hall, where I have class this semester, isn’t quite that old, but it’s no spring chicken either.

Originally beginning as two separate buildings, thus the funky name, Linsly-Chittenden dates all the way back to 1889 with final construction completed in 1907.

Now, I have to confess.

I had to look up all of those dates on the ‘ole Google.

I share them to give you some context for what I really want to talk about.

Steps.

Every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon I head down the hill from the Divinity School to the old campus. The classroom where we meet in Linsly-Chittenden is on the second floor. Most days I enter through the quad and walk up the beautiful old marble staircase.

I get there early, so the staircase is usually empty. But I always make sure to walk on the right side. It’s not because I’ve got post traumatic stress disorder from being told over and over again to walk on the right side of the hall in elementary school.

I walk on the right side of the stairs because it affords me the opportunity to quite literally walk in the steps of those who have come before me.

Marble is a hard rock, but like all rocks it wears away with time.

More than a century’s worth of Yale students have worn down the steps of Linsly-Chittenden Hall and if you know where to step you can feel the path they blazed. Soft groves in the stairs, worn smooth with time that serve for me as a physical reminder of those that have come before me, who endured the challenges before them, and who went on to live great lives.

In a way, the steps at Yale are like an old Bible.

They tell a story.

Not only of the school, but of all those who passed through it.

My old Bible from high school is even more worn out than the steps in Linsley-Chittendon Hall. I carried it with me seemingly everywhere back then and now it’s quite literally falling apart at the seems.

But when I go back and flip through its pages, I’m not just reading the story of faith.

I’m reading my story.

That old BIble is filled with old scribbles, notes, stickers, bulletins, and handouts that remind me of countless great memories from church camp, youth group, and countless youth retreats and mission trips.

Those memories, like the steps at Yale, remind me that I’m not alone.

They remind me that my faith is not my own.

That it was handed down to be through countless generations of believers I’ve never met who struggled with the same things I struggle with, who had the same doubts that I have, and who saw God work in their lives in ways that I’m only beginning to get a glimpse of now.

In the midst of a world consumed by individualism, it’s important to remember that as Christians we’re part of a Body, not a private faith.

The beauty of that Body is not found in its perfection, but in its willingness to admit its faults, struggles, doubts, and fear and then confront them head-on with faith, hope, love, and community.

When we hold our Bibles in our hands, sit in the pews at our local church, or volunteer to serve our community we walk in the well worn steps of the countless Christians who have come before us, who endured the challenges that came their way, and survived to go on and change the world.

We’re in this thing together. We grow together. We learn together. We fail together. We succeed together.

We carry each others’ burdens, meet each others’ need, celebrate each others’ victories, and change the world….together.

Which means the Christian faith is not our own.

Like an old family Bible, it has been entrusted to us for a time and then we must pass it on others.

So, the question is what will our legacy of faith be?

Will future generations go out of their way to walk in our well worn steps?

Or will our story be so insignificant and uninspiring that it becomes lost in the pages of history?

No matter what we say in response to that question now, like the stairs in Linsly-Chittenden Hall, only time will tell the true story of our faith.

Grace and peace,

Zack Hunt

As I’m always welcoming new people to the blog I sometimes like to revisit an old post or two that sparked a good conversation, but may have been missed by those who weren’t around when it was originally posted. In light of the tragic events at the Boston Marathon yesterday and the inevitable search for why such madness occurs, I thought this post would be appropriate to share again as it pretty much sums up my thoughts on the widely held notion that “everything happens for a reason,” or, worse, that horrific evil like this is somehow part of God’s plan. 

I’ve long been annoyed by the saying “everything happens for a reason.”

For one, I find it to be rather sappy and, well, I’m not a particularly sappy person.

Secondly, I’ve never thought the sentiment was true. Some things just happen. There’s no rhyme or reason to them. They just happen. But the more I think about it, the more I’ve come to realize that I was wrong.

Everything does happen for a reason.

When you got that new job you were hoping for, that happened for a reason – you applied for it, you interviewed well, and the company thought you were the best candidate for the job.

When you failed that test you needed to pass in order to maintain your GPA and keep your scholarship, that too happened for a reason – you spent too much time on Facebook, going out with friends, and catching up on your favorite shows when you should have been studying.

The time that house on the news got hit by lightinging and burned to the ground, that happened for a reason – the roof of the house was the closest contact point for the bolt of lightning and the massive charge of electricity caused the wood the house was built with to catch on fire.

And when that young mother and her child were hit head on by a drunk driver and died tragically in a car accident, that also happened for a reason – someone had too much to drink and without concern for anyone else’s well being they got behind the wheel of their car wherein their impaired judgment and slowed response time resulted in them running a red light and taking the life of a mother and her child.

