Media Outreach

3. Creativity is like giving birth to barbwire, but someone has to do it.

Imagination is the “bridge” between the ancient past and the contemporary present. There is a vast difference between fantasy and imagination. Warren Wiersbe once described fantasy as “Disney World” and imagination as “Epcot Center.” Disney World causes one to escape the real world, while Epcot causes one to enter a brand new world. Ministers are to preach the gospel in such a way as to help people see a new world with Christ in the center. One of the reasons the great entertainment centers of the world can charge exorbitant prices and still turn away thousands of people is creativity. The reason so many people sit sanctimoniously in our sanctuaries half-asleep is because ministers often do and say the same things the same way while expecting a miracle on Sunday. Our culture demands creativity!

Preachers need to remember they do not see the world as other people see it. We assume that the world is the way we speak it, that reality matches the metaphors we live by. Effective communicators understand how listeners imagine or view their world. The sacred responsibility of the preacher is to use biblically guided imagination to cross the bridge from the past to the present. The danger lies in the preacher’s mind serving as a “filter” or “paradigm” to accurately bring the sacred message of the scriptural passage into the arena of ideas today.

Imagination is the imaging function of the mind.

• It is thinking by seeing, as contrasted with reasoning.
• Imagination puts flesh and clothes on mere naked ideas and facts.
• It makes the unknown known and the unseen seen.
• The imaginative mind sees how different facts and ideas can be mixed together to build a sermon.
• Just as a contractor knows how to pull together blueprints, brick, sand, and wood in order to build a house, the creative preacher knows how to tie together the parts of exegesis to form a “meaning” and the different aspects of homiletics to form a “message.”
• The creative preacher powerfully connects every word of the message to the next to form sentences packed with pictures for the modern mind to understand eternal truth.
• Imagination arouses faith in God and His Word. Imagination makes history come alive today.
• Imagination is one of the strongest allies of the sermonizer to change lives forever.

Words are outward, vocal expressions of hidden thoughts in a person’s mind.

• Creativity and imagination can make unseen thoughts visible. We cannot see the thoughts of God; they are hidden from us. Thus, God revealed those thoughts through the life of Jesus. Jesus became both the outward visual and vocal expressions of the hidden thoughts of God. As sermonizers, we should strive to help people who are blind to the truths and thoughts of God in His Word to see visions in their minds and the difference Jesus Christ will make in their lives.

• Imagination and creativity are to be used all along the way of sermon preparation. Just like prayer keeps the proclaimer in tune with God, imagination and creativity will keep the minister relevant to the world. In order to be effective communicators of the gospel, preachers must stay in touch with the eternal world above them (God), the temporary world around them (nature and humanity), the pragmatic world within them (the body, mind, and spirit), and the life-changing world of the Bible. The imaginative preacher has the distinct ability to pull all of these worlds together into an effective preaching ministry.

• If your life has lost its luster, then you could be neglecting one of the greatest qualities of human existence. This is a God-given quality made available to each of us. This is what I call the “missing link.” Bureaucracy kills it. Systems stifle it. Education squelches it. The Church is silent about it. What I am talking about? What is the missing link? It is creativity. Just the mention of the term “creativity” bombards our brains with excuses. We say something like, “I am not creative.” We say creativity is for dancers, songwriters, authors, musicians, and artists.

• As we walk through life and work for God, we develop a “creative cramp.” We trade dreaming for dogma, move from laughter to logic and from using our imaginations to memorization. Ministers often live their lives on pause. They try to copycat something rather than endeavoring to create something. This breaks the heart of God. God wants all of us to ride on the crest of creativity. A lot of us are content to splash around with our floaties on in the shallow waters of sameness.

Creative people make it look easy. The easier something looks in a particular ministry, the more hard work that was done behind the scenes. What would have happened if God had stopped with His idea of Christ coming to earth to die for our sins? We would have been lost for eternity.

We must build in creativity time. We must have blocks of time to pray, think, conceptualize, brainstorm and write before trying to make it happen. If you are a pastor, do the creativity as a team and not just by yourself.

Those who are the most creative have a structure to their presentation. Those who do not have a structure are slaves to chaos. We must be focused on our destination. How many times have we listened to a sermon and said at the end, “What was the main point?” “What did he really say?” When this happens, the speaker failed to create a powerful message.

Every message must be packaged in some creative way in order for the audience to grasp its meaning and to be motivated by it. The biblical text determines the substance of the sermon. The sermonizer determines the structure of the sermon. The crowd does not determine whether or not you speak the truth; the truth is not optional. But your audience does determine which truths you choose to speak about.

By: Dr. James O. Davis, Founder of Cutting Edge International and Second Billion Network

Tune-in tomorrow for the fourth law of communication.