In this issue I want to share with you the talk I gave at the second What Is A Family? brunch I am hosting monthly.

The first aspect of a balanced and healthy home that I want to deal with is found in Chapter 3 of What Is A Family? ("The Birthplace of Creativity"). I start here because I believe the loss of creativity in the practice of homemaking is one of the main reasons we have seen such a decline in homemaking over the last five decades. Martha Stewart has become very popular precisely because she has tapped into this longing for creativity which God formed in every person made in His image.

In Genesis 1:1 we read, "In the beginning God created.…" The first thing we learn about God is that He is the Creator. Then in Genesis 1:26 we hear God say, "Let us make man in our image.…" Now jump forward to Ephesians 5:1: "Be imitators of God.…" As an image-bearer of God we are to be growing in godly character and modeling it before the world. The first revealed characteristic of God that we are to imitate is creativity.

I want to define what I mean by creativity:
· Creativity is taking what God has directly or indirectly made and making something new which is lovely and useful.
· Creativity is looking at life and finding new ways to do something or overcome a problem.
· Creativity is a skill to be learned.
· Creativity is delighting in life and sharing that delight with others - your own family first.
· "Creativity is the ability to see that which is waiting to exist." (according to an unknown source, as shared by one of the women at our brunch).

In looking at God the Creator let's see what we can learn about being creative. One thing we can say is that God was extravagant. He didn't create one kind of flower or bird or tree or animal or rock. He created flowerS, birdS, treeS, animalS, rockS. He created hundreds, no thousands, no millions of surprises for man to discover over the course of time.

He created an oyster for a man to find and break open to discover not only food but a pearl. He made a round, rather plain rock and waited for the man who would crack it open to find sparkling crystals. He made spiders who spin an art form to catch their dinner and hold dew drops which sparkle in the sunlight to delight and fascinate us. He paints the sky daily with colors to end our day. He made fuzzy, soft, gray flowers for us to enjoy. And what about the photographer, Robert Vavra, who has found and photographed the English alphabet and numerals 0 to 9 in butterfly wings? Are all the world's alphabets hidden somewhere in nature waiting to be found?

God is the master of details. Nothing seems too small or unimportant for Him. He made colors and smells and textures and sounds and tastes, and He gave us the ability to enjoy each one. He didn't have to - he wanted to. He delights in His creation and wants us to do the same. When I stop to think about it, it brings tears because it is so awesome and overwhelming.

And you and I are made in that Creator's image and are called to be like Him. No, we are not called to create something from nothing, but we are called to take what God has given to us and create things that will bring honor and glory to Him. We have all been given an ability that needs to be developed and used.

In a lecture I heard before I was married, Mrs. Schaeffer told how she was in India to speak on the topic of Hidden Art. She was staying in a high rise hotel and as she looked down on the poverty and squalor of India she wondered what her message had to do with these people who didn't even have the basics of life. A woman came up to her at that meeting and thanked her for her book and its message and for the difference it had made in her life. She went on to explain that her home was a concrete drainage pipe and that she had been able to bring beauty to it because of what Mrs. Schaeffer had written.

Here was a woman who was reminded that she was in God's image and that she should reflect that image to the world through the beauty and creativity of her home, her principal place of ministry. She saw the truth, caught the vision, took it to heart, and did something with what she had learned.

I want to be sure you to get the full import of this example. Picture in your mind an overcrowded, smelly, dirty, noisy community of drainage-pipe houses with shacks of cardboard and wood mixed in. I want you to smell the garbage and filth, picture that filth and trash, and hear the cacophony of sounds. Do you have this scene in your mind? Now picture one of these drainage pipes that is radiating a glow. Draw closer and hear the voice of a loving mother and picture the sweet aroma that this home is offering up to God. Perhaps just a weed bouquet in a tin can, a small evening meal lovingly arranged on a cracked plate with a single candle in a cup to serve as the only light in the home. Perhaps the bedding has been neatly folded to serve double duty as chairs. Yet it is all lovingly arranged by a godly homemaker. That is the home of our dear Indian sister carrying out what it means to imitate God's creativity. Now picture your home and ask yourself how can you do anything less in your home?

