One of the most transforming concepts for me is that people are body, soul and spirit, not just body and soul. The soul has been defined as the mind, emotion and will. The spirit is the part of us that related to the spiritual world. I don’t want to confuse emotion or intellect with the movement of the Spirit.

Do the powers of our soul compete with the spirit? Because they can compete, they do compete. If we have the skill to pretend to be spiritual or powerful when we’re not, we constantly have to refuse to do that.

New perspectives help us to see our faith more clearly, and they are desperately needed. I find new perspectives from two sources. One is historical: people used to act like us and it didn’t work out, or people used to not act like us and it worked better. The other is cultural: Christians in China don’t do that/have that/need that and they do better than us.

In one sense, truth is static, written in heaven, but our understanding of it is imperfect so not static.

In another sense, truth is relational. What is good news will change depending on the needs of the hearer. The broken-hearted need mercy, and the unrepentant need law.

Some Christian artists believe that anything done for God is acceptable, even if it’s artistically flawed, if it quotes enough scripture or something. And others confuse spirit and soul, and believe that as long as it stirs your aesthetic sensibilities, it’s acceptable as Christian art. One approach is to think of ourselves as craftsmen instead of artists. Our job is to make well what needs making. Our job isn’t to fit some stereotype of an artist, or to expose our inmost expressions (express our fascinating self) to the world. Continue reading “Art or craft?”

All real art has a vision behind it. Characters take on a life of their own, paintings turn out differently than you planned. You can’t go against this vision without completely changing the work, and probably making the work less believable. Continue reading “Mind of the Maker”

Referring to religious traditions that forbid any practice not commanded in the New Testament, a friend of mine proposed a witty slogan: “If we wrapped ourselves up any tighter in rules, we’d likely choke.” But there can be humility to considering such rules. Or you can look at them from the cultural perspective I like to practice. If people experienced the power and authority of God while following certain rules, we don’t need to abandon those rules to experience God ourselves, and they may turn out to be more than just rules.

It’s so hard to minister to someone without being tempted to feel patronizing or holy, and others may not help much with resisting the temptation. Whenever somebody told me what a wonderful person I must be because I was a missionary or because I take care of my grandmother, I have tried to say Thank you and ignore their compliments. Why should people fawn over me for doing what I enjoy doing? Do they think that if you really obey God, it has to be unpleasant?

I don’t believe in mental illness, per se, even though it’s a common diagnosis in my family. Sometimes symptoms are caused by character or spiritual problems; often by physical or chemical problems. But it’s a mistake to consider it a disease that some people (i.e. other people) have. I see it as an extreme version of problems that all of us have. All of us can be irrational at times. Most of us can control it. But none of us think clearly or feel accurately all the time. We are mistaken if we take our own minds too seriously. Insanity is more common in ourselves than we think, and less common in others than we suppose.

I once rehearsed a play in which I served as the “voice of God” replying to a delightful little girl saying her bedtime prayers. I frustrated the director. “No, say that line more majestically.” “No, say it more warmly.”

I never got it right. I should have retorted, “What do you want me to be: both God and man?”

It’s rare to find someone who can do that successfully.