Beholding Beauty

Kasey Olander: 

Welcome to The Table Podcast where we discuss issues of God and culture to demonstrate the relevance of theology to everyday life. I'm Kasey Olander, the web content specialist at the Hendricks Center here at Dallas Theological Seminary. And today our topic is on beauty. We recently did an episode that was released in March of 2024, depending on if you think that's recent. The title of that episode was called Why Christians Care about Art and Beauty. And so that was a fascinating conversation with Dr. Brian Chan, with Dr. Neil Coulter, and weaving together some of the things that we think about when we think about art and beauty together. And I thought this conversation was so rich that we needed to plumb the depths of beauty a little bit further. 

So I want to highlight one thing that was said in that episode and then pick up from there. Essentially the idea is that Christians a lot of times have no issues with someone who is living a life that is pursuing truth or even pursuing goodness, but a lot of Christians would have questions about a life in pursuit of beauty. So that's where I want to pick up. And we have our esteemed guest with us, Dr. Brian Chan. He is Assistant Professor of Media Arts and Worship here at DTS. Brian, thanks for being back with us. 

Brian Chan: 

Thanks for having me back again. Last time was so much fun and so rich, so I'm glad to be back here with this conversation. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah, I'm really grateful for that. So how did you initially start reflecting in this area? I mentioned that a lot of Christians would maybe undervalue or question the importance of beauty, but how did you initially start to value it? 

Brian Chan: 

Oh, well, that's a great question. It started for me over 20 years ago when I was a historical theology concentration in my THM, and I saw how much the concept of both art and aesthetics, including beauty, was interwoven with our Christian faith and throughout the early church, medieval theologians as well too. And being an expositor, as we're trained here at DTS, I noticed all the language of beauty that's found in scripture. And so I focused my thesis on the beauty of God, and that's where it began for me. The studies of beauty began with the beauty of God, and that's where I find ultimately the foundational value of this subject is it begins with God. 

Kasey Olander: 

That is, I'm going to try not to overuse the word beautiful in this episode, but we'll see. So starting with that, could you give just a brief definition of what is beauty and what is aesthetics and how are they the same or different from each other? 

Brian Chan: 

To define objective beauty according to scripture is beauty that's defined by who God is in terms of his attributes, his being in nature, and as well as who God is in terms of his Word and works. So it stems from him and it's a concept of beauty that not only flows from him being the source of beauty but also is congruent with who he is. So beauty is not incongruent with who he is and his being. 

Kasey Olander: 

And then how does that overlap with aesthetics? 

Brian Chan: 

Well, when it comes to the study of the broader concept of aesthetics, we can begin with the understanding of objective beauty based on God and using that as a definition for how we understand beauty in art, in music, in poetry, in dance, architecture. And so one example maybe is that God in his person, his attributes, is order, and what he creates is order not chaos. He creates cosmos and not chaos. So Genesis 1:2 tells us that very clearly, that the earth was formless and void, but he didn't leave it that way. And so what he creates is this intricate universe that medieval theologians would say there's unity in his universe and it's defined by the proportion of the parts in relationship to one another to form this purposeful designed unity. And I was going somewhere with this and I trailed off. But okay, so that being a basic concept of aesthetics, well, what do we do in terms of both informal qualities of art as well as the symbolic messages of art? Do we promote greater unity and cosmos, order, or do we promote greater chaos? 

Kasey Olander: 

In terms of the art that we, let's say, the art that we create as humans? 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah, the art that we create as humans. And that's not to say that there can't be art that looks chaotic, and I think chaos as portrayed truly as chaos and not morally as something good is actually a good thing. Does that make sense? So evil that's portrayed as evil but not celebrated or justified is actually a good thing because there's truth in that. So part of order right alongside with that is the other transcendental, which is truth, God is a god of truth. He can tell no lies and everything was created by his word. We see that in Hebrews 11:3. And so everything that is created and ordered is sown with his word, his truth. So the revelation of truth, even if that truth may be the revelation of something that is ugly, is actually still a good thing aesthetically. 

Kasey Olander: 

That's a fascinating idea. So an artist can portray something. If it's something ugly as something ugly, then that is a conveyance of something that is true. 

Brian Chan: 

Versus if something is ugly but is glorified, then that's not true nor good. Over this past summer I was in Auschwitz and getting a tour through Auschwitz and coming out of it I saw an art exhibition and that art exhibition were drawings that portrayed the Holocaust and they portrayed ugliness. It's not something that people would normally hang above their mantle. It's not portraying beauty, and yet there's beauty in it because it reveals the genuine ugliness of the Holocaust and there is what we would say aesthetic beauty in being truthful about a situation that was truly morally wrong and wicked. 

Kasey Olander: 

Not calling evil good. So would you say that the transcendentals of truth, goodness, and beauty always go together? 

