Confessions of a Quirky Christian Artist

Is there a right way for Christians to commune with each other? Are there wrong ways? As my new beliefs have placed me outside the comfy walls of any organized branch of Christianity that I know of, I find those nagging questions about church that I've had for years are easier to examine dispassionately. One thing I'm quite sure about is that our traditional and current forms of Christian expression (i.e. church organization) are never going to change. So any conclusions I may come to can only be seen as observations, not prescriptive actions to be taken by myself or others. What church is, and how we ended up this way is a fascinating study, and one I've only began to research. So I don't have a lot of historical data to feed this fire; it's primarily powered by simple curiosity, philosophical, and theological fuel. The first question I'm starting with is, "What is a Christian church?" Well, actually, let me take a step ba...

There is a character trait that I lack so severely, it may be my single biggest shame. I am so dishonorable in this area that even writing about it embarrasses me. But hey, that’s what the internet is for, right? That character trait? My work ethic. There was a period in my career when I could rightly have been called a workaholic. But it wasn’t because I had a good work ethic. It was because I was doing something that engaged me creatively on a multitude of levels. Had you examined my work habits during those years you would have concluded that I was a studious and self-driven individual. And you would have concluded correctly. But take away the fuel of creative control and heady, industry-shaping design challenges and you have a lazy leech. Jesus’ admonition about much being expected from the one to whom much is given has always provoked shame in me. If I ever get self-righteous about how much better I seem than a drug dealer or prostitute I can always re...

I was raised without Santa as far as I can remember. But then, my memory of childhood is vague at best. My ex-wife comes from a family that found it very important to make Santa an important part of Christmas. He always gave the biggest and best gifts to the kids. He would eat some of the cookies that the kids would leave out for him and take the carrot they left out for Rudolf. So my ex continued the tradition, and even though I was never excited about it myself, I went along. I never thought it made much sense as Christian parents, to fool our kids into believing in an all-seeing, all-knowing magical being who rewards the good and punishes the bad. For one thing, the image comes way to close to God, and for another thing, it reinforces a skewed view of good and evil that trains the spirit in legalism. As to the first point, why do we find it acceptable to say to our kids when they are older, “Yes, we lied to you about Santa, but God is real.” What does that teach...

I used to know my place in the universe by my doctrine. I felt secure because I knew I was right. I knew I was right because I was surrounded by those who agreed with me. How much I felt I was absolutely right about has changed. Why? Because I find it presumptuous to believe that I, (or my religious subculture) out of deafening roar of the multitudinous past, have heard and believed the Pure Truth. When I survey Christendom’s history I find so much variety in doctrine, attitude, works, and form that I find it unintentionally humorous when I hear or read my fellow evangelicals make huge, sweeping statements based on the proposition that they, out of all Christendom, are the ones who got it right. We are ready and willing to argue our interpretation of scripture and God down to the jot and tittle with our last breath, because to do less would be to compromise the Gospel, right? Yet we claim – at least most of us do – that we are not sectarians. We claim that the rest...

I was at the Tacoma Dome Holiday Food and Something or Other Thingy a couple of weeks ago thanks to my friend, Dennis the Santa sculptor. He heads up Artists In Action which is a group of artists like me who go to art fairs and stuff and actually make art, rather than sit in the back of our booth doing crossword puzzles. I don't have anything to sell yet, so I was trying to get people to sign up for sculpting lessons taught by me. Well I got about a dozen people who showed enough interest to actually put their name on my list. But when I sent out emails to everyone only one person actually got back to me. So she and her husband were the only students I had yesterday. Which I guess isn't a bad thing. I got to teach my first class with very low demand and stress, and get a feel for how to teach people who have never touched Sculpey before. We ended up doing Santa heads. It was a very interesting challenge to constantly view their work and try to figure out e...

I’m including this entry under my Heterodox Aftershocks category even though it does not deal specifically with Hell®, Free Will™, or theodicy. Though not explicitly connected with those topics, one’s stance on the nature of the Biblical will radically affect ones determination on those issues. So I have been working on this in the background concurrent with my other studies. I’ve involved myself in a broad ranging debate about this issue on the CARM forum, and have been studiously following links to papers, sermons, books, and other material on the subject. In that quest I came upon a bunch of lectures from a professor at Covenant University , Dr. Michael Williams who is an inerrantist. One of those lectures helped to organize this topic for me, so I’m following his lesson plan for the first part of this entry. The hot topic on the issue of Biblical authority is inerrancy. The second hottest topic is what inerrancy even means. Orthodox Christianity had used the t...