To experience happiness, craft your life into a work of art within God’s boundaries.
Erwin McManus writes, “Every creative endeavor becomes a realization of both how limited and how unlimited we are...Every medium carries within itself inherent limitations, and every artist comes with limitations. True creativity is not the outflow of a world without boundaries. The creative act is the genius of unleashing untapped potential and unseen beauty within the constraints and boundaries of the medium from which we choose to create” (The Artisan Soul, pp.145-146)
The commandments of God are boundaries for our lives. Jesus taught that he did not come to abolish the commandments of God but to fulfill them. Jesus and the apostles fulfilled and deepened God’s Old Testament laws through their teachings and by embodying the law of love. The laws of God are boundaries within which we most flourish in life and experience authentic happiness in our relationships, accomplishments, and well-being.
Take Away: Memorize the 10 Commandments and then pick one to understand more deeply, beginning with Luther’s Small Catechism.
Canvas
March 15, 2020 • Steve Brown
Masterpiece
March 22, 2020 • Mike Weaver
“When a life is a work of art, it is always more than simply an expression of ourselves. Life becomes a work of art when we live it not for ourselves but for others. We live and tell our story, and through it we carry the hope of the world.” Jesus turning water into the best wine is the work of his reflection of his essence. “The greatest art of an intersection of contrasts.” Jesus didn’t have to tell the people a miracle had happened, the quality of the product did it. God turns water into wine time and time again, the “water” being the quality of our ordinary lives.
Craft
March 8, 2020 • Mike Weaver
Paul was a tentmaker. Peter, James and John were fishermen. Jesus was a carpenter. Remarkably, Jesus became a common laborer and dedicated his life to a craft. What’s the best way I can do the most good? What is your “genius”? What is your unique talent? Where might you be considered, if you worked at it, the best in the world? Craft means strength.
Image
March 1, 2020 • Steve Brown
We transform invisible ideas into visible reality to unleash God’s love to others. Having been created as artisans in the image of God, Erwin McManus teaches that we transform the invisible into the visible. Everything that exists began as an idea in the imagination of someone’s mind, including our personal creation that began as an idea in the mind of God. An artist brings a piece of art into visible reality from the invisible imagination of the artist’s mind and we craft our lives into works of art by bringing what we can see only in our imaginations into the visible reality of how we live. BUT, as followers of Jesus, we do not create art or craft our lives into works of art only for our sake. We are primarily motivated by love for others to transform the images in our minds into visible reality so that others will have real and eternal life. It is therefore necessary that we strive to take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ and his command to love others as he has loved us. Next Step: Identify one idea that you have to serve, invite, or give to meet the hopes or hurts of another person; then transform that idea into visible reality.