the    sides

I had this crazy idea one day last November while visiting Washburn Rural High School. The backstory: I’m a bit of an art geek. Yes, it’s true. The Denver Art Museum was a haven for me. In fact, last month I took the kids to the Kemper Contemporary in Kansas City. They like it as well – at least the older two.

There is something that happens to the human spirit when it observes good art. I’m not sure if it’s completely fair to call it worship but I don’t think that’s all that far off either. So I’ve had this desire to include art any time it’s possible in the context of worship.

Back to my crazy idea – I knew we were going to do this series on ORIGINS and I wanted to have dramatic art pieces that went along with each of the stories. But who can paint 12 different paintings, 6 different themes with the first one just a few weeks away? That’s when I saw the painting at WRHS. So I asked around to see who painted it – turns out I knew him and his mom worked at the school.

That’s when I first heard about Circle of Friends. I walked into the mom’s office and there was even more artwork. Most of it done by disabled kids. Circle of Friends paired disabled kids with ‘abled’ kids for the purpose of creating a ‘normal’ high school experience. Lunch buddies, class buddies, peer tutors and art are just some of the ways this club is bringing healing to these students.

I asked about the possibility of these kids in this club painting the stories of Genesis – no rules or direction other than read the story first. What could they come up with? Would they even be interested in doing something like this?

The answer was an overwhelming yes. All of a sudden this whole project kind of generated a life of its own. Hobby Lobby sold us the canvases at an incredible discount. The idea of selling of them to benefit Circle of Friends turned into an auction, turned into an auction on the Topeka’s First Friday Night Artwalk February 5. Warehouse 414 stepped up and said they’d sponsor it for us.

All of this is great and there is no telling how all this will play out but I’m struck by a couple of observations.

I’m hearing from some of the students that are painting that this is the first time they’ve ever read these stories in Genesis. For some, it’s the first time they’ve ever read a Bible at all.

When the pieces are revealed, there has been this pause…this holy silence of wonder. Then applause. I think the art for some is ministering to a place in their soul they didn’t know existed. And they’re liking it.

It’s another avenue to connect and serve the community around us. With budget cuts, the arts are going to suffer the most. And when the arts are left out of a kids education, we all suffer from it in the long. I think beauty and the appreciation of beauty is part of what makes humanity very different from every other being alive. When we lose this, we lose a part of what it means to be human.

What an opportunity for us..to provide a context for artists to experiment with these stories, our stories. A chance for some to hear God’s story for the first time. A chance for us to see God’s story through a different lens.

If you haven’t seen these paintings, you need to come by and spend some time in our worship center. For those who are out of town…I’ll try to upload some pictures later.