Brian Chan: 

They do. In medieval theology, it was always understood that these three were like stars that revolved around each other, that to truly have something good has to bear truth and that goodness contributes to flourishing and truth and goodness will inevitably reveal something that's genuinely beautiful. So your initial question, why do Christians not care about beauty as much as they may care about truth and goodness, well, we've been acculturated, I think, under a certain definition of beauty, which is not really the objective biblical idea of beauty. What we've been given is something more like a sentimental version of beauty, which we might call pretty. So something surfacey, superficial is something that is commercialized, and so we don't see beauty as on the same level as truth and goodness because we are not operating with the same definition of what beauty really is according to Scripture. 

Kasey Olander: 

Right. Thinking of it as something that's simply cosmetic makes it sound frivolous or why would we devote our time and study to that. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah, exactly. And that really kind of draws us to an important issue, which is where we derive the definition from. The definition we derive beauty from is from social constructs, but it's not a definition we have derived from the authority of Scripture, which gives us a very rich, substantive understanding of what beauty really is. 

Kasey Olander: 

I remember the first time, I think I just stumbled across it in a book somewhere, thinking about beauty as objective. And I was floored because I'd never heard. I always heard that beauty was in the eye of the beholder and it was kind of just based on what you like or what you're feeling that day. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah, yeah. There's nothing that can reduce the idea of beauty more than simply making it purely a subjective thing. Now having an understanding of objective beauty doesn't mean that you don't have subjective experiences of the objective. So our subjective experiences of the aesthetics, aesthetic experiences still are present and valid, and there are things in the world where, do you find a burrito more attractive or do you find fried rice more attractive? Well, there's no biblical paradigm for that, and there are some things within this world that God has created where our subjective opinions, it's all there really is. There's no moral element or truth element to burrito versus fried rice. 

Kasey Olander: 

That one is objectively good and the other one is evil. 

Brian Chan: 

Exactly. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah, that's a good analogy. So you're saying that our subjective experience a lot of times can be more linked to our preferences as opposed to something being inherently beautiful in itself? 

Brian Chan: 

Well, there's a both and there. So there's a subjective experience that where objectivity really has no real say in that. These are just choices. Some people like red and other people like blue. But there are also subjective experiences of the objective. So if something is declared beautiful by God, that's objectively beautiful and we can experience and we might experience it differently. You and I may experience something differently that's objective out there because perhaps from past experiences, memories and what we gravitate most towards within that objective thing, the real question really comes is when God declares something objectively beautiful, but we don't find it subjectively so. 

And oftentimes that's where the transformation may begin, is when our own tastes, our own liking or what we might find attractive and adore, it's not in alignment with what God has made to be beautiful and calls beautiful. So there's a real relational quality to beauty. And that's one of the things that really grabs me is if beauty is defined by God according to his character, who he is, what he says and does, and according to actually his subjectivity, it's his desire and what pleases him, then when I don't find something beautiful that God does, it begs the question, how is it I'm not aligned with what God finds to be beautiful, and what about me tells me that I'm not attracted to this, because I want to be aligned with my heavenly Father, and there's something rich and wonderful and visionary likely that he finds beautiful that I would want to as well, what he calls good that I would want to call good. 

Kasey Olander: 

Right. So can you give us an example of that? What is maybe a common one that God would say is beautiful that people a lot of times are not attracted to? 

Brian Chan: 

Well, maybe there's some aspects of righteousness that God finds beautiful that we might not. And perhaps in contemporary times where definitions are in question, whether it's gender or marriage types of definitions, when God looked at Adam, and he said, "It's not good for man to be alone," the one time God says something is not good, where all the other times he declares to be tov, the Hebrew word tov, which has the aesthetic nuance of delightfulness, pleasant, beautiful unto God. And the one time he says something is not good is when man is alone and what he forms in complement to man is woman. And out of that he provides the definition of marriage. And the understanding, the implication is now what was not good is now made good and there's a beauty to that. 

So there are times perhaps where we might not find that beautiful, or it could be something far more of a personal nature, perhaps in entertainment. Perhaps in entertainment where, let's say, reversing this idea, some things that God might not find beautiful in entertainment, but we do. We find it very attractive. It's entertaining. It's funny. We get a kick out of it. And I've had times like that where I'm watching something, all of a sudden it clicks in my conscience. I'm thinking, "I don't know if God would find this beautiful based on the content, but why do I find it so funny and attractive?" And I think it goes to say both that whether it's of our human nature and flesh or if it's a matter of sometimes our tastes are acculturated, we find something attractive because society has said so, and we grew up in it. 

Kasey Olander: 

So maybe one example is I feel like anti-hero stories are really popular nowadays. It's like a hero that you really can't root for and there's not always a sense of justice. There's maybe a sense of moral ambiguity that I feel like we're seeing in a lot of films, for example. That has become really popular and celebrated. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah, the anti-hero thing when we start relating it to story can be a really well-used archetype if done well and right, I think. If it is celebrating someone who's on a vengeful path that is morally wrong, then it's not such a good thing. But the anti-hero sometimes can show redemption, the hero that has some vices, a lot of them perhaps, but we see that in the end their character's redeemed because of certain universal qualities that identify a hero, whether it's self-sacrifice or selflessness. We might see them all throughout their arc as wrestling with selfishness. They don't want to care, they don't want to care, but in the end, they do care and they sacrifice for someone else's benevolence or good. And then there's a redemption in that. The great thing with anti-heroes is sometimes people can identify with them more. 

