The Disconnect: Why Evangelicals Make Bad Art, Part 7

Again in this post, we continue to consider the question of why, in an America where a large portion of the population (one-fourth to one-fifth, reportedly) claim to be Evangelicals, who believe that Holy Scripture directs believers in “every good work” (1 Tim 3: 16-17) (which would include the making of art by Christians), the Church has failed so dismally in producing effective and quality art (music, television, dance, film, etc.).

In earlier installments, we discovered that this failure is in large part due to a lack of knowledge and understanding of the Bible by Evangelicals. The twin causes of this ignorance we saw to be, first, laziness motivated by self-worship in the pursuit of pleasure, and, secondly, deficient theology as a result of disregarding the Bible’s ethical demands in favor of an emotional feel-good experience.

The surface view of Scripture which flows from these sins results further in the loss of the ability for Evangelicals to see reality (God, themselves, and the world) as it really is. Christian art depends in its creation on a Biblically particularized version of the human experience of God’s Created Reality, and the absence of a correct understanding of that reality leads inexorably to inferior, distorted expressions rightly viewed by both Christians and non-Christians as inaccurate and irrelevant representations of the universe in its depth and beauty. Bad theology inevitably leads to bad art.

We began last week to examine the damage to the artistic enterprise that a defective doctrine of Creation effects. To have an unBiblical view of God’s Creation of all things from nothing (Gen 1; John 1: 1-4), which is continually sustained by God’s Action (Col 1: 16-17; Heb 1: 3), and which always reveals God (Psalm 19: 1-6; Romans 1: 18-23), leads to such errors as a reluctance to use physical, created media (language, the body, paint, musical notes, architecture, etc.) for rendering artistic expressions (at least, doing so without guilt…), a denial of the revelation of God’s Existence and Attributes through the created universe (Rom. 1: 18-24), and a denial that matter is not evil in itself, but is to be the arena of the spiritual, wherein Christ’s Lordship is to be expressed and advanced in every area of life, rather than only simply in the personal experience of individuals. 

We turn now to consider a further implication of the denial (or ignorance) of the fact that God continually mediates Knowledge of Himself through the entire created order (Ps 19; Rom 1: 18-23). Scripture teaches in these (and other) passages that the entire universe, both taken together and in its individual parts (as well as in any combination of parts) symbolizes God. The entire world is a Symbol of God.

This means that everything has multiple meanings and that the ultimate meaning of everything is God (thus, everything exhibits both unity and diversity like the Holy Trinity Who created these things). For instance, a human can be simultaneously a man, a son, a brother, a judge, a soldier, a citizen, a parishioner, a poet, and the Image of God, with each of these functions/relationships revealing a different aspect or symbolic meaning. Yet the man can show forth any or all of these meanings at any time.

To believe that matter does not communicate multiple meanings symbolically is to flatten things to one dimension, restricting the richly variegated depth of the creation to a single meaning, giving birth to artistic work which lacks nuance, verisimilitude, and the reality of life itself (which would yield, say, a novel wherein the characters seem contrived, puppet-like, and unrealistic, as so many current Christian novels do).

A restriction of created things to a single meaning is also the hallmark of propaganda, which seeks to force information into one arbitrary sequence in an attempt to manipulate or coerce its audience to a single point. Such a belief also leads frequently to the opinion that matter is not important in itself, but is only important as a utilitarian carrier of a message, rather than being seen as a part of the message in itself (as, for instance, the Lord Jesus’ Humanity was as integral to Who He Was as was His Divinity, since He was, as the God-Man, both Matter and Spirit).

Since reality cannot legitimately be viewed as uni-dimensional, art of any quality will reflect the depth of the multi-faceted, nuanced life of the world God has created in all its fullness. The more accurate the portrayal of reality (e.g., the truer to Scriptural Reality), the better the art. 

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