Feeling Burnt out creatively?

As a person who does creative ministry I find Psalm 40 to be a great inspiration for creativity.

Ps. 40: 3  He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the Lord.

I often feel I have nothing new to give or bring to the table. If you are like me you don’t like to repeat yourself or just copy what is already out there. We want “New”. But in our effort to be unique and original we somehow keep going back to the tried and true. We want to hold tight to the familiar. The boring known is better than the scary unknown. I like what Nancy Beach said, “If we are not carful we can do ministry more out of memory than out of imagination”.

Lets face it when we try new things we set ourselves up for criticism. And we are plagued with the fear that the great idea might not work out or worse people might not get it. FEAR! Fear is the enemy of creativity and innovation.

But listen to Psalm 40:3 He put a NEW song, (“he” not us gave the song and guess what, not only did he give it, it’s NEW) a hymn of praise to our God (our creativity is an expression of thanksgiving) Many will see and fear and put their trust in the Lord (but listen what’s at stake if we don’t give creative expression: many will not see and many will not put their trust in the Lord).

Artists have a duty to seek after the new…the good news is God has already provided it. Us creative’s traverse in the realm of the prophetic. We give expression to what is felt and seen in the spirit. We speak from the heart and God wants to use us. We need to trust God in our creativity and not look outward but ask God to reveal to us what he wants us to say through our art. Only than will our art transcend and speak to the heart. And dare I say even at times transcend technique. We all know we have been confounded by the non-professional when their art, as crude as it is, touches us deep and stirs our spirit.

Let go of the familiar and seek out that new song. A Greek philosopher made this point, “You could not step twice into the same river; for other waters are ever flowing onto you”.  This is a word picture of how the Spirit of God moves – it’s fresh water. We serve a creative God who is forever giving us something new. He designed us in his image. The first image I see in the Bible is that of a 

creative being surprising us with his beautiful creative power.

I think many times I don’t partner with God in his creation because I’m doing it my way. Adam and Eve got kicked out of God’s creation for that very thing. We don’t take that new song God has freely given us – the self-expression of what God is constantly doing in our lives. This is always in flux, hence always new.