But there was no grander narrative behind these moments, no deeper meaning to be discovered if we simply read the signs correctly. They happened and there was a reason behind their happening, but that reason was mundane, not divine.

In other words, these things were not part of God’s plan.

When these sorts of events occur and we find ourselves in a moment of speechless horror, many of us utter the words “everything happens for a reason,” either to ourselves or to those who are suffering, with the thought being that God is behind these events and has a reason, or purpose, for them occurring.

Let’s assume for a moment that that is true, that the sort of events I’ve described, as well as other horrific tragedies, were the handiwork of the divine. What, then, does that say about the nature of God?

In short, it says that God is a God who apparently delights in suffering. It says that God is the sort of god who sends drunk drivers to kill babies, who burns down people’s homes, and afflicts random people with horrendous diseases like cancer.

Regardless of any potential “reason” such a god would choose to does this things, if indeed God had a hand in intentionally causing them to occur, then that God is not the God of the Bible.

That God is not worthy of worship.

That God is evil.

Does the Bible speak of a God who works to draw out good in the midst of great evil? Absolutely. But there is tremendous difference between a God who orders the chaos and a God who causes it.

This does not mean that God does not enact judgment. Scripture testifies to this truth. But what scripture does not do is ascribe to God the responsibility or blame for every terrible thing that happens in life.

The truth is we live in a broken world and in such a world terrible, meaningless things happen. Not because God wants them to happen, but because our decisions have unavoidable consequences and because nature is an untamable beast that is always on the prowl.

But when we try to ascribe divine meaning, purpose, or reason to tragedy, we merely compound the pain and turn God into a villain.

Mothers who suffer miscarriages should never have to hear that God killed their baby. Family members who just lost a loved one to cancer should never be told that God made their loved one sick. Friends whose homes have been lost to natural disaster should not have to hear that God wanted them to be homeless.

While we would never say these things exactly this way, when we try to comfort our friends and loved ones with the words “everything happens for a reason” or “God has a purpose,” then this is exactly what we are telling them.

It is a good and holy thing to want to console our friends who are suffering, but more often than not the greatest comfort you can give is the silence that accompanies a listening ear, a loving shoulder to cry on, and the promise of prayer.

Pain is hell.

Which means we must do everything we can to avoid becoming our loved ones tormenters in their time of trial.

Yes, there will come a day when every tear will be wiped away and there will be no more death or crying or mourning or pain.

But until that day comes, our testimony to that future reality is not found in trying to attach meaning to the meaningless. Our testimony, and our gift of grace to those to suffer, will be found in our willingness to suffer with them, to walk with them through the valley of the shadow of death so that they know they are not alone.

In that act of grace, we incarnate the truth that though meaningless pain and suffering may seem to rule the present, that is not part of God’s plan.

God’s plan is that one day He will make His dwelling place among His people to dwell with them. They will be His people, and God Himself will be among them and be their God.

On that day and not before it, the old order of things will pass away and all things will be made new.

Grace and peace,

Zack Hunt

Jesus replied, “Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.” – Matthew 8:20

In the Gospel of Matthew Jesus described himself as homeless.

But apparently a couple of Roman Catholic churches in Toronto missed that verse.

According to their administration ‘Homeless Jesus’ is just too controversial.

That sounds about right.

Sculpture of Jesus the Homeless Rejected by Two Prominent Churches

By Leslie Scrivener, The Star

Jesus has been depicted in art as triumphant, gentle or suffering. Now, in a controversial new sculpture in downtown Toronto, he is shown as homeless — an outcast sleeping on a bench.

Pat Robertson has said some completely bizarre and outright awful things in recent years.

Those comments using get their brief moment in the sun before quickly withering on the vine as Robertson’s influence, fortunately, seems to have seriously waned.

So, what bothers me about his most recent ridiculous comments is not that I fear he will change hearts and mind, but that his words are echoing what many evangelical Christians already believe even if they never pay any attention to Pat Robertson.

Blessed are the peacemakers?

More like cursed.

Like so many other American evangelicals, Robertson has bought hook, line, and sinker into the 19th century nonsense that is end times prophecy. I say 19th century nonsense, because it was this particular period of time that gave rise to ideas like the rapture, Revelation as a road map to the apocalypse, and everything else that goes along with that sort of stuff.

With this misguided apocalyptic mindset having cemented its place as pseudo-orthdoxy by the 20th century, the establishment of the modern state of Israel caused this end times fervor to explode like never before as countless evangelicals hailed it as the fulfillment of prophecy. Subsequently, with their powerful influence in American politics, evangelicals have essentially shaped the United States’ policy towards Israel and the Middle East ever since.

