Creation waits for the revealing of the children of God

Here's the sermon that I shared this morning at St Gabriel's Pitsea:

We live in a world that, as St Paul described in Romans 8.12-25, is groaning because of its enslavement to decay and futility. What the Bible describes as the effects of sin impacts the world in terms of: our propensity to engulf the nations of the world in conflict; our greed which leaves some nations and individuals with too much by way of resources and others with too little; and our thirst for energy which has changed the climate in ways that threaten sustainability.

St Paul says that the solution to this is to be found in the reality and realisation that we are children of God. The creation, he writes, ‘waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God’ and it is only as the children of God are revealed that ‘the creation itself will be set free from its enslavement to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God’.

This is because we naturally tend, as human beings, toward living life selfishly by putting ourselves first and looking after No. 1. This is what scientists describe when they talk about us having selfish genes which get us ready to live in a world that is about the survival of the fittest.

Jesus shows us a new and different way of being human, however. He gave his life so that everyone who believes in him may not die but have eternal life. Jesus allowed his own life to end so that all people could know what it is like to really live. Not to live in the old, selfish, self-centred way of being human but to live in his new way of being human, loving God with all our being and loving our neighbours as ourselves.

It is this way of life that we enter when we realise we are God’s children and are baptised. When Jesus was baptised (Mark 1.9-15), he saw heaven opening, the Spirit coming down on him like a dove, and he heard a voice from heaven saying, “You are my own dear Son. I am pleased with you.” As he was baptised, he was immediately affirmed as God’s Son.

It is easy for us to think that that only applies to Jesus. That it was a special word spoken by God the Father especially to him and, on one level, no doubt it was. But the Bible makes it quite clear that Jesus came into our world and laid down his life to make us one with God so that, as Christians, we are Jesus’ brothers and sisters, members of the same family – God’s family – and co-heirs with Jesus of everything that he has.

Let’s remind ourselves of what St Paul says about this in Romans 8. 14-17: “Those who are led by God's Spirit are God's children. For the Spirit that God has given you does not make you slaves and cause you to be afraid; instead, the Spirit makes you God's children, and by the Spirit's power we cry out to God, Father! my Father! God's Spirit joins himself to our spirits to declare that we are God's children. Since we are his children, we will possess the blessings he keeps for his people, and we will also possess with Christ what God has kept for him …”

So, baptism is about moving from the old way of being human to Jesus’ new way of being human. It is about dying to the old purely materialistic way of life and taking up the new way of life which Jesus shows to us. We ask those who are baptised to: continue in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in the prayers; persevere in resisting evil, and, whenever we fall into sin, repent and return to the Lord; proclaim by word and example the good news of God in Christ; seek and serve Christ in all people, loving our neighbour as ourself; acknowledge Christ’s authority over human society, by prayer for the world and its leaders, by defending the weak, and by seeking peace and justice; so that Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith, that we may be rooted and grounded in love and bring forth the fruit of the Spirit. We ask this because, as Jesus said, it is by their fruits (their deeds) that true Christians will be known.

When we do these things we begin living the new way of life to which Jesus calls us and we are revealed as the children of God. As we live differently, selflessly, we impact the planet in different ways that are positive, not negative. This is why St Paul says the world is waiting ‘with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God’.

James Thwaites has written about this passage in Romans suggesting that the creation is crying out: ‘for its goodness to be fully realised and fully released. The creation cannot be good apart from the sons and daughters because we alone were given the right to name it; we are the image bearers who were made to speak moral value and divine intent into it. We were created to draw forth the attributes, nature and power of God in all things.’

He writes about the cry of sonship, pointing out that, because Christians have received the Spirit of adoption, they are sons and daughters of God who cry out "Abba, Father". He argues that this identity releases believers from fear and calls them into an eternal inheritance. 

He also notes the cry of creation and suggests that the physical creation is actively crying out for the full realization of its goodness. He argues that humans were made to be image-bearers who bring out the inherent possibilities and divine intent of the world through their everyday work and creativity. This is the task that we all have as human being and the calling on our lives our baptism. 

