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Kemper Crabb

Worship. Art. World.

The Sons of Issachar: Knowing What Israel Should Do, Part 28

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In the last column, we saw that the Biblical Narrative elements of Plot, Character, and Setting have impacted and formed Western literacy, musical, dance, and visual Arts in terms of influencing the progressive flow from a beginning to the arising of a problem or tension which is brought to a resolution point by the end of the poem, musical piece, dance or theatre-piece.  We further saw that this appeals to men of every culture, but especially to those raised in a culture dominated by Christianity and its Bible.

Mention was also made of the fact that this appeal of the Biblical Plot-Form was rooted in the historicity of the Scriptural Narratives.  The Bible is the revealed Record of God’s Purposes in History, as history is itself a Narrative designed and enacted by God, in which we humans (along with spiritual beings and animals) are the characters, and Creation is the setting.  

That God is the Author of history is borne out by His Word, as He is taught there to uphold, direct, dispose, and govern all creatures, actions, and things.  (Heb. 1:3; Dan. 4:34-35; Ps. 135:6; Acts 17:25-28; Job 38, 39, 40, 41; Matt. 10: 29-31; Acts 15:18; Eph. 1:11; Ps. 33:10-11; 2 Chron. 20:6; etc.).  So involved is the Lord Jesus with creating, sustaining, and bringing history to its consummation, that He is titled “the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last” (cf. Rev. 1:17). 

Christ is Himself, as the Incarnate Second Person of the Trinity, both fully God and Man at the same time, the Principal Character, the Protagonist of history itself.  History is a plot (in both senses), as the true narrative of God’s Plans to create and refine for Himself a people in His Image.  History begins with a beautiful and harmonious creation (Gen. 1-2), whereinto comes betrayal, tragedy, sorrow, and alienation (Gen. 3ff.), leading to the necessity of an Heroic Sacrifice (Heb. 10:10-18; John 19), which leads to a miraculous restoration of the creation to its harmony and beauty (1 Cor. 15:12-57; Rom. 8:19-25; Rev. 21-22). Notice that history bears the shape of the classic plot-form of a story (which, as we saw in the last column, Scripture’s Account of history gave birth to): a peaceful beginning (Creation at the first) wherein a tension or problem arises (the Fall of Man), which must be struggled against and overcome (the Incarnation, Life, Death, Resurrection and Ascension) by a protagonist or central character (the Lord Jesus) to lead to a successful resolution (the evil in Hell, the redeemed in Heaven, and an all-new Restoration of Creation to its full intended glory).  Within the Gospel Story, the very History of Redemption as recorded and revealed in Scripture, are all the elements of any good story: tragedy (the Fall, Samson, Judas, Absalom), comedy (Balaam and his ass; some of Christ’s Parables; Isaiah’s taunting of the priests of Baal), epic (the Holy Quest of the Lord Jesus), even what J.R.R. Tolkien called “Eucatastrophe, “where out of a seemingly hopeless situation, good triumphs (the Crucifixion and subsequent Harrowing of Hell, Resurrection and Ascension) [Tolkien gives this theme amazing realization in his own The Lord of the Rings].  

Romans 1:18-23 tells us that every man knows, deep inside himself that God is the Creator of all things, including history and that we are all actors or characters in His Story.  We know intrinsically, all of us, that God’s Story is true; it is, as it were, hard-wired into us all.  Because of this, we recognize deep down, and are drawn to, stories that recapitulate on some level the same elements and order of plot that characterize history (which is the story of Redemption, the Gospel).  On that deep level, we know that all stories are about God’s Story (it could not be otherwise, since we are all actors who exist in, and take our meanings from, God’s Creation and Enactment of historical Redemption).  This is why hero and anti-hero, and the actions of protagonist and antagonist are built around themes of love, betrayal, rejection, tragedy, restoration, and resolution: they are all elements drawn from the pattern of the Great Story – of Creation, Fall, Redemption, and the Restoration of all things.  All stories bear witness on some level to the truth that there is only one Story, and that Story is God’s.  

Romans 1 also tells us, however, in the very same passage, that men in their wickedness seek to suppress the knowledge of God, and thus false religions and the cultural forms that arise from them attempt to aid in this suppression.  Even in this rebellion, though, the knowledge exerts influence, and, though men attempt to suppress it, this knowledge of God that is at our core reasserts itself, since even false religions have only the Reality given by the True God to work with, and, though it attempts to pervert and twist Reality, the true shape of Reality and its witness can still be clearly seen.  By the telling and living of the Gospel in its full sense, the suppression of the true nature of things is removed, as the Holy Spirit empowers God’s People in their cultural incarnation and enactment of the True Record of history and existence form the Perspective of history’s Maker, the Triune God. 

Man, created in the Image of God, is a sub-creator; we make artifacts in imitation of the Creator Who Makes.  Because of this, we make our own little histories (stories and narratives) and we make things that comment upon the Great Story (songs, dances, architecture, etc.), embodying our interaction with God’s Story.  We are always interacting, artistically and otherwise, with God’s Story, whether positively or negatively.  In Scripture, we see all of life represented, rendered, and interpreted artistically, and, since God authored this Scriptural Rendering, we know that we sub-creators can follow His Example.