Scripture: Genesis 1-2:3
When I think of creativity, I think of the craft cupboard in the dining room of our house. My particular children are frequent and heavy crafters. Inspiration strikes often, and when it does the table is instantly scattered with paper, markers, glue sticks, crayons, ribbon, googly eyes, pipe cleaners and stickers. And glitter. Oh, the glitter! Always and everywhere. As one friend with similarly inclined children put it, glitter is the head-lice of the craft cupboard. Small, spreading and impossible to get rid of!
We call it “aggressive crafting” when the cupboard gets emptied onto the table and the bits and pieces fly everywhere. I’m always glad that they’re occupied with a project, but I grown inwardly (and often outwardly) at the growing mess. Every meal is preceded by a ritual of tidying that inevitably includes pushing a stack of half-finished projects to the end of the table for completion at a later date. And onto that pile gets added the myriad creative projects brought home from school or activities or camps. We do our best to display what we can, but were every wall in the village ours for the hanging, it would not be enough! The projects collect until late on a Wednesday night, when all are safely in bed, and I slip out a few select items that make the cut for the kids’ memorabilia boxes, and shove the rest into the recycling bin at the curb. Then I pray that the truck comes to pick it up before the kids leave for school the next morning, lest an ardent crafter with a big heart and bigger puppy-dog eyes step out of the house and notice last week’s forgotten but beloved masterpiece sticking out amongst the newsprint and crushed cereal boxes, and ask with quavering lip why it’s being thrown away.
And then there is the craft cupboard itself. It’s pretty scary in there. Many generations of fairly ingenious organizational systems have been imposed on this space, but somehow the application of abject creativity manages to prevail with remarkable speed. Occasionally one of us takes the cupboard to task and restores a semblance of order, but most of the time we just sigh and concede that this is in fact the shape of creativity in action. And further, that it is witness to the divine outworking of our human identity as creative beings made in the image of a creative God.
I can’t usually see this in the moment, but I do think it’s true. In a very real way, the flurry of glue and glitter in our dining room reflects the breathtaking burst of original creativity that we read about in the first chapter of Genesis. Calling out light and dark, cutting and separating elements and sticking them where they belong. Adding colour and sprinkling little extras here and there. The swish of a paintbrush, the shading of details, the explosion of unique elements that come together to reveal a masterpiece of beauty and delight. And in the middle of it all, the deep mystery that Sandy read in her opening: “So God created human beings in the divine image. In the very image of God they were created.” We were created to be artists and wonder-workers, carrying within us the same spark of creativity that established the cosmos in all their glory. Made in the very image of an endlessly creative God.
This is good news, and heartening as I survey the state of the dining room table once more. But what does it mean for those of us who might not be such natural crafters? Sandy confessed earlier that she doesn’t usually consider herself a creative person. I’m probably with her on that, and I suspect many others are too. Not all of us are artists in any straightforward sense. Drawing or painting or poetry or music or dance may not be our thing. We all know people who are amazingly creative, and we can see very clearly that’s not us. Did we somehow get a lesser dose of that image of God that Genesis speaks of?
Well, part of what we want to do today and for the rest of the summer is to expand our understanding of creativity. The traditional arts are creative pursuits without a doubt. And I’m so glad there are people who can express themselves beautifully in some of these ways. It’s a gift to us all when art communicates something about our human experience in whatever form. But I think the divine spark of creativity takes shape in us in all kinds of other ways too. A few examples:
Whether or not we think of ourselves as artists, many of us have learned vocational skills of one kind or another. Crafts or trades that have been our livelihood. That spark of divine creativity emerges as we fix engines or design software or build houses or teach children or prepare food or work farms or lead teams or care for others. And whether at work or elsewhere, many of us have learned to be very creative problem-solvers. We transform obstacles or work around them. We come up with alternative solutions and imagine new possibilities. Next time we gather here for worship our theme will be the creative ministry of Jesus. His way of telling stories, of doing the unexpected, of confronting power in unique ways and tending to those on the margins. This is creativity too. In Jesus we see the spark of our Creator God burst into world-changing flame.
I can’t help but think of the huge project currently underway here in St. Jacobs to convert the old Jacobstettel Guest House into temporary housing for Ukrainian refugees. The effort is being spearheaded by Woolwich Healthy Communities alongside lots of local support from neighbours and residents. Talk about finding a creative solution that pairs an asset with a desperate need. The team is working hard to get the building ready, and are hoping there could be refugees housed there this summer already. But it’s a big project, and will need broad support in terms of volunteers and funds. Some of us have already gotten involved, and hopefully others will too. Creativity in action that offers hope and healing in a new way.
But even if the things we’re involved in are not so grand or ambitious, just navigating life takes a kind of creativity. We all find ourselves getting up each morning in a changing world, facing a day ahead filled with mysteries and unknowns. What do I do next? How should I respond to this situation? How can I balance these commitments? Where should I go? Who should I see? There isn’t a script for the day on our bedsides. We make it up as we go along, writing the story minute by minute and hour by hour. Life is a drama and we are playwrights, actors, directors. Creating something beautiful and intricate and complicated just by taking the next breath. We are all life-artists, whatever our gifts and skills. Living out our calling as bearers of God’s creative image in the world.