Then, he writes about the divine purpose in "all things". He looks at the phrase "all things work together for good" as proof of God's intimate involvement in the physical world and God's call for believers to engage with creation to bring it to its fullness. Ultimately, Thwaites uses Romans 8 to argue that followers of Jesus should stop treating the physical world as something to be abandoned. Instead, he believes Christians are tasked with noticing and nurturing God's goodness in their everyday lives and vocations.

This is the purpose for which we were created and for which the creation itself is crying out. Instead of the selfish and wasteful exploitation of creation’s resources – the domination and abuse – which characterises human engagement with the world, we are intended to creatively realise the inherent possibilities, the essential goodness, of creation through our imaginative ability as those who notice and name. We are able to do this because we have left our old, selfish way of life behind and have been adopted by God as his children, becoming brothers and sisters of Jesus, co-heirs with him of all he possesses. This is what we celebrate today and what we are challenged to be and to become as we begin to live the new way of being human that was first shown to us by Jesus Christ. Amen.

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Steve Scott - Different Kind Of Light.   

Nature Morte: A brush with death

My latest exhibition review for Church Times reflects on Nature Morte, a touring exhibition by MOCA London which is currently at the Guildhall Art Gallery:

'Can an exhibition change our understanding of what it means to be human? “Nature Morte” is an exhibition that essentially makes that claim, as it invites us to pause and look anew at the human condition.

The exhibition explores the chang­­ing significance of the still life (or nature morte in French) by bringing together historic still-life paintings and contemporary art­­works ...

“Nature Morte” can make the claim that still life is life-changing because the genre has never involved the innocent depiction of everyday objects, but has always utilised coded images.

For much of the history of the still-life, it has been Christian codes that viewers have been required to decipher.'

I have also written on the same exhibition for Artlyst in an article exploring whether art can transform society.

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Shovels & Rope - Death Or Glory.

Artlyst: Art Awakening Humanity Conference report

My latest piece for Artlyst is a report on the Art Awakening Humanity Conference held at St Stephen Walbrook in October.

Art Awakening Humanity was an afternoon of short talks and meditations organised by St Stephen Walbrook in partnership with Awakened Artists and Watkins Mind Body Spirit Magazine. The event included contributions from artists, collectors and spiritual teachers centred around the relationship between art and the spiritual dimension.

The conference offered a wide range of perspectives on the theme of art awakening humanity. Participants described the event as: “Wonderful day of talks and lectures”, “Wonderful, inspirational” and “Spiritually uplifting conference.”

My other Artlyst articles are:

• Central St Martins in the Fields Design Then And Now
• The Sacramental And Liturgical Nature Of Conceptual Art
• Caravan – An Interview With Rev Paul Gordon Chandler On Arts Peacebuilding
• Art Awakening Humanity Alexander de Cadenet Interviewed
• Polish Art In Britain Centenary Marked At London’s Ben Uri Gallery
• Michael Pendry New Installation Lights Up St Martin In The Fields;
• Mark Dean Projects Stations of the Cross Videos On Henry Moore Altar;
• Refugee Artists Learning from The Lives Of Others;
• The Religious Impulses Of Robert Rauschenberg;
• The Christian Science Connection Within The British Modern Art Movement;
• Artists Rebranding The Christmas Tree Tradition;
• Art Impacted - A Radical Response To Radicalisation;
• The Art of St Martin-in-the-Fields; and
• Was Caravaggio A Good Christian?

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The Unthanks - How Wild The Wind Blows.

Migration: This is a story about humanity

'Migration is what we have done since the earliest of times, triggering growth and enlarging our circles of possibility. Whether we’re discussing the Roman or British empires, 15th-century Venice or 20th-century New York or London today, great civilisations and dynamic cities have been defined by being open to immigrants and refugees.

