Good Produces Good
Do you want to produce good work? Not for your salvation, of course, but out of the love you have for your fellow man? Out of the love you have for God? Do you want to craft good stories that inspire, encourage, comfort, entertain, and feed people intellectually, spiritually, or emotionally? Do you want to offer up your gifts as a sacrifice before God, to do with what He wills?
The first step to producing good works is, actually, to take a look at what is in your heart (and your mind!). Is your heart full of hate, anger, selfishness, lust, greed, unforgiveness, or other sin that you are letting sit there and fester? Are you fueling your story with these sinful, negative emotions? Or are you striving to fill your heart and mind with good qualities, thoughts, and emotions? Are you seeking to be selfless, kind, merciful, generous, self-controlled, and loving? Are you striving to put away evil from your own heart and chase after the Lord?
Now, two important notes on this: first, this is not a call to be perfect before you start to create. Jesus was the only perfect person and we will only be perfected in Heaven thanks to His sacrifice. This is a call to repentance. To be actively seeking a renewed heart and plucking out the old evil that dwells within it. No human heart, and no human story will be perfect on this earth, but what is in our hearts is what will come out naturally in our stories and creations. If we have anger in our hearts, anger will be present in our stories. If we have lust in our hearts, lust will come out in our stories. If we have greed, selfishness, or hate, it will come out in our stories. The first step to producing good, God-honoring work as a creative is our own repentance.
Second: this does not mean you can’t tell stories about the sins you are most familiar with. Each and every human on earth is tempted towards every sin in some way or another. One of the primary ways that we help our brothers and sisters out of the cycle of temptation is by testimony — whether that is by directly talking to them or by using a fictional narrative to communicate. The key to “good producing good” is not about whether or not sin is present in a story, it is about how that sin is depicted.
Take, for example, a story about a bank heist. Now, robbing a bank is stealing, and therefore goes against God’s commandment not to steal (Exodus 20:15). The story can be presented in one of two ways: first is where robbing a bank is glorified and theft might be considered a noble act (”they deserved it for being rich and evil” or a Robin Hood type situation). It is the kind of story that, at its core, is sending a message of rebellion and sin. The second way it is presented is where robbing a bank is either as something heinous or as something with consequences. The robbers are caught and sent to prison or are left with guilt and shame over their unrepentant sin. Both stories may have epic action, daring feats, and cool plot twists, but the former piece of media sends the message that stealing is cool, while the latter sends the message that disobeying God’s commandment comes at a price.
If you want your creations to do good in the Kingdom of God, actively seek Him, not just as a creative, but as His child. Pursue the new heart He has given you, fill it with good, so that you can then pour that good into your creative endeavors and help build up the people around you.
Putting it Into Action
What sort of sin is depicted in your creation, and what can reveal that about your own spiritual health? Is the message of your project, at it’s most foundational, the consequences of sin and disobedience? Or is it encouraging poor behavior and unrepentance? Do you know how to tell the difference? Meditate on these questions and ask God what this reveals about your own heart. Ask Him to help you seek repentance from sin, to humble yourself and your creations to glorify Him, not the sins of yourself and the world.
“The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.”
“Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.”
“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.”