While supporting a fledgling country isn’t necessarily a bad thing, the evangelical obsession with end times prophecy created a myopic and delusional perspective towards the Middle East that viewed Israel as capable of doing no wrong, while simultaneously offering unquestioned support to any and all Israeli policies, not out of compassion or concern for the Israeli people, but because nearly everything Israel did and is doing was and is considered to be some sort of fulfillment of Biblical prophecy.

As a result, everything else about the Christian life has become secondary to doing everything possible to cross everything off an apocalyptic check list that once completed will, we believe, force Jesus to return.

In this idolatrous pursuit to manipulate God’s actions for our own ends, evangelicals have become more than just overzealous misguided fanatics.

We’ve become the the very anti-Christs we claim to be warning the world about.

Christ came to give life, liberate the oppressed, set the captive free, and bring peace to a war torn world.

In our apocalyptic idolatry, we eagerly set aside our calling to go and do likewise, and instead try to convince ourselves that the life Jesus lived and called us to emulate, a life where peacemakers and the poor are blessed, where the oppressed are defended, and where our enemies are loved, that sort of life is somehow secondary to fulfilling prophecies that only really exist in the imagination of Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins.

Yes the book of Revelation is true.

Yes Jesus is coming back one day.

Yes we should prepare for his return.

But we do that by loving our neighbors, praying for our enemies, caring for the sick, and being the sort of people whose lives actually look like the life of the one whose name we claim as our own – Christ.

Jesus did these sorts of things and called us to do likewise, not because they were simply nice things to do or to just keep us occupied until the real show started. Jesus’ sacrificial life – his loving of enemies, defense of the persecuted, healing of the sick, and embrace of the outcast – was the breaking in of the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven.

It was a prophetic life that professed the truth of the coming kingdom of God by enacting that kingdom life in the here and now even as we wait for it to fully dawn.

Our being Christ-ians is found in living this same sort of prophetic life. A life that’s not consumed with deciphering cryptic prophecies that don’t exist, but one which lives out the kingdom reality Jesus embodied.

Which means as long as we call for war instead of peace and turn a blind eye to oppression, poverty, and injustice we don’t need to read the prophetic tea leaves in the morning news to find the anti-Christ.

We just need to look in the mirror.

Grace and peace,

Zack Hunt

I have a confession to make.

When I was in college I, along with my roommates, watched an obscene amount of dating shows.

By “obscene” I mean all of them all the time. Blind Date, Fifth Wheel, Elimidate – you name it we watched it. Not so much because we loved dating shows, but because we didn’t have cable and they were a train wreck we just couldn’t look away from.

While my standards were pretty low back then for what I would watch on television, I’m not sure they were ever low enough to watch what GSN has in the works.

Emboldened by the popularity of Jeff Foxworthy’s show ‘The American Bible Challenge,’ GSN it talking about creating a new faith based program called it ‘It Takes A Church.’

It is, or will be if/when it goes into production, a Christian dating show that “will ask congregations, pastors, friends and family to find a suitable potential mate for a parishioner who is single.”

Of course, they could probably save a lot of production costs by just turning this into a reality show, because if you’re single or have friends that are single then you know this is exactly what’s going on in most churches already.

Though, if they went the reality route I would still want a host because, well, that would just be too awkwardly funny not to watch.

And I want that host to be Jeff Foxworthy.

Anyway, you can check out the article below for more info about the show.

And let me know, would you watch a Christian dating show?

GSN Considers Adding Church-Based Dating Show

By Stuart Elliot, The New York Times

Spurred by the success of an original game show that rewards knowledge of the Bible rather than, say, how much grocery items cost at the supermarket checkout, the GSN cable channel is considering a dating show with a religious twist: congregations will seek suitable mates for single parishioners.

At an “upfront” breakfast in Midtown Manhattan on Tuesday morning, GSN outlined its plans for the 2013-14 television season, a season that is being reshaped by the popularity of “The American Bible Challenge,” which was introduced during the 2012-13 season and is already back for a second go-round.

Still, GSN executives told reporters they were not planning on creating a channel dominated by faith-based programming. The network, they said, will continue to offer viewers secular shows like “Baggage”; “Family Feud,” in a new iteration with Steve Harvey as the host; “Minute to Win It,” which will have its debut on June 25 with original episodes and a new host, the Olympian Apolo Anton Ohno; and “The Newlywed Game,” also in a new iteration, with Sherri Shepherd as the host.

“We still need to be a broad-based channel,” said Amy Introcaso-Davis, executive vice president for programming and development at GSN.

