How to glorify God and bless others: Spiritual gifts for artists
(part one)
As an artist it is incredibly important that my art brings glory to God and blesses others. Sure, I make art just for myself, for therapeutic reasons or practice. But over the last few months my artist philosophy has adjusted and I try to only put out art that blesses others in some way.
This goal of blessing others has, instead of limiting me, pushed me to create content that is deeper and higher quality. It encourages me to think of others, not only myself. And just as there are many ways to create art, there are many ways to bless others through art.
In a recent Bible study, we discussed spiritual giftings. The artist in me noticed quite a few parallels between the gifts we discussed and various ways to bless others through art. I believe every artist has different strengths, and instead of comparing ourselves to others we should play to our own strengths.
For the Christian artist seeking to glorify God, I believe that his or her strengths come in part from gifts granted by the Holy Spirit and described in 1 Corinthians 12, among other passages.
This series will cover some general principles about using one’s gifting, then work through specific gifts and offer commentary about where an artist might best use these gifts.
General Principles (AKA disclaimers, so I don’t get struck by lightning for accidentally writing heresy)
-The purpose of spiritual gifts is to bless others, specifically the Church, so gifts shouldn’t be used with an intention of lifting ourselves up or for selfish gain.
-The gifts need to be exercised the way Christ wants us to use them.
-We all have different gifts picked out by Christ for us, so we should be neither proud nor ashamed of our gifts.
-We could have all the gifts in the world, but it’s all useless if we don’t first love God and the Church.
Because each of us have different gifts, the way I am able to bless people might be really hard for you, and vice-versa. But we need this wide variety of gifts to take care of the range of needs that we have as a church body.
In my next post, I'll start discussing the individual gifts. If this series is interesting to you, don't forget to subscribe.
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