“Then God said: Let us make human beings in our image, after our likeness… Then the Lord God formed the man out of the dust of the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.”
–Genesis 1:26 and 2:7
I’m a nerdy Catholic. I read ancient texts and obsess about the proper way to clean and iron altar linens. I like Latin a lot. And I spend a whole lot of time thinking about theology, ontology, and eschatology. That means when I think about creativity, God comes into it a lot. In fact, I don’t think it’s possible to separate Him from it at all.
From the very first chapter of the very first book of the Bible, we are given a strong message about who we are and who God created us to be. We are made in the image of God, after His likeness. And what is God doing, in these first pages of His Word to us? He is creating. In fact, the very, very first words of the book of Genesis are these: “In the beginning, God created…”
If we are to take these words of God seriously, then creativity is not an elective course that certain individuals can choose on their path to heaven. We have been made to be God’s sub-creators, and it is part of our very being.
There’s a phrase you’ll hear a lot–maybe you’ve even said it: “I’m just not a creative type.” One might as well say, “I’m just not a saintly type.” There are as many ways of being creative as there are ways of being a saint, because both are vocations God is calling each and every human in the history of the world to fulfill. No two saints are alike. No two artists are alike. Your task is to find the way God is asking you to live these two vocations–or, more accurately, these two facets of the universal vocation to beatitude.
Until recent centuries, the survival of the human race literally depended upon the fact that every able-bodied person made things. Our ancestors couldn’t make a Target run to pick up new socks and protein bars. They spun wool and knit fabric and cured meat. They curdled milk to make cheese and churned cream to make butter. They thatched the roofs over the houses they built. Perhaps one of the greatest dangers of the ease and comfort of technology is that it has made us forget that we are capable of doing just the same creative work as our ancestors. We’re humans. We were made for this.
On Ash Wednesday, we Catholics (and many other Christian denominations) hear over and over the words, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” Our bodies, formed by God out of the earth, will return to that earth, and none of us will know the day or the hour.
This should add an urgency to our daily work. Sooner or later, death comes, and we will stand before our Maker and Judge, called to account for our lives. He will not ask us how many great things we did or how many dollars we donated to the missions from our surplus. Christ, as we are so often told by the saints, is not interested in our success but in our faithfulness. How did we use the time and talents God gave us? Were we faithful to the work He set before us, or did we allow distractions to drive us off course? Did we strive to work with passion and love, or were we idle and lukewarm?
There’s a Latin phrase the early church fathers used to keep this idea before them at all times: Memento mori. Remember your death. If you feel stuck in your creativity…remember your death. You’ve only got this one chance. When I keep that in mind, it’s actually easier for me to make my life the work of art it is meant to be. I can turn to Christ and place myself in His hands, clay (earth!) in the hands of a potter.
You are a child of God, made in His image.
You can create, because you were made to create.
You can do all things through Christ who strengthens you.
Blythe & Bold 