Art and Music, Space and Objects

For St.Stephen’s University, Essentials Red Online Worship History Course, the Institute of Contemporary and Emerging Worship Studies, with Dan Wilt

 

Our gorgeous church building where we were married. It was important to me to have the ceremony in a place already full of beauty.

 

 

In thinking on the role of art and music in the church and larger culture throughout history, I am once again astounded and excited to see how important God has made art in representing who He is and what He has done.

Right from the moment of creation, the beauty of Eden and it’s inhabitants, God said it was good. Then he created man and woman in His own image, full of creativity and the glory of their creator. Since the fall of man, we have been trying to recreate that beauty, that imagery of perfection and fullness. This is not an empty aim, as along the way we reflect the personality and loveliness of God. (1) We may never reach perfection in this life, but we can certainly strive to represent Christ in the best way we know how.

When God instructed Moses to build the tabernacle, He was extremely precise in the way it was to be done.(2)  So precise that no lay person would be able to construct what was required. Skilled craftsmen were needed for each part of the tabernacle: weavers, metal smiths, carpenters, incense and oil makers, potters, and more. It is a statement of God’s perfection. Not of our perfection, but of our submission and the use of our ability to demonstrate God’s perfection. 

Again in the early church through the middle ages we see the importance of architecture and the value of art pieces in the buildings where Christians gather. Any town in Europe will reveal at least one cathedral, built to last and full of artistic pieces in the way of stained glass, stone works, carpentry, etc. What has impressed me most about these buildings is that the life span of those who worked on them was not long, especially in the middle ages. The larger cathedrals, such as the Strasbourg Cathedral in France, was

Strasbourg Cathedral - too large to get a full shot of it from the square

built over 200 years, meaning it took several generations to finish. This speaks not only of  the determination to build something awe-inspiring and strong, but also of humility. The humility of passing one’s own work onto another generation not knowing what the finished product will be, or if it will be anything like the original design. In the case of the Strasbourg Cathedral, it changed designs entirely three times. I question whether I would be able to devote my own life to an artistic expression that I believed in, knowing that at my journey’s end another person would complete the task to their own judgement and visions. 

 

These great buildings were made to inspire and awe and “lift the hearts of people to remember and celebrate the living, resurrected Lord”.(3) We have in many ways drifted so far from this experience in our architecture. The Reformation certainly played a role in this. While many things were good and necessary in this time, the extreme nature of the sermons of men like John Knox in Scotland and England incited riots and the destruction of much liturgical art and objects for worship, seeing them as idols. This idea has seemed to hold true in Protestant circles even until now, although it seems to finally be moving back to the intended use of the arts. Art itself is not to be idolized. But the One who the art points to is to be adored. 

This break has come not only into the liturgical aspect of art, but also the daily life of individuals. I recall instances where I have heard that dancing is sinful, and therefore children are not trained in a beautiful expressive art. This art that Jewish people have celebrated with since the beginning of time. I have also been a part of discussions that we are not to mix with unbelievers with our music, because we need to be separate from the world and holy. But Christ himself sat in the homes of tax collectors. And if we are to be light to a dark world, how can we do so unless we are in that world. In it but not of the mindset of it. This is where art can move beyond buildings and into spaces that have not known worship before.  

In our postmodern age where our world is also full of new technology and constant changes, we still must hold to our faith, but the expression of it has become even more vast. I still long for beautiful spaces to worship, but now worship is on video, online, in every city in different ways. We have media arts in our services and on youtube. I think the church has come to fear in some ways the moving forward of technology. We tend to either embrace it and live on the “cutting edge” of technological worship services, or we refuse to have any part in it at all. I have been thinking on this often lately, and I think time itself and the development of technology is not good or bad. It simply is movement. We have nothing to fear in this. But we must cling to truth in every age, in every space, with every art. 

The tabernacle became a synagogue. The synagogue became rooms in houses. Rooms became cathedrals. Cathedrals became churches. In all of these places lives the Spirit of God. But if we can learn from history, our artistic expression is valuable to the development of our faith, to the deepening of it. I think we can embrace technology, but I still think the strongest impressions are made in person, in community, and in art. If we would release our artists to create, we would see beauty come alive in our objects of worship (the cup of wine, the altar table) and in our places of worship (the buildings) and in our cultures (the pubs, the coffee shops, the art galleries, the theatres). 

God speaks through art. Let us not limit His voice.

 

The entrance to our sanctuary (I love that word)

 

 

1. N.T. Wright, Simply Christian, Harper Collins Publishers, 2006, p.40

2. Exodus 35-40

3. Dan Wilt, Essentials In Worship History: The Language of Space, 2008, p.2