I would love to give you a series of practical take aways that we are accustomed to in these types of posts. I could tell you to take longer showers, turn the radio off during your commute, wake up 30 minutes early, stay up later, etc etc etc. But the truth is, silence, just like any other spiritual practice, takes…practice. You must be intentional, you must facilitate silence by finding a rhythm. I am still searching for mine.

Here’s the great news: when you find that rhythm, it becomes natural to respond to God with both life and work out of a spiritual depth and grace. I’ve known this to be true in my own life. I also heard Pete Wilson say once that writer’s block is really just being empty. To break through the block, then, you just need to fill yourself up. Of course, there is no greater way than by spending time in silence and prayer. Here’s a bit from Merton on his writing (and on life):

…I had found that the interval after the night office, in the great silence, between four and five-thirty, on the morning of feast days, was wonderful time to write verse. After two or three hours of prayer your mind is saturated in peace and the richness of the liturgy. The dawn is breaking outside the cold windows. If it is warm, the birds are already beginning to sing. Whole blocks of imagery seem to crystallize out as it were naturally in the silence and the peace, and the lines almost write themselves.

Yes, you will be more productive, more creative, and more pleasant if you find room for silence. But productivity and creativity are not, cannot, be the end goal. A life more firmly rooted in Christ’s grace is the aim, and the rest are byproducts. Keep your eye on the prize. Find your rhythm.

This post was inspired by the Luminous Project. Luminous is a creative spiritual event in Nashville May 1-3, 2013. To find out more, check out www.luminousproject.com. You can use the promo code ‘BRINGitHERE’ to get 35% off the registration price.

This will be the first of what I hope is a series of gatherings to work through what it means to explore faith and creativity in our lives, communities, and churches.

Here’s the event bio, if you will…

Join other pastors, creative directors, artists, and others exploring the intersection of faith and creativity over coffee and good food at The Beat Coffeehouse in uptown Minneapolis. 

I will be sharing a few brief concepts such as how to creaft your life (and art) in response to the Creator, how the burden of creation may seem inevitable but how it can be conquered, and what it means to take our place in the restorative work of God. 

The one-day event, Saturday, March 2nd from 8am-12pm, will also begin conversations regarding the future of the church, such as:

• Cultivating creative talent
• Curating artwork in the local church
• Producing deep work and resisting the urge to copy
• How to creative and prolific, as required with a 6-day turnaround
• Releasing artists to join in the work of the gospel

All attendees will receive an eBook version of Creative Theology, as well as a signed hardcover copy ($30 value). See what people are saying about the book here.

Registration also secures you a spot in an exclusive online community that will receive resources and an opportunity to connect throughout the year. 

For those of you in or near the Minneapolis area, I’d love to meet you and discuss these topics wtih you in person! You can register here.

A few pieces from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s letter from a Birmingham jail cell, written to eight clergymen from Alabama.

While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities “unwise and untimely.” Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence in the course of the day, and I would have no time for constructive work. But since I feel that you are men of genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I want to try to answer your statements in what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms.

…

We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we stiff creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging dark of segregation to say, “Wait.” But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can’t go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking: “Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?”; when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading “white” and “colored”; when your first name becomes “nigger,” your middle name becomes “boy” (however old you are) and your last name becomes “John,” and your wife and mother are never given the respected title “Mrs.”; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you go forever fighting a degenerating sense of “nobodiness” then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

…

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

…

I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil rights leader but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities, and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.

Yours for the cause of Peace and Brotherhood,

Martin Luther King, Jr.

You can also buy the poster version of the written piece here.

May you be grounded in the hope of a child King.

May you, like Simeon, feel the assurance that all will be set right.

Jesus has come.

Glory to God in the highest.

Fertile creativity is a creative product or process that has the ability to propagate further creativity into perpetuity, that is to say – creativity spawns creativity.

I came upon this concept in Eugene Peterson’s book, “Working the Angles” in which he states…”The variants of error are finite. The ‘deadly sins’ can be numbered; it is virtue that exhibits the endless fertility of creation.”