Godly homemaking, which is our dominion calling as women, is a powerful witness that is desperately needed in our day. What an honor, what a privilege, what a wonderful job to wake up to each day… what potential. Now I am not glossing over all the hard work, repetitiveness of jobs, loneliness, and frustrations that occur because of our finiteness and the effects of sin. Rather I am simply trying to set before us a vision of the possible.

Martha Stewart, without apparently even understanding how we are made to mirror the Creator, has been using her creativity to further the art of homemaking. Susan Wyland, the editor of Stewart's Living magazine, says this about her:

She has the genius for taking quotidian activities that have been tedious for centuries and transforming them into opportunities for excellence.... One of her functions, in a world where less and less has given meaning, is to take the pieces and make something that is not loaded with significance on the face of it, and give it value.... She is offering information that skipped at least one generation. I was never raised to wash a floor. I did homework. My mother did the dishes. There was not a lot of training going on, because it was assumed that our lives would be different. My mother thought I'd have more important things to do.

Martha Stewart fills a great void that women feel today (and there are, of course, Christian women writing on homemaking; I use Martha since she is so well known). Women need to be educated in the how-tos of homemaking. Just go to K-Mart and watch her video playing in the linen section on how to make a bed. For those who possess basic skills she then adds beauty and dignity to homemaking.

Vicki Goodchild has an insight in her book, The Simplicity of Homeschooling that has inspired me often. She writes:

We must be models.... It is extremely important that our children see us in the process of learning. To develop a desire within our children to be life-long learners they must see learning as something positive, even an adventure, rather than a chore or worse, drudgery. Children automatically pick up traits, attitudes, likes and dislikes, etc. from their parents. If you model a passion for learning then they will most likely internalize learning as valuable and worthy of pursuit.

Now translate that into homemaking. Do we model a passion for homemaking that our daughters can internalize and pass on in a rich family life to our grandchildren? Do our daughters and sons see us have a joy and love for homemaking? Do they see us content and fulfilled in our womanly dominion calling? As Karey Swan (Hearth and Home) writes, we need to get beyond mere maintenance to the art of homemaking.

For the family to be the birthplace of creativity someone must model creativity. Mrs. Schaeffer writes in The Hidden Art of Homemaking:

It is true that all men are created in the image of God, but Christians are supposed to be conscious of that fact, and being conscious of it should recognize the importance of living artistically, aesthetically, and creatively, as creative creatures of the Creator. If we have been created in the image of an Artist, then we should look for expressions of artistry, and be sensitive to beauty, responsive to what has been created for our appreciation.

Recently an e-mail discussion took place within our community centering on an article by Monte Wilson in the April issue of Chalcedon Report. This generated a lively discussion and I want to share a quote from the article that I found applicable to our study. Mr. Wilson writes:

Appreciation for art begins in the home. Appreciation for beauty, self-expression through creation, and the education of our senses should be part of every child's education. These things expand the soul and increase our capacity for glorifying God. However, families need help.

Part of that help comes from you, the homemaker, as you are the someone who can see that beauty and creativity are a daily part of your home life.

One last quote I want to share with you comes from Intimate Home, put out by Victoria magazine: "In all its many forms, creating a home is performed with reverence for the beauty of the mundane, elevating everyday tasks into a gentle art."

So a clarion call goes out from many sources to imitate God by creatively pursuing the art of homemaking, to set before our families and the world a beautiful reflection of what it means to be made in the image of God, a reflection that calls people to God.

For us this means working first of all in our own homes taking what at times seem wobbly baby steps, but remembering that even baby steps are progress. And as each one of us grows, our progress encourages growth in our families and in our neighbors. That personal growth has an ever widening effect like the pebble thrown into a pond: the ripples keep expanding.

The godly woman understands who she is, an image bearer of God. She understands and accepts the order God has created and the boundaries He has established for her, and with great freedom and creativity she takes dominion, under her husband, in her little kingdom called "home."

So what is a family? Among it's many vital functions, it is the birthplace of creativity!

May God richly bless you and inspire you as you read, reflect, and move into action in the area of creativity.