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The Thriving Christian Artist - The Hardest Part of Trusting God with Your Art · Shine FM

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Every day for an artist is really the ultimate walk of faith, right?
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: We we come into our creative space wherever it may be, whether it's a studio or your dining room table or the back porch or whatever.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: And we're crazy enough to believe that the things that we feel like God has put on our heart actually make a difference in the world and actually connect us to his purposes and plans for our life.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, learning to walk by faith as an artist is a journey.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Which you know, I've kind of learned along the way there are a few things that you can do to make walking by faith a whole lot easier.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: And the first thing I would say is this it took me a long time to realize that God designed me as an artist on purpose.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: And he designed you as an artist on purpose.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: This isn't some selfish thing.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: This isn't a mistake.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: This isn't, oh well, Matt's going to be an artist.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: I guess we can do something with him.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: No, the first way that God reveals himself to humanity is as an artist.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: And so there's no greater way that you and I can reflect and reveal his nature than by doing the very thing that God did first and the thing that he created us to do.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: And so I want you to realize that just by you getting up every day and honoring the gift, honoring the design, giving it space and time in your life, growing that, learning to steward your talents well, learning how to sell your work, learn how to connect with people, do all the stuff we have to do as an artist.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: When you do that, it's kind of like raising a flag in the spirit and saying, hey, Lord, I appreciate what you've given me.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: I honor what you've given me.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: I believe that it's important.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: I believe it's enough to give my life to.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: I believe that it was important enough for you to give it to me, and so it's going to be important enough for me to take it seriously.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: That is huge.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that sets the stage in your life for allowing your creative gifting to be in a place of prominence.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: Not pride, but prominence, because again, it was God's idea in the first place.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: Number two, I've really struggled a lot in my life with learning to trust what God says and what God's shown me more than what I can see in the natural.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: You know, as artists, one of the beautiful things that God does in our life is He He gives us, I think, some extra sensors, right?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: He gives us this extra ability to see and feel and sense and perceive with Him.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, just like anything, if we don't take that and bring it under the Lordship of Christ, the enemy can absolutely have a field day with those things.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: Instead of being informed by our emotions and our perceptions, we can be driven by them.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: We can be ruled by them.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, learning to walk by faith and learning to renew your mind is 100%.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: I can say that, it's 100% learning to trust more, more fully in God's word and what he's shown you and what he's promised rather than the things that you're going through on a daily basis.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: Because I don't know about you, whether you're, you know, doing your art as a hobby or whether you're like me and you're, you know, you're making your living from doing your art.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: There are situations every day, in every moment of every day, whether it's financial, whether it's artistic, whether it's a gallery choosing you or not choosing you, getting in a show or not getting in a show, having a commission that goes through or somebody just ghosts you.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: All of those things, how many of you know, those things play on your mind?
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: And the enemy will use those things to absolutely drive you crazy and torment you, unless you learn to renew your mind and say, you know what, there's a lot of stuff going on around me, but there's only one thing that's going to be going on in me, and that's the truth of God's word.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: And so one of the things that that I really purpose to do in my life is along with that, is pray in Ephesians 1, 17 and 18 on a regular basis.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that prayer where Paul says, Hey, my prayer for you is that you'd have a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, that the eyes of your heart would be enlightened to the glorious riches of your inheritance in Christ and of the power that lives inside of you, right?
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: The same power that raised Jesus from the dead lives in you.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, if you can learn to ask the Lord and perceive the goodness and the bigness and the beauty of God and his plans and purposes for your life, that will automatically overshadow and over uh overwhelm anything else that's going on in your life.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: But it's a choice.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: We've got to choose to turn our hearts and our eyes toward him, especially in situations every day in the studio, you know, living and working as an artist, that situations that want to drag us into all the mess and drag us into the mirage of it's not gonna work out, I'm not supposed to be an artist, this isn't the right thing, it's taking too long, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's a huge, huge thing that you have to learn how to do.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: Now, listen, if you've never learned how to do that, that's what we do inside of our Thriving Christian Artist Pathway.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: God, God gave me this strategy years ago to be able to help artists learn how to renew your mind, have your heart healed by the goodness of God and learn to walk in the fullness of what He's got for you.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: So if you need help with that, which most artists do, most artists that love Jesus have never been taught how to do that.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: So you're not alone, check the link that's down here in the video, and uh, and you can figure out how to join us inside the pathway in the community.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: But but learning to structure your mind and to see your life and your art and what God's called you to do through the lens of his promises and the lens of his purposes, his strength rather than your inadequacy, that is a huge game changer when it comes to walking by faith.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: And number three is this I would say, as I operate in his design and his plans for my life, I can trust that he's leading me and directing me, even though I can't see the outcomes.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, one of the things I think that that um, you know, there's been a lot of great teaching over the years, even in the church, about, you know, being driven by a purpose, being, you know, planning and and stewarding well the things that God's put on your heart.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: All that's great.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: Love it.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: The thing that's difficult though for people is that when we do that, when you have a dream, when you feel like you have a purpose, you got a vision from the Lord, and then you start walking in that, and it doesn't go the way you think it was gonna go, right?
