Five Misconceptions From Three Years in Art School Ministry
I recently graduated from Massachusetts College of Art and Design. I started to follow Jesus when I was a freshman, and was involved with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship for three and a half years at the college. After reflecting about my time there, I decided to write about some thoughts about campus ministry directed towards artists.
Artists are a different breed of humans.
One of my old staff leaders at MassArt, Tina, had such a gigantic impact on my life for Christ, but she didn’t treat us any differently than she did her engineering, pre-med, or liberal arts students at Northeastern University. We’re humans before we’re artistic individuals.
Worship is the same-old thing.
If you’re at an art school leading a large or small group meeting, you’re sitting in a room with a group of potential worship leaders. These are people who threw away every ounce of sanity and went to pursue a highly-subjective and dangerous career field. Art is important, and it’s important to The Lord, too. He wants to use it, and he wants your heart to be in it first. Don’t ignore the gifts that The Lord has put on art students. Whether music, or painting, or film, or performance—these students are oozing creativity, and God wants us to offer it up to Him. When campus ministries start embracing these gifts, then things get really stinkin’ interesting.
Mediocre will do.
Your work speaks for itself. At an arts campus, you’re only as good of an artist as your work is. Maybe you have straight A’s, maybe you’ve travelled to Italy to study in Rome, but if your work is mediocre, then people will see right through you. This doesn’t mean art students don’t fail, bomb critiques, or take risks, but if you’re lazy with your projects, then it’s painfully obvious to everyone. It’s the same with campus ministry. And of course, there are different seasons in ministry, but if you huddle away in a room on Monday nights, close the door, and don’t invite anyone, your work is going to be lame.
God doesn’t care about your artwork because the church doesn’t.
Art is about beauty, and God created beauty. This is affirmed in the creation account in Genesis, and even when God created us in his image, he said his creation was “very good”. We can also think about the creation of the tabernacle in Exodus 35. In terms of design, the tabernacle really needs to be a box, that’s it. But that’s not what it turns out to be.
“See, the Lord has called by name Bezalel the son of Uri, son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah; and he has filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, with intelligence, with knowledge, and with all craftsmanship, to devise artistic designs, to work in gold and silver and bronze, in cutting stones for setting, and in carving wood, for work in every skilled craft.”
Artists are in the business of beauty, and so is The Lord. Don’t create exclusivity between The Gospel and art.
This is about art.
As awesome, wild, and fun as art students can be, Jesus needs to be the center of it all for campus ministry. And here’s the thing, if Jesus isn’t at the center, then students’ art will suffer. This is nowhere near reason #1 to follow Jesus, but if He really is the way, the truth, and the life, and following him means we become more like we were created to be, then I believe our artwork becomes more like it was created to be, too.
