As the person who made the scuplture up there, I’m not sure what I think about it looking back. I did that about, yeesh, like five or six years ago and I was in a completely different state of mind. Were I to do it today there would have been something redeeming as part of the work as well as the idea that we do need to remove our sin. But there’s certainly something to be said about something that will slap the viewer in the face and make them think. Because there’s never anything wrong with thinking, and typically the vessel that is used to kick off that thinking is broken, being that it was a human or was created by a human. I’m thinking about televangelists for some reason, they certainly slap me in the face and make me reconsider what my faith really is in comparison to the faith that they’re selling.

So maybe it’s a question of what the end result would be. I mean what I was trying to do at the time with that piece of work was to take the image of the cross and the horror and violence that come along with that and translate that into something that wouldn’t be cliche. Since you see crosses every where you look.

Also I suppose makes me think of the Passion movie. I haven’t seen it, since I’m not real big on snuff films, but i’ve seen some clips from it and I would have to say that it sure as hell isn’t the ‘whatever is lovely’ type of art, but the end result was that people saw for real the hell that our God put himself through for us. And I suppose that’s not all that bad…

So anyway, these are my early morning ramblings…

I guess I see things in the Bible that are radical ideas and forcefully put and so I appreciate when people express the same ideas differently, memorably, even shockingly. Like Jesus telling people to put out their own eyes or cut off their foot if these body parts cause them to sin. A gruesome thought, but I think he was serious. Sin is sort of like an appendage that must be amputated. I picture the scene in “The Great Divorce” where the lizard is amputated forcefully from the ghost. It’s painful and in a way it’s killing part of yourself.

“In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.”

“Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature…”

That’s what the sculpture makes me think of – for me it passes the Phillippians test. But I haven’t known anyone who died this way, so I can see how it could be offensive that way.

Thanks for commenting 🙂

Romans is about justification — Paul’s analogy to the legal system whereby the penalty of our transgressions has been paid and we are hence declared ‘not guilty’! Therefore, Romans 6 is able to state that we should consider ourselves dead to sin. Sorry. As well intentioned as it might have been, a hangman’s noose isn’t the message of the scripture. Read on in Romans. Chapter 14. Consider art, especially art you’d propose that go in a church, in the same light as food. My first thought at looking at Brandon’s piece sculpture was not “praise God for my justification”. Rather, the act of suicide. Incidently, your grandmother, my mother, died by suicide. I thought of that before I thought of Romans, before Philippians came to mind. But I digress. See Romans 14:19,20 — is this pleasing to all? Does it not destroy the work of God for the sake of …. “art”? For the sake of someone’s desire to be provocative? If this style is pleasing and meaningful to you, there’s nothing wrong with that. Place that art in your home if you desire and appreciate it. Personally I find it offensive and I suspect I would be very far from alone. So should it be in a church???

a) A Thomas Kinkade pastoral painting with cute little animals running around and a verse on it

b) A morbid sculpture like the one above (also with a verse on it)

I don’t know, but I might answer BOTH, depending on the person? I cringe when I see TK art, but some people really like it. B has more effect on me, I still remember the theme and think about it. What do you think?

Not sure about the culture differences, what do you think?