They are, as migration specialist Ian Goldin characterises them, “exceptional people”. Over centuries, as he painstakingly details, it has been immigrants and refugees who have been part of the alchemy of any country’s success: they are driven, hungry and talented and add to the pool of entrepreneurs, innovators and risk-takers. The hundreds of thousands today who have trekked across continents and dangerous seas are by any standards unusually driven. They are also, as Angela Merkel says, fellow human beings. To receive them well is not only in our interests, it is fundamental to an idea of what it means to be human.' (Will Hutton)

'Other than a tiny proportion of sociopaths, our species is naturally empathetic. It is only when we strip the humanity from people – when we stop imagining them as being quite human like us – that our empathetic nature is eroded. That allows us either to accept the misery of others, or even to inflict it on them. Rightwing newspapers hunt down extreme and unsympathetic stories of refugees, and we fight back with statistics. Instead, we need to show the reality of refugees: their names, their faces, their ambitions and their fears, their loves, what they fled.' (Owen Jones)

'What do the following people have in common: Mark Carney, governor of the Bank of England; the former England cricketer Kevin Pietersen; Nigel Farage’s wife, Kirsten; Chelsea’s new striker, Pedro; and Sir Bradley Wiggins?

Yes, they are all migrants – or, if you prefer, immigrants. Having moved to the UK to further their careers, some of them might perhaps be described as “economic migrants”. Except that this term is reserved exclusively by politicians and the media to describe people who – unlike bankers or sports stars – they don’t like: people who, in the words of our foreign secretary, are “marauding” across Europe.

People from the UK moving abroad to pursue their career or financial interests, meanwhile, are “expats”, never emigrants or migrants.

The language we hear in what passes for a national conversation on migration has become as debased as most of the arguments, until the very word “migrants” is toxic, used to frighten us by conjuring up images of a “swarm” (as David Cameron put it) massing at our borders, threatening our way of life.

As Prof Alexander Betts, director of the refugee studies centre at Oxford University, says: “Words that convey an exaggerated sense of threat can fuel anti-immigration sentiment and a climate of intolerance and xenophobia.”'

'Another journalist says: “They are people – men, women and children, fathers and mothers, teachers and engineers, just like us – except they come from Syria, Eritrea, Afghanistan and elsewhere. Why not just call them ‘people’, then list any other information we know that is relevant?”'

'Politically charged expressions such as “economic migrants”, “genuine refugees” or “illegal asylum seekers” should have no part in our coverage. This is a story about humanity. Reporting it should be humane as well as accurate. Sadly, most of what we hear and read about “migrants” is neither.' (Dave Marsh)

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Michael Kiwanuka - I Need Your Company.

Combining business with humanity, without neglecting either

On Thursday I had the opportunity to visit the Rothschild Archive and learnt about the ethos which underpins this famous company's success.

The success of the Rothschild family business owes much to the solidity of the original partnership of the five sons of Mayer Amschel Rothschild, who developed businesses in five European capitals: Frankfurt, London, Paris, Vienna and Naples. Working in close harmony, the family rose to prominence in a number of business sectors including bullion, government bonds, railway and mining finance.

Mayer Amschel believed that forming a partnership would sustain a strong family business into the future, a belief that proved to be correct. The agreement ensured that the reputation that Mayer Amschel had built up for himself, through a lifetime of innovative trading, could be passed on to the next generation. By remaining true to the principles and rules of the partnership and by staying in close communication, the brothers went on to create a business that has remained at the forefront of global finance.

The formal structure of the partnership agreement survived into the twentieth century, though the family business subsequently adopted more sophisticated corporate structures. Profit sharing was built into the agreement. Mayer Amschel intended that his sons should share out the profits of the partnership, ensuring that the brothers were committed to the well-being of each other, and the partnership as a whole.

This ethos is demonstrated by a letter of thanks sent by Sir Siegmund George Warburg after spending time in 1926, as a young man, at New Court, under the tutelage of Lionel de Rothschild and his brother Anthony. His time at the London house obviously made an impression, as his gracious thank-you letter shows:

"At the moment of leaving London I wish to tell you how grateful I am to you for the time I was allowed to spend at New Court which I consider a great honour. You provided me with many opportunities to learn. I learnt quite a lot of details of business-machinery. But I learnt something also which will be far more important to me in my future life. This is the fine tradition of New Court which combines business with humanity, without neglecting either. To learn such a combination is particularly valuable to somebody from the continent where so often humanity is killed by business."

Warburg was later to become a senior City figure who firmly believed that financial integration of Europe was an essential step in the development of the European economy. He managed the firm he created, S.G. Warburg & Co. until the 1970s. S.G. Warburg & Co. was later acquired by UBS AG, creating UBS Warburg, which then became UBS AG.

