Page 5 - Empowering Missional Artists - Jim Mills.pdf

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is now considered good, and that which was formerly good is now considered evil. Also, the

evangelical church’s propensity for cultural disconnection and tendency to marginalize art and

the artists to their great loss, is an unfortunate abdication of the Biblical mandate to be salt and

light in our societies. It is also expedient therefore to develop leadership mentoring strategies in

the church for marketplace artists and consider some of God’s ways and means for missional

artists development. Whereas the church is not called to tell artists how to be artists, the church

can affirm the artists calling, which nurtures broader-cultural participation. A focus on character

focus on vision, and values, aids in laying the tracks for God’s artists to run on.

We will also investigate the role of adversity in the maturation process for artists. Also, we

shall delve into the importance of crafting an integral Christian worldview and also briefly

undertake a study of a prominent artists in the Bible in our search for examples. A focus on the

Biblical mandate for all God’s people including His artists, which is servanthood, will be

addressed and finally some examples of postmodern visionary believing artists today who are

serving in European culture will be introduced.

The fact is our turbulent fragmented, decadent, value-depleted, sensory and visually

oriented western societies necessitate active and mature involvement in the world of the arts in

the public square. We have ignored this sphere too long in the believing church. Pastor and

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writer David Taylor declared: “we the church ignore this culture shaping heart-transforming
power to our own determent!” (Taylor 2007). A fundamental presupposition is that art, all art,

bends and shapes our cultures for either good or bad. In truth, it is not so much the arts

themselves, but rather the artists who have a missional destiny.

More often than not, self-absorbed artists in the pop media-world consciously or often

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even unwittingly embrace philosophical pluralism and invest their worldview and values into

western culture. These artists unfortunately are the role models mentoring the youth of our times.

The fault lies, however, not only at the door of their decadence, but rather as much or more at

our feet, the church, for the abdication of our responsibility to empower God’s missional artisans