On art and being proportional

If the Christian life is nothing more than just a journey through a fallen world, what is the role of art, and art-making, while on this journey?

If we are not to assign eternal meaning to the temporary furnishings of this world, what kind of meaning should we assign to art, and to art-making?

And if for this journey we are only to bring a little money for our needs, and even a sword or two for our security -- but if these bare essentials are "enough" -- how do we account for art?

After all, isn't art the emblem of a life that is furnished with more than just the bare essentials?

During the Reformation, in response to the excessive use of objects of art in the Roman Church, John Calvin not only rejected art-forms of any kind as unbiblical, he even said this: “we must hold it as a first principle, that as often as any form is assigned to God, his glory is corrupted by an impious lie.”

This seems extreme to our ears.

Recent commentaries on the arts have been more accommodating. But Calvin's "anti-aestheticism" persists in overall Protestant understandings of the Bible.

I don't think we should see this cautionary view of art as merely some form of Protestant prudishness. Jesus was very clear that our time here is only for "a little while." Paul also spoke of urgency: the time is short ... if you are sad, don't be too sad; if you are happy, don't be too happy; if you buy something, remember it is not really yours. Don't even think of marriage as the be-all and end-all of contentment.

In all of this, where is art and art-making?

I think one answer is proportions.

Look at the creation of which we are a part. Everything fits together with every other thing so perfectly -- from sub-atomic particles to galaxies -- everything fits together so perfectly it is beyond comprehension. And this is in a fallen nature. What would a restored nature -- an unfallen nature -- be like? It would be all new beyond comprehension.

And who or what has Christ's work already made new?

Us. "Behold if any man is in Christ, there is a new creation..."

So art begins with proportional beauty in who we are and in what we do.

The art of being practical is the art of being proportional, in right relation to all else, even if everything else still bears the taint of the fall.

A being that is proportional in who he is and in what he makes. I think a Christian understanding of art-making begins with this, at least for this little while.

Logos2Go

John 16.16 "In a little while you will see me no more, and then after a little while you will see me."

Luke 22.38 The disciples said, "See, Lord, here are two swords." "That is enough," he replied.

1 Corinthians 7.29-31 What I mean, brothers, is that the time is short. From now on those who have wives should live as if they had none; those who mourn, as if they did not; those who are happy, as if they were not; those who buy something, as if it were not theirs to keep; those who use the things of the world, as if not engrossed in them. For this world in its present form is passing away.

2 Corinthians 5.17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!

John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, trans. Henry Beveridge (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975), I.xi.1, 91.