Small church makes big splash in arts
SASKATOON, SK—A small church is making a big splash by creating an arts-based worship service.
The Louise Street Community Church of the Nazarene started its worship gathering of artists in October. Called Poiema—a Greek word for 'workmanship' or 'masterpiece'—the monthly 'episodes' are built around a theme, feature guest artists and offer a chance for worshippers to share and create their own art.
"When we first moved our church about five years ago we talked about a café service Friday nights," says pastor Steve Grove. "But we didn't want to do a service for the sake of doing a service."
Both Grove's and his wife's experiences with the arts led to the creation of Poiema.
"To move from the place to say 'I'm a writer' to say 'I'm an artist' has been about a five-year journey for me," says Bonnie Grove, whose works include the award-winning novel Talking to the Dead. "It's only been quite recently I've been allowing myself, giving myself permission to say 'I am an artist.'"
For Steve, it's been a journey over the past two years to move from seeing his woodworking as not only a hobby but as an art.
"It doesn't mean I'm a good artist, it doesn't mean I always know what I'm going to be doing when I start, or that I even finish what I start," says Steve. "It's the task of creating that seems to tap into that artist God has put in me that's reflective of His image as Creator."
Steve began thinking about his ministry in the pulpit as an art form during his doctoral research where he read Preaching as Art. That research inspired him to review church history and discover how the Church had been a "major patron of the arts." And this led to him asking how a missional church could incorporate the arts as a way of reaching out to the post-modern generation.
"People who would not listen to absolute truth, people who would not take the biblical stories at face value and are turned off in some ways by the biblical record will listen to story—to art, to picture, to crafted words," says Grove. "They'll engage in a story about faith in a way they won't on a Sunday morning in a traditional church service."
Bonnie says Poiema "came out of a discussion of what was a felt need for me." Recognizing "the artist's life is one of isolation" Bonnie often wondered if the sense of worship she experienced while writing could be incorporated into a corporate worship service.
"We began to discuss the issue with other artists and heard them say, 'Yes, I would like to be able to take this form of how I worship and have it better understood,'" says Bonnie.
"Everywhere we go and talk about a church by and for artists, people's eyes light up," says Steve. "There's a little bit of artist in all of us and Poiema connects with that."
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