Despite the depredations of time and occasional bouts of over-enthusiastic destruction, a high proportion of the records of N M Rothschild & Sons have survived across nearly two centuries of continuing business, in good physical condition and carefully preserved order, looked after by generations of clerks in the Archives Department of the London Bank.

In 1999, the Board of Directors of N M Rothschild & Sons Limited, under the Chairmanship of Sir Evelyn de Rothschild, formally gifted the contents of the Archive Department to the newly established Rothschild Archive Trust. The Trustees of The Rothschild Archive Trust administer the Archive as an independent charitable trust in purpose-built premises made available for the purpose within the offices of the London business.

In 2011, the Rothschild Archive moved into new premises at New Court in the City of London. The latest building to stand on the New Court site was designed by OMA, Office for Metropolitan Architecture, headed by the eminent Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas. OMA’s vision for the fourth version of New Court was inspired by the idea of ‘heritage in the City’ The Reading Room is a key feature of the dramatic modern glass and steel design.

The Reading Room bookcases and furniture were designed, crafted, and installed by the prestigious North Yorkshire company, Robert Thompson’s Craftsmen Ltd, also known as ‘The Mouseman of Kilburn’.Thompson’s use only the best quality sustainable oak and skill to create the finest pieces.The bookcases alone used 19 English oaks, took 5,500 hours to produce, and over 1,000 hours to install, and all the pieces in the Reading Room feature Thompson's trade mark mouse motif.

The Archive now houses, alongside the records of the London banking house (which themselves include often detailed correspondence from the continental houses in Frankfurt, Paris, Vienna and Naples), records of the different branches of the businesses in England, France, Germany, Italy and Austria. The Archive is also responsible for a large collection of papers of the French banking business, held on deposit with the Archives Nataionales du Monde du Travail, Roubaix, France. The Archive also holds collections of private papers of members of the English, French and Austrian Rothschild family.

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Mathilde de Rothschild - Where lilac blows.

We were meant to live for so much more

“Ever since God created the world his invisible qualities, both his eternal power and his divine nature, have been clearly seen, they are perceived in the things God has made.” (Romans 1. 20)

That is the claim which St Paul makes in the first chapter of Romans and that understanding forms the basis of the teaching about worry that Jesus gives us in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6. 25 - 34).

The teaching Jesus gives us is based on lessons drawn from his understanding of nature and creation. Firstly, he looks at the cycle of existence – the circle of life - which enables all creatures to live and flourish in their way and time.

Birds provide his specific example, possibly because they would have been prolific and yet are not reliant on human beings for their survival. The birds don’t do any of the things that human beings do to provide food for themselves – they “do not sow seeds, gather a harvest and put it in barns” – yet, in the circle of life there is a sufficiency of the food that they need in order to survive.

In this way, Jesus says, we see that God the Father is taking care of them. Jesus is saying in effect what is repeated in Genesis 1 that God’s creation is good and provides all that is needed by the creatures which live in it. In Genesis 1 we specifically read that God has provided in creation the food which the birds need in order to increase in number (Genesis 1. 22 and 30).

For Jesus, God’s provision for the birds is a sign of the worth that he sees in his creation as a whole and in each specific part. Just as the creation as a whole is “good,” so are the birds which are found within it. If that is true of birds, then is it not also true of human beings? “Aren’t you worth much more than birds?” Jesus asks.

In Eucharistic Prayer G we read that in the fullness of time God made us in his image, the crown of all creation. Genesis 1 tells us that God made us to be like him, to resemble him and be made in his image. That gives us incredible worth and value, in and of ourselves and regardless of how we feel about ourselves. Jesus is saying that the power we have over creation and our unique position in creation - being conscious creators – speaks clearly to us of this incredible privilege of having been made in the image of God.

To what extent do we appreciate this reality? Often we can be so caught up in the busyness of daily life that we do not stop to reflect on the wonder of existence and our existence. Stop for a moment to think about the incredible complexity of our physical bodies and of our conscious existence.

Stop for a moment and think about the incredible achievements of the human race – the great art we have created, amazing technological developments and inventions, the cities we have built, the scientific and medical advancements we have seen, the depths of compassion and sacrifice which have been plumbed by the great saints in our history. While we are also well aware of the darker forces at work in human beings, our positive abilities and achievements reveal the reality of our creation as beings that resemble God in his creative power and energy. We can and should celebrate this reality – realising the worth that God sees in us – at the same time as giving thanks to our God for creating us in this way.               