I really like the idea of sin being finite. It makes sense when you think about it, as sin cannot lead to life, as it only leads to death and/or destruction.

Wrath begets murder.
Greed begets taking.
Sloth begets nothing.
Pride begets stumbling.
Lust begets wanting.
Envy begets resenting.
Gluttony begets devouring.

But, what about virtue?

Temperance begets enjoyment.
Prudence begets wisdom.
Fortitude begets courage.
Justice begets equity.

Faith begets conviction.
Hope begets expectation.
Love begets love in return.

My hope is in your creative endeavors. That each of the projects you pour your heart into will overflow with fertile creativity. A virtuous creativity that will propagate your artistic legacy as one of hope, love, and strong conviction — positive and long-lasting impressions meant to give life in a world driven towards destruction.

May we live lives that make others nostalgic for God.

You can listen to the sermon dated 11/25/12 on Cedar Rapids Family Church’s website here.

How we spend our time, and how we spend our money.

My newsletter going out this week also talks about how we, the Church, need to communicate a deep joy and peace in this season of insane consumerism, which is reflected in how we spend. One way we do this is by resting in the hope found in Christ. Another is responding to the grace we’ve been giving by joining God in his redemptive work. After all, in Jesus, we are invited to get in on the renewal of all things.

One way we can do that is by offering freedom to those in slavery. To respond to God means that we cannot overlook or turn our heads to injustice happening in our backyards and around the world. This season, I am raising funds for the new organization, The Exodus Road. I am one of several bloggers who will be telling the stories of children rescued in SE Asia through their work, and I am excited to help expose the abhorrent injustice to those who care deeply for the things God cares deeply about. More to come on that…

A quick way for you to respond:

Will you take 5 minutes and check out my page dedicated to my fundraising efforts for The Exodus Road? There you can watch a short video

Will you respond generously with your finances to join me in literally saving children from slavery? My goal is to fund one entire raid, which costs $1,400. I am just crazy enough to think we can do it, but I’ll need your help. Join me in giving here.

They are all, I don’t care how they’re marketed, attempts to play on our greed and insecurity. I say this because it’s our desire to have the newest, shiniest, keeping-up-with-the-Jones’est thing that drives people to the mall on the very day we set aside to be thankful for what we have.

I didn’t want to play in the consumeristic sandbox, despite the fact that I have a product for sale.

I have been wrestling with it a bit, and here’s where I landed. I hope this is a genuinely generous response to the consumeristic tendency we fall in to this week and season.

Pay What You Can Cyber Monday eBook Event

Yes, that’s right. I am offering the eBook version of Creative Theology for whatever you can pay.

A few questions you may have…

Q: How many copies can I purchase

A: No limit. I certainly appreciate you not buying one copy and gifting it to 10 people.

Q: Is this just good for today?

A: Since a lot of subscribers won’t see this until tomorrow (Tuesday), I’ll honor this through Tuesday at midnight.

Q: Can I buy it as a gift?

A: I would love that! – see above comment about gifting one purchase to 10 people

Q: Is the book awsome?

A: As they say on Reading Rainbow, you don’t have to take my word for it!

Q: How do I get in on this incredible deal?

A: Email me: smahlstadt at gmail dot com

Q: These questions seem to be leading the reader. Is that fair?

A: Probably not. Sorry about that.

I can’t unplug the phone. I can’t silence the Twitter bird. I long for the screen.

Glory to Thee, our God, glory to Thee!

I resist the silence. Anything but being present. Anything but depth.

Holy God! Holy Mighty! Holy Immortal! Have mercy on us.

No solitude. “Distract me!” I scream. I can’t bear me.

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages. Amen.

I cannot rest. I’d rather not have peace. I forsake being still.

O most Holy Trinity, have mercy on us.

I stand alone. I stand in the whirling of many voices. I stand.

O Lord, cleanse us from our sins. O master, pardon our transgressions. O Holy One, visit and heal our infirmities, for Thy name’s sake.

I am not sick. I need no healer. I cannot still myself for examination.

Lord, have mercy.

Lord, have mercy.

Lord, have mercy.