Below is a drawing of some different churches and their use of creativity vs content. You can see church 1 is larger in size with a lot of creativity. Church 4 is small but has a wealth of creativity and content. As church leaders we should constantly be pushing ourselves for the perfect blend of both creativity and content which you can see in the upper right corner.
A while back I was able to see some of the buildings designed by American architectural giant Louis Sullivan. Sullivan made famous the design ideal “form follows function.” He looked to the purpose of each building he designed and then applied his creativity. In doing so, Sullivan has left a legacy of people finding his buildings both useful and beautiful.
Intuitively we know people need more than creativity. Equally we are aware people need more than just content. Regardless of what we create (videos, songs, concerts, worship experiences, messages, books, blogs) the truth is there’s a chance that if we don’t figure out how to balance and marry creativity to content, we’ll be either lulling people to sleep with informative and thorough content or be bedazzling them into a hungry and empty existence.
A few weeks back I started recording a new record in Nashville with the famous production house Zod Lounge. I always love working with these guys and it was a real treat to be out there again. Zod’s guitar guru, Todd Shay, introduced me to the saying, “polishing a turd” which is used by a lot of people in the music industry. The “turd” refers to a poorly crafted song. It could be the lyrics, the song structure, or any other component that makes the song a song. The “polish” is the production or post production that the industry guys can apply to cause you and I to not notice how “stinky” the tune really is. Some argue there are a few of these types of polished songs today on radio. Maybe you’ve heard one of them.
A recent post on the Imago Dei Arts Blog talks about this as well. The post wrestles with anonymous art which exists primarily for self-expression and private worship verses signed-by-the-artist pieces that bring clarity and meaning to each creative piece. Christopher Dennis, who posted this blog, brilliantly argues that humans can’t fully connect to art until they are able to connect with the art’s maker. The maker gives context and meaning, content, to the observable beauty of each creative piece.
As artists and creatives our best work seems to come when we not only set our sights on self expression but also on the people who experience our work.
