Painting the gospel - Jesus the name above all names

Last weekend I became President of the Baptist Union at our annual assembly in London.

The year long role is going to be exhilarating as I’m embarking on a ‘Big-hearted’ tour, working with as many Baptist churches as possible in evangelism visiting each of the 13 associations around the UK.

I started as I mean to go on at the Assembly weekend. It’s not just me to get too comfy behind a lectern and teach others theory, I wanted to teach something practical, something that would launch others into a lifestyle of sharing the good news of Jesus with those who haven’t got a clue as to what it means to be a Christian.

So, I worked alongside the mission department of the Baptist Union and led a day on training in evangelism: loads of ideas, stories and teaching. As part of a training day I had a small group of 20 who agreed to ‘go out of the building’ to share the news that ‘Jesus is the name above all other names.’

However, instead of simply sending the delegates out to tell people the news, (something which most of us would find very hard I suspect) I split the group up into teams of 3 and gave them a canvas, a choice of materials and some ideas of how they could paint with others something on the lines of the amazing verse form Philippians.

We didn’t have too long, but the idea was so simple, each one of the delegates were able to engage with people, collect names and share something of their faith.

Once they had added their names to the picture, many people then got their cameras out to take a picture of our simple attempts to show through art that there really is no other name that is higher than Jesus. How could you use art to show big truths in simple ways?

Chris Duffett is President of the Baptist Union in Great Britain and national evangelist with The Light Project, a group of people who aim to actively demonstrate the Christian message and train others to do the same. His book Big Hearted shares a vision of a big Hearted: God, Church and evangelism.