So – Sandy and I will take comfort in this even if no one has ever commissioned us to paint something or tastefully design a space. Though she at least says she can dance, which puts her in a category that I won’t be breaking into anytime soon! Even so, we are creative beings through and through. God’s own marvelous handiwork given life to share in that gift of creativity wherever we are and whatever we do. Our creative expression is a form of praise, a discipline of prayer, a place of worship as we celebrate the image of God at work in us.
Now, the truth is that we are not alone in celebrating creativity. If anything, words like “creativity” and “innovation” have become the buzzwords of our time. Try finding an employer or company or organization that doesn’t bill itself as being innovative, cutting-edge, outside of the box. We prize and value creativity – and with it growth, change, even novelty. These are particularly pressing values in a time where it seems like the world is moving and changing at an incredible pace. If you’re not finding creative new ways of going about your business, you’re getting left behind. Dinosaurs of a previous age that just can’t compete in today’s marketplace of products and ideas.
There are certainly things to celebrate in this culture of openness to change and creativity. There’s more freedom to express yourself, to be who you are – less pressure to conform to a particular model or pattern that just doesn’t fit for everyone. But our culture of innovation also carries within it a seed of restlessness that is never satisfied. What we have is never enough, and what is familiar is immediately passé. And so we keep pushing the limits of our creativity, making more and more just because we can. We see this in technological advancement, which turned a corner with the industrial revolution a couple of centuries ago, but has exploded in the last decades. Our best and most creative minds are hard at work making things faster, smaller, more powerful, more efficient, more plentiful. The shelf-life for new technologies is up in the blink of an eye. By the time you figure out how to use the current generation of a particular product, it’s obsolete and you’re being enticed to buy the new and improved version.
This hyper-valuing of unlimited creative innovation, I think, is at least partly to blame for the crisis of stuff that our world is drowning in. Products of every kind available cheaply and disposed of carelessly as the next new thing comes along. And we know the toll this has taken on the earth in our limitless quest for raw materials and in the byproducts of our mass production. Isn’t it interesting that our human creativity comes around full circle in this tragic way. The Genesis creation narrative blesses us to be makers in the image of the God who made all things. But we have pushed this creativity so far as to actually damage the earth, the water, the air, the plants, the creatures that God declared so good.
I know that these days there’s a lot of creative energy being invested in technologies that can reduce our footprint on the earth and mitigate the effects of climate change. And I’m grateful for this. I’m grateful that there are still creative minds and hands exploring new opportunities and developing new technologies. In fact, I don’t want to cast aspersions on any in the long tradition of invention and discovery. Partly because I’m as invested as anyone in the technologies of our time, but also because the spark at work through it all remains that creative image of God at the heart of the Genesis story.
And yet there is something in the biblical creation account that we have so often missed in our rush to create and create again. And that is what happened on the Seventh Day. On the Seventh Day, God rested. God stopped working. God stopped creating. God looked out over all that had been made and saw that it was good. It was enough. The restless longings found a home, found satisfaction. The tools were put down and God enjoyed the marvelous fruits of this divine creativity.
What if our creative expression could remember this Seventh Day too? The image of God in us holds two things together: on the one hand, the calling to make, to produce, to multiply, to expand, to improve, to fashion and draw and paint and fix and build and learn and grow. And on the other hand, the calling to rest, to enjoy, to play, to let go, to trust in the goodness of creation, to see that it is enough, to settle in and be at home.
I think we probably do understand this link almost instinctively. Many of our regular forms of creative expression are exactly what we do for fun and recreation. Whether we’re painting or singing or dancing or tinkering or quilting or building lego or playing sports or cultivating gardens – this is how we enjoy the good gifts of creation. This is how we rest and recharge.
But like the days of creation, the creativity that we have received comes with its healthy boundaries. Not everything that we can do ought to be done. If our creativity is fueled by a hungry restlessness for more and more, we will miss the goodness that is there in front of us. We will take its gifts as possessions, and its opportunities as our right. And we will find ourselves destroying what was made good for us.
Discerning the boundaries of our creativity is hard, and I don’t begin to know how we return to the vision of our calling in Genesis. But I do think that practicing the rest of the Seventh Day alongside our creative work is a good place to start.
And what better time to make a beginning than the summer, a season made for a slower pace. I know our craft cupboard will be emptied onto the table for much of the next two months while school is out. And most of the time I will happily see a reflection of creation’s glory in the mess of supplies, and the image of God in the proud artist holding her work up for inspection.
What creative ventures will you try out this summer? Maybe something new, or maybe a favorite activity that you come back to often. May you get lost in the delight of making or shaping or imagining your project into existence. May you feel the spark of God’s creativity flickering within you as stretch the muscles of body and mind. May you join creation in praise of your Creator as you make each day into a unique work of art – weaving each step in a way that only you can. And may you find that seventh day of rest that holds your creativity in the assurance of God’s sufficiency. This is enough, and it is good, thanks be to God.
Amen.