Isn’t life worth more than food and isn’t the body worth more than clothes, Jesus asks us. Often we can be so caught up in the busyness of daily life that we do not realise the wonder of our existence and do not realise all that we could achieve if we were to use our abilities and creativity more fully in his service. “We were meant to livefor so much more” is how the rock band Switchfoot put it. Jesus challenges us to be concerned with more than the worries of daily life, to be “concerned above everything else with the Kingdom of God and with what he [God] requires of you.”

Stop for a moment and think of the unique way in which you have been created by God – the unique combination of personality and talents with which you have been blessed – and ask yourself how these things could more fully be used for the building up of the Kingdom of God on earth, as in heaven.

Stop for a moment and think about the Kingdom of God as described in the Beatitudes with which Jesus began the Sermon on the Mount. The Kingdom of God is a place of happiness for those who know they are spiritually poor, a place of comfort for those who mourn, a place of receptivity for those who are humble, a place of satisfaction for those whose greatest desire is to do what God requires, a place of mercy for those who are merciful, a place in which God is seen by the pure in heart, a place in which those who work for peace are called God’s children, and a place which belongs to those who are persecuted because they do what God requires. What might God be calling us to do for him to bring the Kingdom of God to others?

Jesus argues that the goodness and worth of all created things can be seen in the way that creation provides all that is needed for creatures and plants to live and thrive. Our worth is greater still because we are made in the very image of God having power over creation and innate creative abilities ourselves. It is incumbent on us then to use the power we possess for the good of others and for the good of creation itself. We are, as God says, in Genesis to cultivate, tend and guard creation. Bringing happiness, satisfaction and belonging by giving comfort, practising humility, sharing mercy and working for peace are all powerful ways of tending and guarding creation and building the Kingdom of God on earth, as in heaven.

Stop for a moment to recognise the something more for which we are meant to live. Dedicate your life to be concerned above everything else with the Kingdom of God and with what God requires of you.   

  

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Switchfoot - Meant To Live. 

Sergio Gomez - The Sacred Beckons

Sergio Gomez is a Chicago based visual artist, Owner/Director of 33 Contemporary Gallery, Curator/ Director of Exhibitions at the Zhou B. Art Center. Founder/Director of VisualArtToday.com, Creative Consultant for Idea Seat Marketing & Advertising, Contributor for Italia Arte Magazine, Co-founder and Creative Director of 3C Wear, curator of the National Wet Paint Exhibition and Chicago's Twelve, graphic designer and art/design faculty at South Suburban College.

Gomez writes: "I am interested in the human and spiritual experience throughout the cycles of life. The human figures stand still, observe, communicate and/or listen, as they exist in their physical state. Overall, I appeal for a sense of human awareness and spiritual consciousness."

Cecilia González-Andrieu writes: "Gomez' use of the human figure grounds his work in the depth of human concerns; his art has our shared plight of suffering, of searching, and of triumph at its center. Far from a dualism that posits a separation between body and transcendence, Gomez's artful technique underscores how A/art points to the indissoluble unity of what is matter and what is spirit. In Gomez's work the use of multiple textures, visible seams, dripping paint, vibrant colors and brushstrokes honors corporality, as his evocative figures celebrate personhood and the world in which we dwell. Yet quite seamlessly, Gomez's works also act like modern icons opening windows and doors into the depths of Spirit, where death never has the last word and the sacred beckons.

In his passionate and passion-making art Sergio Gomez tells a community's story, raises a cry of pain, mediates a vision of hope, and points with care and reverence toward that eternal Other whose love the very beauty of these works brings into relationship with a thankful world."

Presence / Absence is a two-person travelling exhibition of painting works by Sergio Gomez and Mark Zlotkowski.

"Gomez' paintings are fused with meditations on the multifaceted experiences of human condition and spirituality throughout the cycles of life. The human form is the dominant element in his work and it exists as an anonymous representation of the self. Gomez’ delves into the essence of humanity and the human condition". "Zlotkowski’s work bears witness to deeply personal versions of shared human experiences. The work makes sense of seeming paradoxes: the urban meets the wilderness; fires burn without consuming; the mundane, ephemeral stuff of life cracks open to reveal its eternal substance".