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: The money doesn't come in as fast, the sales don't happen as fast, your your creative process is a little messier than you thought it was gonna be, all the stuff, right?
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: And in the middle of that, again, what does the enemy come and do?
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: You're on the wrong track, you missed it.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: God doesn't love you anymore, you you messed it up, blah, blah, blah, all the stuff.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so, again, when you can realize, hey, God designed me this way, he cares more that I create than what I create.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: He just wants me to show up every day and be the person and do the thing that he's called me to do.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: Number two, I can trust what God said and what he's shown me in his word and by and by his spirit more than I trust what's going on around me.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: And number three, even when I'm taking hold of the vision and walking in it and everything I got, I can release the outcomes to him because I ultimately trust him, not the dream that he gave me.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's really easy for artists who love Jesus to trust more in the dream and trust more in the promise and trust more in the outcome than it is to trust the Father.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: And listen, I'm learning in my own life more and more every day.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: The purpose of our Christian life is not the destination that we think.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: The purpose of our Christian, our Christian life is to be formed into the image of Christ, that we'd learn to be more like him, that the Holy Spirit would be transforming us as we learn to cooperate and walk with him, as we have our eyes enlightened to the beauty and goodness and truth of God in everything that we do.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: And so when you're when you're doing that, one of the things I try to do every day is, you know, after I come in and I work, I'm in here just about every day doing something, um, making little, you know, sculptural pieces, doing, you know, whatever it is, weaving a basket, painting, whatever it is.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: Well, when I get done at the end of the day, sometimes, I don't know if you're like this, but sometimes you just have a day like, Lord, what in the world did I do?
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: Like I was busy today, but what did I do?
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, no matter whether you feel fruitful or whether you feel like, well, today was just like I just spent another day, whatever it is, I really try to take that to the Lord and say, Lord, thank you for today.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for what we did together today.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: And now, Lord, I trusted, I trust you with that.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: And Lord, I pray that you would take this like my, like my five loaves and fishes, and that you would take this and that you would multiply it in ways that I could never even think were possible.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: Father, I thank you for favor and divine appointments.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: I thank you for open doors.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: I think I I just I just take all that we did today and I just push it over to him.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I say, Lord, I've done my part.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: Now you do yours.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: You continue working.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: While I'm asleep tonight, Lord, you continue working, continue to refine the ideas, continue to work behind the scenes, do all the things that you do.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, that's what it means to walk by faith.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: Walk by faith, walking by faith is not just, you know, grin and bear it.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: Walking by faith is this beautiful, beautiful opportunity to operate in the design and the plans of God in your life, trusting that he who began a good work in you is faithful to complete it.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, I promise you, as you start walking by faith and being intentional about that process in your life as an artist, not only does your art get a lot more fun, you get to, you get to walk in the surprises and in the goodness of God in ways that you never ever thought possible.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: And listen, if you're looking for help on your journey and you're like, I'd love to be living this life that you're talking about, man.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: I do believe that God's called me to sell my work, but I just I've never done that before.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're at an age where you've you never had your own business before.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: You don't, the business stuff, the technology stuff kind of scares you a little bit.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, that's exactly why I created the Thriving Christian Artist Pathway Course and Coaching Community.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's a simple process that I've laid out over the years that's been proven in the lives of thousands and thousands of artists to bring clarity not only to your spiritual life, but also your creative life and your business life.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: And we do that in the context of community so that we can support you along the journey every day.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: Again, you can find out all the information about the pathway in the community right down here below this video.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, let me pray for you.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: And uh then I want you to watch this next video that's coming up because it's gonna be a big blessing to you.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: But Father, thank you today, Lord, for the invitation to walk by faith.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: God, thank you that we can walk by faith and not by sight, that we can walk informed by your goodness and by your word and not just by the things that we see in this world.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: And God, that when we do, you move in us and through us in ways that we could never imagine.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: So, Lord, I pray today for an increase of a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of you.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: Enlighten the hearts of my friend right now, Lord.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: Bring them into a revelation of your goodness like they've never ever seen before, especially as they create with you.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name I pray.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: I love you, friend.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: Do all the stuff.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: Like, subscribe, comment.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: Let me know what God's showing, showing you through this video.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: Watch this next one.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's going to be a blessing.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: And remember, till next time, you were created to thrive.
• 12:10
  unknown: Bye.