Even so, the success of “The American Bible Challenge,” hosted by Jeff Foxworthy, is hard to ignore.

“Literally, it put us ahead of the game in the year’s most talked-about programming trend,” Ms. Introcaso-Davis said, referring to the renewed interest among viewers in programming with religious themes like “The Bible,” the miniseries on the History Channel.

Have you ever got sucked down an internet rabbit hole?

Sure, you have. We all have.

It starts with a YouTube video or maybe a Wikipedia article, then another one and another one and another and before you know it hours have flown by because you’ve been sucked down an internet rabbit hole you just couldn’t find your way out of.

Well, that happened with me this morning, except my rabbit hole wasn’t Wikipedia or YouTube.

It was pictures of Jesus in outer space.

It started with this picture.

I saw it on a friend’s computer and had to look it up for myself because, well, it’s just too awesome for words.

Well, that picture of Jesus in space led me to this one….

Apparently Jesus is like Galactus the Devourer and the second coming is when he will return to consume our planet.

Who knew?

Then we have the “he’s got the whole world in his flag draped hands” space Jesus.

I’m sure United Nations Jesus appreciates that one.

Not to be outdone, we’ve also got Jesus, King of Outer Space.

And Jesus the constellation.

When Jesus isn’t holding the stars in place, he’s apparently looking out his heavenly window waiting patiently for his pet bird to come home.

Better say your prayers Jesus’ pet bird does comes home, otherwise, he gets really sad…..and crushes half the planet.

But my favorite Jesus in outer space piece of art has to be this awesome Revelation Jesus motorcycle fuel tank.

I don’t own a motorcycle, but that custom tank really has me thinking about getting one.

Anyway, that was the journey through space with Jesus I experienced this morning.

I hope it blesses you with the same sort of holy procrastination it offered me.

And if it doesn’t, maybe you need to spend some time in serious prayer and contemplation, trying to understand why you can’t appreciate such glorious works of art.

It’s been a while since I enjoyed reading a book as much as I did Matt Appling’s Life After Art.

Now, granted I’ve been in school for a while and have been forced to read many things that are less than pleasurable, but that has little to do with why I enjoyed Matt’s book so much.

In Life After Art Matt touches on a subject that I am very passionate about – creativity and imagination. In his book, he challenges us to rediscover the fearless love for creativity we all had when we were children, but lost as we grew up, learned our limitations, and began worrying about what our peers thought of our creations.

Matt’s passion for art and all things creative saturates every page of Life After Art and he’s such a great writer that from the opening pages I felt like I was sitting in his classroom watching him teach. The only thing missing was my own canvas and paint to work on while I listened to him describe the importance of beauty and creativity in life.

As someone who great up in a multi-generataional family of teachers I am pretty opinionated about our country’s educational system. One of the things that frustrates me the most is the disproportionate emphasis placed on math and science to the degradation of everything else. Without going on a rant about standardized testing, this overemphasis leaves us with a glut of profoundly unimaginative and uncreative (not to mention historically ignorant and borderline illiterate) children. This is where I think Matt really hits the nail on the head.

As he says in his book, life is not like math class. It’s like art class. That’s not to say math isn’t profoundly important in “the real world.” It is. But life is about facing new challenges, failing, and imagining new ways of looking at and engaging the world, all of which we learn in art class. In other words, if we force feed our children nothing but mathematical equations and scientific facts, yet totally deprive them of the ability to develop their creativity and imagination they will never be able to reach their full potential by taking the things the learned in math and science class and imagining how they can be used to transform the world.

I think the same is true of the church, which is also why I think Matt’s book is so important.

For too long, just like the classroom, the church has put the bulk of its discipleship weight into teaching facts about the faith (i.e. doctrine), memorizing Bible verses, and waiting for her people to simple regurgiate what they have learned. Just like with math and science, there’s nothing wrong whatsoever with teaching facts about the faith and memorizing Bible verses. But if we don’t spur our people on towards creativity and challenge them to imagine how their faith can and should be lived out in the 21st century, then we will ultimately find ourselves failing to live up to our identity as the people of a God who at His core exudes beauty and creativity.

Life After Art faces this challenge head one with a wonderful array of stories, insights, and ideas that invite the church to abandon her stagnant approach to simply doing things the way they’ve always been done because that’s the way they’ve always been done, and instead rediscover our childhood wonder, or as Jesus said “become like little children,” so that we can use our once fearless creativity to change the world.

I can’t encourage you enough to pick up a copy of Life After Art. It won’t take you that long to get through, you’ll love every minute of it, and by the end I think you’ll find you’ve rediscovered that creative spark you thought you lost the day you left art class.

Grace and peace,

Zack Hunt