“He has filled them with skill to do all manner of work of the engraver and the designer and the tapestry maker, in blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and fine linen, and of the weaver—those who do every work and those who design artistic works.” (Ex. 35:35, NKJV)
In the previous teaching we pointed out how the architecture of the church building has, throughout the ages, been building on a wrong foundation, and how the spirit of perversion became manifest within it. Not only did it become a functional building, but it was also decorated on an aesthetic level. In the previous teaching we did not have the time to examine the development of how the basilica became the cathedral. (This word is also derived from the Latin term ex cathedra, which means “of the throne”.)
In his book The Secular Use of Church Buildings, J. G. Davies describes the state of things as follows: “When Christians began to build their great basilicas, they turned for guidance to their Bible and were soon applying all that was said about the Jerusalem Temple to their new edifices, seemingly ignorant of the fact that in so doing they were behaving contrary to the New Testament outlook.” With the passing of time, following the examples of the Byzantine and later Gothic art, the church was decorated with large, open spaces and massive pillars, gables and domes, with elaborate decorative icons and mosaics (Edward Norman: The House of God: Church Architecture, Style, and History).
Stained glass windows, which had become synonymous with the church fathers, was for instance used for the first time in the sixth century, and was introduced to the church community by Gregory van Tours and later Sugar (Will Durant: The Age of Faith), who were obviously mesmerized by the beauty and artistic aesthetic thereof. In their book Exploring Churches, Paul & Teresa Clowney argue that the goal of these windows was to create an emotional consciousness in which God’s glory (symbolised by the otherworldly play of light and colour) could be worshiped. The underlying motif of the colours was to create a mystical and transcendent atmosphere. (Also see http://www.christinyall.com/steeple.html for the influence of Egyptian architecture.)
Frank C. Senn is absolute accurate when he argues in his book Christian Liturgy: Catholic and Evangelical that all this was an attempt to take that which is spiritual (“heavenly”) and translate it into earthly, realistic terms. Viola & Barna make it clear in Pagan Christianity: “In a very real way, the church building throughout history reflects man’s quest to sense the divine with his physical senses. While being surrounded by beauty can certainly turn a person’s heart toward God, He desires so much more for His church than an aesthetic experience.” Paul notes in 2 Cor. 5:16 – “Even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him thus no longer. Earlier, in 1 Cor. 2:9-14, he extensively describes the difference between perception of the soul and perception of the spirit: “But as it is written: ‘Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.’ But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
The very real danger lies in people being influenced by the grandeur of the church building to such an extent that their aesthetic experience is confused with a spiritual experience. Thus they will return to the “holy” space based on that original “glorious” experience, for another burning bush experience with God. With time we wrongly associate God and the godly with this so-called sacred space. Through this God is subconsciously colonised and bound to the church; it removes worship from our everyday social life. Within this we are manipulated into a solemn atmosphere in which the presence of God is alas not tangible.
One could mangle Lewis Carroll’s famous book title here to make a point. The identity the church presents of itself as sacred space, is through the stained-glass, a beautiful, but false worldly unreality.
In her MA-dissertation (Wits): A Case Study on the Windows of the Witbank Dutch-Reformed Church Ariane Janse van Rensburg points out how the stained glass windows in the traditional Dutch Reformed Church were used to express Freemasonry symbolism. In the stained glass window pictured above a similar all-seeing eye can be seen in the central part of the art work. This Egyptian and occult symbol is very easily accepted as the all-seeing eye of God, but it is a perverted rendering thereof. The demands of aesthetics often makes a demonic appeal to the church that they have not yet calculated the spiritual cost of. Beauty and aesthetics often end up functioning as soporific elements, where their mystical affect distracts from the presence of demonic agendas. However artistically pleasing something may be, it does not ipso facto mean that it is holy. John 14:17 makes it clear: “the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you”.
The opening Scripture does however clearly speak of how God fills his children with a spirit of artistry “to do all manner of work of the engraver and the designer and the tapestry maker, in blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and fine linen, and of the weaver—those who do every work and those who design artistic works”. Those who had to design artist works did not do so with earthly wisdom, which is “earthly, sensual, demonic” (James 3:15).
It has always bothered me that the following is found in Rev. 18:22: “The sound of harpists, musicians, flutists, and trumpeters shall not be heard in you anymore. No craftsman of any craft shall be found in you anymore, and the sound of a millstone shall not be heard in you anymore.” But remember – this chapter is concerned with the fall of Babylon, which includes the demonic corporate structure of politics, religion and business. In their different functions: the government, the church and the financial world, no art or true artist will any longer be found, as the artistic gifts of creation belongs to Elohim, He who creates, from whom it has been stolen and perverted. For this reason the Bride should not be seduced into an emotional experience of God through perverted stained-glass windows.
- Selah: Do you perhaps have the spirit of artistry? And in what kingdom is this spirit functioning?
- Read: Joshua 12-18
- Memorise: Joshua 13:33