Presence / Absence hopes to encourage its audience to a deeper understanding of their own visible and invisible experiences.

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Mehran - The Little Song of Hope.

Seeing and being seen

The traditional image for our Patron Saint at St John's Seven Kings, St John the Evangelist, is the eagle and that is, of course, why images of eagles can be seen in different parts of our church. This image for John and the writings we traditionally attribute to him wasn’t chosen at random but was selected because it expresses something of what John’s writing do for us.

Richard Burridge, in his important book Four Gospels, One Jesus? tells us that the eagle was used to represent the Evangelist because he gives us the high-flying, far-seeing perspective of the eagle when he writes about Jesus. These writings give us the big picture about Jesus and his significance.

We can see this in our readings today. In 1 John 1, we read that Jesus, the Word of life, has existed from the very beginning and in John’s Gospel we read of Jesus speaking of his coming again at the end of time. This is the big picture into which John sets the stories and theology that John gives us about Jesus. When John writes about Jesus, he is not simply saying that these are interesting stories about a great human being. Instead he is saying that this is God himself, the alpha and omega, the beginning and the end, walking, talking and acting in the flesh.

In 1 John 1 there are two key features of God that John wants us to grasp in order to understand the significance of the big picture. The first is that God is someone that we can see and the second that God is someone who enables us to see.

John uses the image of the Word made visible to tell us that God is someone that we can see. The heart of the Christian faith, he is saying, is the incarnation; the reality that God, in Jesus, became a human being and lived in a particular culture and time. John was able to say of this Word; “we have heard it, and we have seen it with our eyes; yes, we have seen it and our hands have touched it.” God is no longer detached from us and unknowable to us, instead he has chosen to come close to us, to move into our neighbourhood, to become one of us.

The incarnation is at the heart of Christianity because it is a sign of the love that God has for us. God loves us so much that he is prepared to become one of us, even though this means huge constraints  and ultimately leads to his death. As a result, he understands us and understands human life. Now whatever we go through, God has been there before because he has experienced life in all its wonder and heartache.

However, God is not simply someone who can be seen by us. He is also the one by whom we can see. John gives us the image of God as light to help us grasp this facet of God’s being. Light is not something we can see directly but something that enables us to see ourselves and our world. This is what Jesus does for us through the incarnation; he shows what humanity was originally intended to become. For the very first time in the history of the world a human being lives a fully human life.

As a result when we see ourselves and our world in the light of the life of Jesus, what we see are our failure and inability to be the people that we were created to become. In the light of the way that Jesus lived his life, we see our lack of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, humility, and self-control. As this letter says, if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and there is no truth in us. But when we live in the light, seeing ourselves as we really are, then we become honest with ourselves and with God. By coming into that honesty we confess our sins and are purified of them.

Both these understandings of Jesus are necessary for us to become fully human. If God was just light that exposed our failures then we would be condemned by God. If God was just alongside us as the Word made flesh then there would be no prospect of change for us. But because God, in Jesus, is both the light revealing our failings and the Word made flesh understanding our failings, we can receive forgiveness and change to become more fully human.

John gives us many paradoxes and parallels in his writings. Jesus is both this and that; both Word and flesh; both flesh and light; both message and image; both human and divine. As a result, his writings can see difficult and dense; yet it is only because Jesus is both/and that we can know what real humanity looks like and have some real prospect of moving towards that reality in our lives. 

To repeat, it is only because God, in Jesus, is both the light revealing our failings and the Word made flesh understanding our failings that we can receive forgiveness and change to become more fully human. So this Patronal Festival, let us be thankful for the big picture that John paints for us and thank God for the salvation that comes to us because he is Word and flesh; flesh and light; message and image; human and divine.

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The Proclaimers - The Light.

What is the purpose of creativity and imagination?

