Creation Re-imagined…
April 11, 2007
What if the whole earth was actually filled with the glory of God?
What if all of creation is groaning and hoping for even more beauty yet to be revealed?
What if since the beginning of time all creation has been screaming out that there is more to life than the visible?
* You can read a bit more on this from a previous post at the vox bookclub.
So I found some old unwanted tiles underneath the deck of my friends’ home, left discarded by the previous owner.
I brought them to our creativity and spirituality class and had each student choose a tile. They were extremely grimy so they were each asked to go wash them off. As they cleaned the dirt off of the tiles they were instructed to imagine themselves as the tile being cleansed by the hands of God.
Some tables were put together with a large blue camping tarp laid over it. This again was to stimulate a fresh environment that was also conducive to creative messiness. Dollar store paint and brushes were laid out.
Somewhat inspired by Steve Taylor’s “The out of bounds church“, everyone was asked to silently reflect, imagine, and paint as I read from Genesis 1, while Moby’s track “God moving over the face of the waters” was playing.
This is what we created when we put sixteen tiles together…
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Posted in Culture, Pictures, art, creativity, stories
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April 11th, 2007 at 3:33 pm
[...] shares how his reading in The Divine Conspiracy relates to his ongoing series on creativity and his recent [...]
April 11th, 2007 at 8:56 pm
[...] at “One life… it’s all I got,” has some enjoyable stuff on creativity. I’m linking to one post specifically but he’s doing a series on it that’d be [...]
April 12th, 2007 at 8:13 am
Lon, I’m so inspired to try the ideas you mentioned in this post myself. Thanks
April 19th, 2007 at 11:21 am
Great exercise. I think that symbolism is something that is missing from my life and the churches life. I think it serves as a practical reminder of spiritual truths. One that is tangible and understandable. What a great way to engage. Do you find it difficult for people from different social-tribes (sub-cultures) in your group to engage in such exercises? Let me put it another way. Do all of those participating get it? Or do you find that you are leading into a different form of meditation or expression and is that difficult for those who do not see the value in it?? Curious to hear your thoughts or experiences.
April 20th, 2007 at 1:11 pm
Sivin, thanks for tuning in, glad it might be useful!
Dallas, great questions. With the proper set-up, I think everyone got it to at least a certain degree. Through the sessions we gave some biblical basis for joining the work of the God-head in the creative process, for reclaiming imagination, and finding fresh ways of expressing faith…
it definitely is different though… since it was more of an experience than anything cognitive… responses ranged from it peaceful, refreshing, fun, to ‘creativity is difficult’.
January 14th, 2008 at 8:49 am
“What if the whole earth was actually filled with the glory of God?”
i guess it depends on whether God is seen as creating the process, or being part of the process, or being the all and beyond of the process.
soulMerlin