I once heard a story about Elvis Presley. When he was young he was a part of a church. He wanted to sing gospel music, and he wanted to do it in new and creative ways. He wanted to bring a new style to worship music. But the church said no. The church said we don’t do it that way. The church said it went against tradition.
So Elvis left, and took his music elsewhere.
That breaks my heart. I won’t speculate about his life and what could be different. But it makes me think. Why does the church so often stomp on the new creative ideas people have? For the sake of tradition, what are we missing out on?
We are made in the image of a creator. That means we are supposed to be creative. Yet somehow creativity and new thinking has been frowned upon in the church. We don’t do it that way. That’s different, we don’t want to change. We’re comfortable with the way things are. New things fly in the face of what we believe to be the right way to worship God, the right way to represent God, or the right way to express spirituality. But really, how much are we missing with that kind of thinking?
We think to please God, we have to eradicate all of self. We must get rid of who we are, and that is what God wants. But God created us to be who we are, he placed things within us. We pray “None of me, All of You, God.” But is that really how God wants it?
I think the church, in an attempt at devotion to Christ, has taken away people’s God-given gifts, talents, and desires. Frankly it makes church boring.
Living in Christ should never be boring. We are made to be creative beings, and to use that creativity to meet the needs of the world. Yet because we’ve adopted a wrong line of thinking about what it means to be a Christian, and what God expects of us, we’ve muted our creativity and tied down our ability to bring the goodness and love of God to the world.
Bill Johnson, the author of Dreaming With God writes, “When unbelievers lead the way in inventions and artistic expression, it is because the church has embraced a false kind of spirituality. It is not living in a true Kingdom mentality, which is the renewed mind. The renewed mind understands that the King’s dominion must be realized in all levels of society for an effective witness to take place.”
God has been teaching me a lot over the last few months. One of the big things I’m learning is how much God loves new creative things, and how he wants me to be someone who encourages the people around me. I spent a week in Romania recently, and the big thing I heard God speaking to me that week is that I need to be someone who throws logs not water onto the fires of people’s dreams and ideas.
What if the whole church did that? What if we all encouraged each other’s creative new ideas? What if when Elvis approached his church they put logs on his fire, instead of throwing water and turning him out?
Awesome things happen when people are released into their God-given abilities and dreams. That’s something I want to support in every way I can, cause I want to see the world changed.
(written by Bethany Nagan )
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