Dorothy L. Sayers remarked on the fact that the one thing we know for sure about God at the point that he makes humanity in his own image is that he is creative:

“[H]ad the author of Genesis anything particular in his mind when he wrote? It is observable that in the passage leading up to the statement about man, he has given no detailed information about God. Looking at man, he sees in him something essentially divine, but when we turn back to see what he says about the original upon which the “image” of God was modelled, we find only the single assertion, “God created”. The characteristic common to God and man, is apparently that: the desire and ability to make things”. (The Mind of the Maker)

She argues that it is therefore logical to suppose that creativity is a significant aspect of humanity’s being made in the image of God. Similarly:

“In his essay “The Image of God and the Epic of Man,” [Paul] Ricoeur suggests that humans are in the image of God because they too enjoy the power of creativity. Thus the image of God, creativity, gives rise to the images of man, in the sense of the images that man makes. These images constitute “the sum total of the ways in which man projects his vision on things.”” (K. J. Vanhoozer, Biblical Narrative in the Philosophy of Paul Ricoeur: A Study in Hermeneutics and Theology)

Within the Biblical Creation stories human creativity is seen in: God’s blessing of humanity which included the tasks of increasing in number, filling and subduing the earth and, ruling over living creatures (Genesis 1: 28); Adam’s working and taking care of the garden (Genesis 2: 15); and, Adam’s naming of the living creatures (Genesis 2: 20). Albert Wolters brings both sociality and creativity together when he comments that:

“Adam and Eve, as the first married couple, represent the beginnings of societal life; their task of tending the garden, the primary task of agriculture, represents the beginnings of cultural life." (Creation Regained: Biblical Basics for a Reformational Worldview)        

These two also sit together because of the development that runs through the stories. Wolters describes this in speaking of Genesis 1:

“There is a process of development and evolution as the earthly realm assumes, step by step, the contours of the variegated world of our experience. On the sixth day this process is completed with the creation of man, and on the seventh day God rests from his labors. This is not the end of the development of creation, however. Although God has withdrawn from the work of creation, he has put an image of himself on the earth with a mandate to continue. The earth had been completely unformed and empty; in the six-day process of development God had formed it and filled it – but not completely. People must now carry on the work of development: by being fruitful they must fill it even more; by subduing it they must form it even more. Mankind, as God’s representatives on earth, carry on where God left off. But this is now to be a human development of the earth … From now on the development of the created earth will be societal and cultural in nature.” 

In addition to the six day development of creation, development is also seen in: God’s blessing of humanity in Genesis 1: 28; Adam’s working and taking care of the garden (Genesis 2: 15); and the two trees that held the potential for god-likeness (Genesis 2: 9, 16 & 17, 3: 22). Wolters says of the world that “[c]reation is not something that, once made, remains a static quality. There is, as it were, a growing up (though not in a biological sense), an unfolding of creation.”

The latter point is worth expanding further. One tree held out the potential for becoming like God in having the knowledge of good and evil, the other in living forever. The former tree was banned for Adam and Eve while the latter is not. One reading of this story is that God intended Adam and Eve to eat from the Tree of Life and become like him in having eternal life. If so, this is another example of development. 

For the stories to have this development dynamic suggests creation is both actuality and possibility and that humanity has the responsibility of actualising the possible. If so, possibilities are, as Ricoeur argues, real, although unactualised. Ricoeur suggests that imagination leads to actualisation and that both are a means of self-understanding for humanity:

“Ricoeur is unwilling to dismiss human projects as unreal just because they have not yet been realized or because their conditions do not yet obtain: “It is by virtue of an unjustifiable reduction that we decide to equate ‘world’ with the whole of observable facts; I inhabit a world in which there is something ‘to be done by me’; the ‘to be done by me’ belongs to the structure which is the ‘world’.” In the case of human willing, the possible precedes the actual, for the forming of a project precedes its realization: “The presence of man in the world means that the possible precedes the actual and clears the way for it; a part of the actual is a voluntary realisation of possibilities anticipated by a project.” Moreover, in determining to do something, I likewise determine myself: “In the same way that a project opens up possibilities in the world, it opens up new possibilities in myself and reveals me to myself as a possibility of acting. My power-to-be manifests itself in my power-to-do …” The “possible” is therefore an essential component in self-understanding. I achieve self-understanding when I grasp what possibilities are open to me." (Biblical Narrative in the Philosophy of Paul Ricoeur)

