Intimacy with God through Creativity

While in Honduras, I had the chance to speak at a creativity conference about Intimacy with God through Creativity. Below are my notes from my message and a video with a few short clips:

It was 2013. I was frustrated and felt stuck in a life I didn’t want. One day as I listened to the radio, a program about the benefits of coloring came on. I was inspired, so I went home, put my cell phone out of sight, turned on some peaceful music and began to color.

As I colored that night I opened my heart up to God and spoke honestly with Him about what was going on inside of me. This was a pivotal turning point for me in my journey with the Lord and opened the door for deeper intimacy with him.

INTIMACY inspires creativity and CREATIVITY has the power to open up our hearts to deeper Intimacy!

Intimacy with God is THE most important pursuit of our lives. Intimacy is defined as "close familiarity or friendship". It's “a blending of our heart with another's, so we can ‘see into’ who they really are, and they can ‘see into’ us.” It's about connection. We all LONG for connection. We were created for it. 

True intimacy with God is about KNOWING Him, and being known by him. 

Two important aspects of intimacy are: LOVE and TRUST.  Love and Trust are at the CORE of true intimacy and without them, it can't exist.     

1. Love - 

God IS LOVE. The more we KNOW HIM and understand his love for us -His DEEP DEEP Love for us- the more WE will LOVE Him.

The more we LOVE HIM, the more we will want to know him. And the more we KNOW HIM. the More we will TRUST HIM.

And it is in this place that intimacy is born and creativity flows.

>> In contrast - Fear KILLS creativity. Fear locks us in and demands a level of perfection that keeps us from ever taking risks. 

Intimacy and Creativity require risk, but the RISK is worth it. 

1 John 4:18, "Perfect love CASTS out FEAR".  

God IS LOVE. And His love for you is POWERFUL.

Zephaniah 3:17 says, "The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing."

He's WITH YOU and He LOVES you and He isn't QUIET about his love. Zephaniah says, He exults over you with LOUD singing. 

As we RECEIVE HIS LOVE in our lives and spend time with him, there is a desire that naturally flows out of us to express ourselves to him. 

We all have a unique fingerprint in this world and we all have something to offer to the Lord. Our own unique words, thoughts and ideas are a GIFT to the Lord. 

 How do you express yourself to God?

 Expressing ourselves to HIM invites INTIMACY, because INTIMACY is about CONNECTION.  It looks different for each of us, but however it looks, we will feel connected to God when we expose our hearts to God.

>>Recently I was in a worship service and I was struggling to connect to God. I felt overwhelmed with all that was going on in my life. In the middle of worship, I sat down and began to write about my struggle to hear Him, see Him, and feel Him in the midst of the storm and as I wrote, something began to rise up in me. Determination and a Declaration of faith. As I opened my heart up to God, MY FAITH rose and the protective walls around my heart began to crumble as I established my trust in Him.

2. Trust 

God knows all about us, but entering into true intimacy requires us to trust him with our hearts.

The Psalms reveal that David didn’t hold back or hide his struggles or desires. He expressed his victories as well as his sorrows through the Psalms he wrote. True intimacy requires our whole heart.

In order to Give God our WHOLE heart, we must connect to it ourselves.

Creativity helps connect us to our hearts SO we can connect to His.

God is AFTER our Heart. He doesn't want half of it. He wants ALL of it. God wants our WHOLE HEART, so that he can make our HEART WHOLE.

>> Back in 2016 I picked up a canvas. I didn’t know what was going on inside my heart or how to express it. My painting started off as one big black canvass but as I painted, I slowly added colors as God began to speak to me. As He spoke to me, I began to see the light, not only on my canvas, but also in my heart.

At times, stepping into creativity is like stepping into the unknown. Sometimes we are unaware of own heart and creativity is a way for us to express experiences that are too difficult to put into words. If we invite God into the process, He will speak to us and bring us healing.

In the Psalms, David connected to his heart, and then he pointed his heart to the truth. He established his trust in God.

When we trust God enough to open our hearts to Him, He always meets us in His Love.

And  THIS is the place that Creativity flows and Intimacy Deepens.

Do you trust him with your heart?

Are you willing to expose yourself fully to him? 

When do you feel most connected to God? 

~~~~~

Father, Thank you for loving us and inviting us into intimacy with you. Thank you for your presence. I ask you to bless and inspire each person who reads this today. Reveal yourself to them in ways that speak to their hearts personally. Draw us into deeper intimacy with you. In your loving kindness, Set us free from any fear that holds us back. And I ask you Lord, to unlock the creativity in each heart today. Amen.