Is Your Outward Creative Expression Born from Your Inward Communion?

There are often times when I hear people ask the question of how so much great creativity flows from another person. It’s understandable to see the vast imaginations and expressions of creativity unfold before us as though it was something that just happened. The reality of the matter is that it never just happens. It’s actually a reflection of the internal work of the one who created it.

Have you ever read about the life of David in the Bible? He is attributed with writing a major portion of the 150 Psalms that we know today. I can actually imagine that the number that we find which made it into the collection of works that were published, probably pale in number to what he most likely held in private. David went through a great deal in his life. Many of the Psalms show us how he processed and handled life in the midst of the trials he faced.

It was David’s inward communion that helped birth the outward creativity that we find throughout the Psalms. Think of the struggles of a young boy being born in a family that did not see the king in him but would relegate him to the backside of the field tending sheep (1 Samuel 16:11). Think of the challenges of a young man who is so gifted and anointed that a king is jealous enough to kill out of fear of being replaced (1 Samuel 18:7-12). Imagine the pains of loss while leading a mighty army that now blames you for what was lost (1 Samuel 30:1-8).

These are the circumstances that were the seedbed for private moments with God. These are the times that David sought the face of God and created the very same songs that tempered a rage-filled, jealous king when the Spirit of the Lord was no longer with him.

Creative people draw from the depths of not only their experience but also from the depths of the well of worship. If the creativity is not drawn from the well of worship and communion with God, the creativity becomes tainted and the expression becomes fleshly at its best and demonic at its worst. You can see, hear, and feel the difference in a person’s creative expression. It becomes unmistakable. As culture healers, we are to draw from the well of inward worship. When we do, there are moments when it becomes convicting, compelling, and convincing that there is a Living God that loves and knows us and others.

If culture healers hope to have their creative expression become the thing that displaces the currently prevailing expression in culture, then the inward worship of Kingdom creatives must be such that it also creates a heart that will not compromise that creative process from start to completion. It’s my belief that culture healers who are secure in their inward worship and in the expression of their creativity will find a connection to others who will help catapult the creative expression until it displaces and disturbs those things that lack the glory.

We have to be willing to allow God into the process of our creativity by purifying us, refining us, and healing us in those places where we are broken. It’s in those aspects of wounding, brokenness, hurt, and pain that our creativity becomes an expression of bleeding, burning, and rage. God desires to bring out the best not only in us as vessels but also in what is birthed from us. He does this in that secret place of prayer, praise, and worship. It is in that place where the fire intensifies and removes the dirt and impurities that tarnish and weaken the potency of our creativity.

I pray that God consumes every creative heart and person called to be a culture healer. That is when we are at our best and able to accomplish what we’ve been commissioned to do. God is the patron who commissions our works. Our payment is not in the accolades of the people who see the outward expression but in the eternal reward of the impact that it has on the hearts of those changed by its expression. May your creative expression be purified and refined by the inward communion you’ve had with an ever-loving God and the all-consuming fire of that love.