Using your Creative Gifts

by Teresa Carr

 

 

Using your Creative Gifts

by Teresa Carr

 

Some of you out there have a gift of sorts. Maybe you write, paint, sing, act, dance, decorate, design clothes, play a musical instrument, gourmet cooking, gardening, woodwork, sculpt, invent and just dream ideas and you felt good doing it. Those of you who have creative abilities may feel that you barely have time to be more devoted each day—let alone to practice your art. Do you sometimes feel guilty for not using your talents because your life is full of other things of everyday living? Some of us have fallen by the way side in favor of other mature responsibilities. But don’t be afraid of taking the time to develop your talents.

Recognize yourself as an individual, and see how God sees you.

Ask yourself:

Does God want me to give up on my creativity as an adult and feel lacking in fulfillment?

If God gave me a creative gift isn’t there a way to develop it?

Why would God the Creator who made us in His image expect us to just quit and forget our ability to glorify His creativity by expressing our talents?

The Bible mentions the usefulness of creativity and art. In Exodus 35:20-35, God called artists whom he chose to create the Ark of the Covenant and the Tent of Meeting. Bezaleel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah and Aholiab, the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan were “master craftsmen and designers” who were filled with the Spirit of God with skill, ability and knowledge to lead the artists in this God-ordained mission. I Chronicles 25:1-7 tells how the musicians were set apart by God. Since God honored artists in the Old Testament, He still values artists today. In Matthew 25:14-30, the parable of the three servants who were given talents by their Master. The one servant buried his talent and returned it without increase and was found wanting. The other two servants had put their gifts to work that increased in value were praised and entrusted with more.

Instead of seeking, hearing and acting on God’s vision for our life we get too busy making our own plans we overlook the very thing that could set us on the path toward spiritual fulfillment.

Do you have a whole list of roadblocks that you think are keeping you from exercising your artistic gifts? If you do and you put it off for a numbers of years, you can still start using them again. Some people got started late in life. Take Grandma Moses for example. All we can do is trust God to bless our gifts and desires to honor Him. He was the one who gave us those gifts and desires. The Lord is great enough and good enough to provide what we need to use our gifts to glorify Him.

Let your art be a part of your spiritual practice. Start making your gifts what god gave you a part of your daily worship. If time is an issue, log how you spend doing other things. The least we sit watching T.V., surf the Internet or talk on the phone, that time can be used for your creativity time. Begin using a schedule to develop these talents.

Here is a list to help get started:

  1. Set aside about 20 minutes a day to write in a journal. This is time to listen to what God is saying to you. Write as if you’re writing letters to God.
  2. Keep a record or schedule of how you spend your time each day. Separate a few minutes from each activity that you can use to create a block of at least 30 minutes a day for practicing your art.
  3. Let others know your need to answer God’s call to create. Take 30-45 minutes a day-or even one hour 3 days a week-to work on your art.
  4. Most of all give thanks and praises to God for giving you creative talents and guiding you to use and develop them.

Writer Thomas Merton said, “Our vocation is not simply to be, but to work together with God in the creation of our own life, our own identity, our own destiny.” Poet William Matthews wrote, “One well-cultivated talent, deepened and enlarged, is worth a hundred shallow faculties. The first law of success in this day when so many things are clamoring for attention is concentration-to bend our energies to one point and to go directly to that point, looking neither to the right nor the left.” Stay focused. It’s a discipline that must be practiced every day. In other words, through our talents we can be part of the Creator’s creative process as He molds us into a masterpiece.

 

Thanks to Janice Elsheimer, author of Creative Call: An Artist’s Response to the Way of the Spirit, and Rick Warren, author of What on Earth I’m I Here For? And especially Thomas Kinkade.

 

 

 

2006. Teresa Carr. Skyhouse Communications & Mega Grafx Studio.

 

 

 

 

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