There's an inborn urge within all of us to create, express, design. Why?
Secular science tells us that all of the beautiful things in the world are only for practical purposes, and that’s the only reason beauty exists—for example, attractive male animals that protect their more nondescript mates, using their plumage as little more than a defense mechanism.
However, if beauty exists only for practical purposes, why are the stellar constellations so enrapturing and the cosmic paintings so captivating, when they don’t serve any purpose to our galaxy whatsoever? The stars could have just as easily been plain, logical, or organized. The Big Dipper could have been an orderly grid of same-sized stars. God could have painted the sky an even, practical gray so we wouldn’t get so cloudy-headed about life.
But often the most beautiful things are lovely simply because they aren’t necessary. We see them in nature all the time, the cherries on top of creation. The pink and red blossoms sprouting on surly, irritable cactus plants. The iridescent feathers on a mandrake glimmering in the springtime sun. The delicate, intricate motifs of diatomaceous earth, sculpted like microscopic castles by the octillions in miles of white dirt. The dwarf desert flowers, microscopic in size, growing close to the scorching sands where Arabic sandals trample them.
Often the most beautiful things are lovely simply because they aren’t necessary.
If the exquisite male animals in nature like the lion, cardinal, or marlin are only beautiful because they “had to be,” God could have just as easily designed nature to not require them and replace them with something just as functional without all the glitz.
The plain fact is this—many lovely things of creation exist just to inspire you today.
So why do you have to write that song? Tell that story? Climb that mountain? Photograph that landscape?
Will the world end if you don’t?
That’s actually debatable … my whole point.
Sometimes art just needs to be created because of the passion inside. It has no practical purpose in natural terms, but when you understand that human beings are more than just flesh and blood, that they each have a spirit with deeper desires, art becomes incredibly valuable. What price do you put on something that can inspire or uplift a person?
What price do you put on something that can inspire or uplift a person?
Really, the unnecessary things are the most valuable, because they are motivated by love, not need. “Need” just gets by. Love is abundant.
The human race was made for love, by love. God didn’t “need” us in the way that we define the word. He created us from the dust he had already created, remixing existing materials to create something new, simply because He wanted to love us. Humanity is the most resplendent evidence that the “unnecessary” things count the most. If God didn’t hold back from creating something just for the love of it, why should we?
If God didn’t hold back from creating something just for the love of it, why should we?
I know for sure that you are a creator, a maker, a worker, a crafter. Even if you don’t realize it, you are constantly creating things that didn’t before exist and making them appear. Every word you speak or write is an act of creation. You possess an incredible arsenal of creativity with endless possibilities. When you take two words that both evoke certain imagery and marry them, you create a whole new concept that is often inspiring.
Take Owl City, which produces whimsical electronic/pop music (yes, I'm a huge fan). The creator, Adam Young, named his musical persona Owl City simply because he liked the way it sounded. Young said this same idea was behind the title of the song “Alligator Sky”. He could have used other descriptive words to try to recreate what his mind saw, but somehow these two words convey an experience unique to each listener that is rich, new, inspiring.
The raw material to create is all around us. Just like when Adam Young took the ordinary words Owl and City and merged them to make something new, you can reach out and pull beauty from ordinary things all around you, combining beautiful things into new works of art. It isn’t necessary. It’s to edify your soul, to inspire, to glorify.
You can reach out and pull beauty from ordinary things all around you, combining beautiful things into new works of art.
So you are an extremely creative individual. You know it, I know it, and soon the world will know. You have the potential to create stories, change lives, write poems, crack jokes, or just cheer up a friend’s day by telling them the value you see within them.
Don't hold back from us.
You're free. To create because you love.
