THE STORY

It was one of those “I’ve heard about it, but I never imagined I would witness it with my own eyes” type situations. I attended, at Breakforth, a worship painting seminar. Wait... that’s not the funny bit.
It was one of two electives I’d remembered signing up for –yes, it was my choice. I’ve got to admit, I did have certain expectations going into it. I had seen a video on youtube (see post below) with a worship painting that really intrigued me, and I assumed that this would be a sort of “How To” class. How to implement this in your service. How to find inexpensive materials/paints. How to use these techniques to maximum effect. How to keep focus on God, instead of the artist, and lead people into a closer communion with their creator.
It was one of those ‘-30 with a -45 C windchill’ Canadian winter days, and I fought my way through high winds and blowing snow over 5 city blocks to the hotel venue. I arrived a few minutes late, since fighting blizzard conditions tends to slow me down a little.
I should have known upon entering the room, glancing at the other participants and passing by the teachers own art pieces by the door, that this class wasn’t quite what I’d bargained for. But it took me a whole minute longer than that, as I got settled into an open seat at the very front of the class, before I really paid attention to what was being said.
“Have any of you ever felt, something or maybe someone, is blocking your creativity?” every hand in the room shot up, including mine –I definitely didn’t want to be left out of whatever she was up to. :D
She went on in a smooth, comforting voice...” I’m going to lead you in an exercise shortly, and we are going to break down those barriers... YES! We are going to break them down right here today!”
People clapped.
“You’ll see on the table in front of you a popsicle stick” (It was a tongue depressor actually, but that’s neither here nor there, just something I noticed) “And in a moment I’m going to ask you to pick up those popsicle sticks that represent that barrier between you and your creativity, and we are going to break them!” It was probably just the sound of triumph in her voice as she made that speech, but she was starting to look a little like the last living descendant of William Wallace.
“First, however, I’m just going to minister to you in song...for just a little while...(insert soft background piano now) and then I’m just gonna pray for you..” both of which she did, for several minutes. “Now, I’m just going to ask you all to pick up those popsicle sticks that are the barrier to your creativity, and we are just going to break them now in Jesus name...” more fervent ministering in song ensued until she was certain everyone’s barriers were broken. “Now...”
I tell you... WOW, that ‘now’ was almost sultry and that music...so....soothing...
“I’m just going to invite you to come and pick up some paint from the table in the centre of the room here. You’ll notice there are some normal acrylic paints, a few water colours and here...right in the centre of the table, some of my favourite paints as I worship through painting, are the glitter paints, aren’t they beautiful (they did sparkle, those lovely vibrant crayola glitter paints), they just add another dimension don’t they?”
Well the person beside me who looked normal, and dressed normally, unlike the ‘artistically’ dressed crowd all around us, seemed in no hurry to grab some glitter paint, and I was in no rush to join the excited mass around the table, so I “people watched” – I bet you would have done the same, it was fascinating.
My favourite was a woman across the aisle from me. She was one of the first up to the table and seemed to have a solid idea of what she wanted to paint. First a tree, much like you might see hanging proudly on refrigerator doors the world over. That happy little tree found it’s home in the bottom right corner of her paper. She dipped her brush into the yellow glitter paint and I braced myself for a happy little sunshine in the sky. To my delighted surprise, the yellow became a large lightning bolt in the bottom left. Next came my favourite part. She took the ‘popsicle stick that is the barrier to creativity’ straightened it out, and wrapped it gently with the napkin ‘for clearing the paint from your hands and brush’. She fished for a moment in her purse, and came up victorious. A bandage –perfect! The now repaired barrier with napkin was then cleverly affixed to the page with the bandage. Of course! Genius.
I was distracted then by the person next to me who had discreetly grabbed a pencil from the table with the paints, and started tracing her hand...just what was she up to?
All too soon, the way to the table was cleared and it was our turn to go and pick paint for our worship piece. I must add that all during this process our instructor ministered to us in song, both personally and with a mix c.d. of her most loved worship songs, most of which she and her husband had written and recorded themselves. Favourites like: “A free bird,” “healing waters,” “The little bird” and much, much more ...available for purchase at the back of the room.
Since I don’t have glitter paint at home, I’ll tell you now, I didn’t pass up the opportunity to put some on my palette. I noticed my closest neighbour also filled hers with glitter paint exclusively. Unfortunately, by the time I got back to my seat we only had about 5 minutes left. *sigh*
Now I know I’ve been far from serious most of the class, but I did want to at least try worshipping through art, so I thought I would sketch out something I’d started at home but hadn’t finished. Kind of thinking along the lines of fixing our eyes on heaven, rather than earthly things. So I painted this rather impressionistic/surrealistic “baptism of Jesus”. I’ll explain it in a minute. It was fun and it made me think, and all in all a pleasant experience, although not overly different (apart from the glitter paint and cardboard canvas) than what I do already at home.
As I was finishing my little paint sketch the instructor started to invite the participants to share their paintings at the front.
I can’t lie, it took A LOT of will power to not grin like a mad thing when the lady with the broken popsicle stick painted got up. I LOVED it... this was the type of class I had only heard about in legends. The instructor put her arm around her as she explained, “I’m not an artist by trade (really had to hang my head then, my grin felt like it would split my mouth open) I’m actually more of a writer, so I decided to use symbols to tell my story.” She went on to talk about brokenness and pain, wounds and healing. Really sweet...the instructor hugged her.
Next came someone from the back, with their painting of a broken egg and dark glitter paint surrounding. More brokenness, another hug.
Several more, including my neighbour, stood to tell their tales of woe..I mean, their personal stories. I don’t mean to be callous, but this didn’t seem much like worship, but rather and outlet for revisited teen angst. I’m glad the class was good for them and let them express and get in touch with these emotions in a healthy way, but really It should have been called “painting as therapy.” Rather than “painting as worship”.

During this sharing time, I had started to feel uncomfortably misplaced, rather than gloriously out of place. I pushed my painting to the side and kept my eyes down.
“We have time only for one more...” Ahhh the relief. I looked up smiling and feeling like I’d escaped the execution, and she got me! Coming right over to me she said, “I was watching what you were doing and I would love it if you would share.... please?” I wanted so much to get up there and either invent some story to rival theirs or shock their socks off with some wholly unspiritual explanation like “I found my inspiration in the works of Antony Gormly and a friend of mine named Michael...shout out to Michael!” I did neither...I just couldn’t...for some reason I told the truth.
I said, “I know it doesn’t look like this, but I intended this to be ‘the baptism of Jesus’ through eyes fixed on heaven, this is why there is the Dove, and the mansions, and the crowd of witnesses. It may be hard to see, but on the heads of the people is a drop of blood, because although they didn’t realize it yet – the people bearing witness to this act of obedience, we already covered by the blood of Jesus, who would shortly obey in an act that was, that day, represented by the baptism itself... death. I was thinking about how all the prophecies about the Messiah were written in past tense because it was the unchangeable will of God... it was as if it had already happened... it was on my mind so that’s what I painted.”
I know you won’t believe it, but I didn’t get a hug! No comforting, “uh huh’s” “oh, I know’s” or “hallelujahs”... All I received for baring my heart was an, “Oh, okay...well...thank you.” And I sat.
I learned a little something that day.
No. 1: I learned that I really am a strange egg... I just didn’t fit...and I’m okay with that.
No. 2: I learned to stick with the deeper stuff at these kind of conferences. All the other lectures were so good, so thought, provoking, even challenging. I found myself very disappointed that I had in effect wasted a session, even if it makes for a funny little anecdote now.