Brokenness to Beauty

In his book Art and Faith, Makoto Fujimura describes a centuries-old Japanese art form known as kintsugi. Ceramic bowls, broken into pieces, are joined back together and remade—but not as they were before. Gleaming gold is set into the seams between the shards. The resulting pieces are unique and more complex, more beautiful, and more valuable than they were before.

This came to mind recently when an old friend shared his counterintuitive opinion with me. “As hard as it is to believe,” he said, “the theme of this era will be an outbreak of the Spirit that leads to unity within the church.”

May it be so. Our moment is marked by division and enmity in the culture as well as in the church. But the Spirit of God can bring unity out of division and love out of enmity. He can make us anew, not as we were before but as we are meant to be, ever more like Christ.

Christianity Today is seeking the gold that might fill the seams and bind our shattered church back together. Recently we announced that Russell Moore will bring his formidable talents to CT to lead a new public theology project. This will invite multiple voices to unfold the implications of the gospel for the whole of life, from the everyday questions of personal faith to the great debates of the public square. Moore models a form of theology that is rooted in Scripture and the theological tradition but also infused with humility and love. As a thousand forces strive to pull the church apart, we hope the public theology project will help bring us back together again through a broad and charitable conversation on the most important questions of life and culture.

We are also immensely excited by Ekstasis, a nascent publication we have acquired and added to the CT ecosystem. Younger generations of believers are seeking new ways of pressing into the depths of what it means to follow Jesus. Ekstasis revives the Christian imagination, offers artful contemplation that nurtures the soul, and illuminates a path that leads through beauty and awe to a profound and joyous faith in Jesus Christ. In a clamorous and contentious age, we view Ekstasis as a kind of digital cathedral, a sanctuary from the noise, a place that captures our attention through loving art and luminous words.

When the one you worship has conquered death, hope comes as easily as breathing. We hope through the ongoing work of our remarkable team, and through new ventures such as these, that we can do our humble part to bind the church together again. Sometimes things are broken so they can be put back together again, and sometimes they are more beautiful for having been broken.

Timothy Dalrymple is president and CEO of Christianity Today. Follow him on Twitter @TimDalrymple_.