Your Creativity, A Gift To The Body Of Christনমুনা

Our Creating Is Our Gift Giving 

Creatives find their skills in constant demand:  a small graphic design project for a friend. A last-minute unpaid gig at an acquaintance’s coffee shop. A quick redesign of an aunt’s small business logo. A fast proofread or edit of someone’s writing. Free consultation on your brother’s e-commerce marketing approach. While it feels good to have your skills wanted, these small projects add up quickly, and a commission is not guaranteed when you are first starting or navigating complicated friend and family relationships.  

The expectation that creatives should always give towards small projects can often lead to bitterness and resentment, and it is not uncommon to see creatives hide their talents from the rest of the body of Christ as a result. We are guarded, and our real experience tells us this is the best thing.  

How do we wrestle with this dynamic in light of Paul’s call for Christians to present our bodies as living sacrifices? Our bodies are the totality of who we are. It is our physical being, our soul, the things we are. Our talents are a part of our bodies too. Even when we feel misunderstood or that our gifts are not valued, our call is still to bring our whole selves before the Lord as a living sacrifice. Coming before the Lord with all of who we are does not mean that artists are resources to be depleted in our organizational programming. This is about our worship and our living in community. That our whole being—our talents and abilities included—are renewed and transformed to the glory of God. 

As creatives, we must play our role in the body while not thinking of ourselves more highly than we ought to. It is easy as an artist to think of oneself as more in tune with what is happening in the world, or as having a unique insight that few could understand. This leads to fracturing, arrogance, and a lack of relationship.  

We must balance our gifts with humility.  

It is essential that we bring our God-given gifts into the service of others. 

Our creating ultimately needs to be our gift-giving.  

This also points to our needing of one another. In the body of Christ, not all are artists. When we give our gifts, we are ushering people into an experience of God’s presence that they may not have access to otherwise.  

This is a holy and sacred task. 

Lord, let us be faithful with the gift of creativity you have given us, so we use it to your Glory and the growing of the Body of Christ.

 This reading plan is based on the Book of Romans edited by Alabaster Co. To learn more about the book this plan was taken from please follow this link:  Click Here