Last year a girlfriend asked me to paint a picture for her house. I said “No”. I know I am a great friend. What I actually said was, “No, why don’t you come over and paint it yourself.” she said “I don’t know how to paint.” Well, sistah neither did I until I picked up a brush and started playing around. I told her I would teach her. Then another girlfriend came over, and another and another and every week we gathered to love and laugh and create together all immersed within the presence of the Creator. Then I guess the guys got kind of ticked and started asking if they could come or if it was only for the ladies. Well, you know me, I hate exclusion including gender exclusion so we said, heck ya, come on along and join our song.
We started kicking around the idea with a few friends about creating an artist collective and the Proskyneo Collective was born. Initially we felt like we should do 4 ecumenical worship gatherings this year and see what God was doing with it. Now it seems weekly, we have like minded kingdom peeps showing up at our house to eat and sing and create. A community of God’s people that would create beauty in the world. A space where everyone gets to play regardless of what church you go to on Sunday morning. Where worship and creativity are blessed. Where people are encouraged to think about their life and express themselves through art. A place where dreams are sparked and mission developed.
Now a days we are praying about producing a cd of all original worship songs and a possible gallery showing of original photography and paintings. I hear rumblings that a pottery wheel will be showing up soon. Wow isn’t that cool. I would love to see how art and the poor intersect. Can we bring beauty inspired by the CREATOR into the poorest in our community and by doing so usher in a deeper level of God’s kingdom among them? I for one would like to see what God could do with something like that.
We have taught many people how to play the guitar and now they are debuting leading worship in their own small groups as I type. Those who have never picked up a brush before in their life, are playing around with color. People are starting to pick up cameras and shoot the beauty that the see, and others are literally having dreams of art installations that are sparking all of our imaginations.
I guess this doesn’t even tip the scale in any church growth demographics. We are just a bunch of friends who want more of Jesus and each other and want to create beautiful things as we do it. Actually I think it says somewhere in the bible that the Church is made of God’s people and when 2 or more are gathered together in his name, He is there. Kind of blows the pews right out of the water doesn’t it.
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i would love start something like this here – just need to turn my friends into artists – i’ve got one started already…
I will pray it in with you girl…..look what has happened here in one short year….
Dang, I want to move to Florida. I need to put in some more prayer time about this, it seems hard to find like minded people in our area in the area of living for Christ, even without any creativity mixed in. Our church’s “Bible” study was, frankly, a joke. We were meeting to learn more about prayer, to support each other in prayer and the very few people who showed up just did so because it was the “right thing to do”. Oy, sorry for the unload, lol.
Well Vicki, come on down….people do it often I hear:-) Why don’t you start with having a few friends and their spouses and kids over to grill out with the idea that the Holy Spirit will be present, guiding your conversation etc. When things come up, as they do, stop and pray right then and then keep on doing what you were doing before you started praying. Let the kids play, let the Mom’s connect, let the Dads grill meat….and before you know it you will start building an authentic Christian community that actually prays for each other instead of learning how to pray but then never really doing it.
I will be praying with you.
Hey, Amber, I’m finally catching up a little on your blog and wow! I’m so excited for you about this collective! What a beautiful picture of community and God’s people joining him in his creativity! I love it! I pray that each unique and beautiful person that participates or comes in contact with the work created would be blessed by the experience.
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