This can be seen in the Creation stories when God asked Adam to name the living creatures. Names in ancient culture are descriptive of the essence or meaning of objects or people. Therefore, here God was asking Adam to be creative both in imagining the possibilities for each creature and in the forming of a name to reflect those possibilities. However, God was also asking Adam to develop self-understanding because the naming of the living creatures is set in the context of finding a helper for Adam. As Adam imagined possibilities for each creature he was also coming to an understanding of his needs as a human being and rejecting each creature in turn as a suitable helper for him. Therefore, when God creates Eve, Adam had the necessary self-understanding to recognise Eve immediately as the helper for which he had been seeking (2: 23 & 24).     

I am suggesting therefore that the creation stories depict a relational God creating a relational world with which he interacts. Within this he created humanity in his relational image to develop the relational possibilities inherent within creation; these being, as Colin Gunton suggests in The One, the Three and the Many: God, Creation and the Culture of Modernity, to develop the practical implications of relationality, perichoresis and substantiality through sociality and creativity.

God’s intention was that this task would be undertaken by human beings in relationship with him and with the rest of creation. Not only was humanity created in his image but humanity’s task was to be undertaken in his image, as though he himself were undertaking it. It is this that helps us to understand the meaning of the ban on Adam and Eve eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

God, as the source of all things, contains both actuality and possibility. In creation he actualised good, and evil remained only an unactualised possibility. Nevertheless it is real (though unactualised) and can be imagined (either through imagining the opposite of the actual or difference in the actual) and thereby actualised.

God’s intention was then to train humanity for our task of developing creation by assisting us to imagine possibilities as a means to self-understanding. This is what I noted in the story of Adam naming the living creatures. In this way God was acting like a parent telling her child not to put his hand into a fire. The child imagines the pain of being on fire and learns the lesson. God in the creation stories wished to do the same. He wished to introduce human beings to the knowledge of good and evil by imagining, under his guidance, the possibility of evil, as a means of learning the dangers inherent in actualising evil. In this way human beings could have developed into divinity by gradually developing the knowledge of good and evil and then by eating the fruit from the Tree of Life and living forever.

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Van Morrison - Rave On John Donne / Did You Get Healed?

Let us be human

A small group of us from St John's Seven Kings spent the day on Mersea Island today with Sam Norton. Sam challenged us with his thinking about Christian responses to contemporary crises during the morning, we then enjoyed visiting the beach and harbour on what was a beautifully sunny day before returning to a St Peter & St Paul West Mersea which was attractively decorated for Harvest in order to share communion together as Christ commanded and as the formative act for us as Christians.

Much of what Sam had to say is summed up in this quote from his most recent post:

"The solution to our predicament does not lie in any scheme which has as its final purpose the preservation of the environment. Rather, our foremost task is to learn again what it means to live as a human being, by following the example of the one who lived a fully human life (hence 'Let us be Human'). The most important contribution that the church can make is to name the powers that are destroying us, to identify all the ways in which our civilisation has become disordered and which prevent us becoming fully human. In other words, it is discipleship that is lacking, not a particular program for planetary preservation. This has what might seem a surprising conclusion, but one that I mean with all seriousness: the God-given way to 'save the planet' is by celebrating the eucharist, and allowing it to form us. If we repent and return to faithful living then the environmental problems will resolve themselves (“if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land” - 2 Chronicles 7.14)."

Similarly, this Thomas Merton quote which Sam used in his talk:

"The only thing that can save the world from complete moral collapse is a spiritual revolution. Christianity, by its very nature, demands such a revolution. If Christians would all live up to what they profess to believe, the revolution would happen." (From: Ascent to Truth)


For more extensive notes of material that Sam summarised and shared with us, click here.
 
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Leonard Cohen - The Future.

What is it that you really want out of life?

Click here for a great Kiosk sketch from 'Paul Merton - The Series':

"You are a sentient human being. What about all the activity that is going on in your mind right now? At this very moment billions of pieces of information are floating across the synapses of your brain. You have the secrets of the universe there inside your head. You are a unique individual. You have your own hopes, aspirations and desires. You can be anything that you want. It's up to you to make the decision. What is it that you really want out of life? ..."

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Bill Mallonee - Life on Other Planets.