Kasey Olander: 

Sure. It's realistic. 

Brian Chan: 

It's very realistic. There are a lot of folks I think in the world where they realize how much they're imperfect. They have regret, they've done things they're not proud of. And the anti-hero sometimes presents hope that there is redemption, even for those of us who have had a shady past or we wrestle with demons and skeletons in our closets. 

Kasey Olander: 

Which is what can make the conclusion of a story so maybe satisfying, is that a lot of times that's where you see the redemption either come full circle or happen for the first time and there's something beautiful and satisfying in that, that even if there was a lot of ups and downs and it was a tumultuous journey that whatever kind of people can end up in a place of redemption, which is what God is in the business of. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. You talked about objective beauty. You talked about it being declared by God and that it's relational, so it can be an indicator of where we stand in terms of our alignment with what God is interested in. What are some other ways that beauty can inform us or help us to navigate or see where we are currently? 

Brian Chan: 

In our own spiritual lives and stuff? 

Kasey Olander: 

Right. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah. Gosh, a number of ways I can answer this are flowing through my head right now. Maybe I'll just start with the one that's the most on the top of my head. Augustine writes in Confessions that we love and adore that which we find to be beautiful and if what we're discovering in the end with all the different beauties of the world and he said, and Augustine wrote this too, that, "Let the lesser beauties of the world draw us to the beauty of God," to the greater beauties that God presents. And if we discover in the end with greater increasing levels of the beauty of God and who he is, one practical relational level is for us to fall more in love with him, to adore him. 

And so sometimes I think there's maybe a gauge there when it comes to aesthetics and beauty, is a gauge of how much do I really madly love the Lord, and by how much, the question is quantitative, but it's also a certain, as we experience love to be a certain kind of love, love of faithfulness, a love of undying loyalty, of gratitude and gratefulness. I think if there's one aspect that beauty can really benefit people spiritually is to foster a love for God. And the other would be is an understanding of what God finds to be beautiful helps us to look at ourselves and our own character qualities, our own Christ-likeness. And what are the aspects of myself that I find to reflect Jesus, Christ-likeness, that God finds beautiful and are there aspects of myself that, yeah, God would say, "I'd like to work on that," with grace and with love and wisdom and sometimes discipline, to shape us into greater images of Christ on this side of heaven. 

Kasey Olander: 

That's a really interesting point that we can see things in ourselves and instead of coming at it with an arrogant, "Wow, I am awesome," kind of attitude, we can see things that God, so let's say maybe the fruit of the Spirit, things that God would say is beautiful and praise him for it, even though it has to do with ourselves. That doesn't have to be an inherently selfish discovery, but everything that we have is a gift from God. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah, there's a real humility that can come from that. And the flip side too, where there are times where, man, we don't like ourselves too much. I think people perhaps wrestle with that other extreme versus an inflated self-image, is sort of a real degrading self-image that people have. And it's like Zechariah 3 where we might not see ourselves in a very positive light or an aesthetically beautiful light. And yet God sees. And that's the thing with objective beauty. Objective beauty is even if nobody else sees it, the beauty is still there. And that's the thing with objective beauty, and that's where the alignment comes in is if it's still there, I want to discover it, whether that beauty is in myself, or in others, or in relationships, or in the world, or in who God is, or values and culture, if that objective beauty is there, I want to discover it. 

And so subjective beauty is like I invent the beauty and that's purely objective beauty. There's a discovery to that. And with that discovery, there's a journey. There's some aspect where I'm adjusting, aligning and changing as I go on that journey. And then there's beauty I create because I discover that objective beauty. So there's something also very empowering with those days and times and those mistakes we make where I feel like I'm ugly. And there might be things that God wants to work in us. And then there's that aspect to where God says, "You know what? I still see Jesus in you because the blood of Christ has covered you." And there's a beauty that is inherent both in us being made in the image of God and also, as Ephesians highlights in Ephesians 4, and 2 Corinthians 3, that we are being made into the image of Christ and the likeness of Christ with ever-increasing glory. So it's a both-and in there and that dynamic of and understanding of biblical beauty as it applies itself is rich and wonderful, and it becomes part of that journey in our lives. 

Kasey Olander: 

And I feel like that can be so anchoring for us when a lot of times if beauty is subjective and it's just in the eye of the beholder, then it's dependent on does it get five stars or something like that? Does it get enough likes or whatever? But really if we think of beauty as something that is us able to go on a journey to discover it because it comes from God, God doesn't change, and so that is something that we're not tossed to and fro, but we can anchor ourselves in what God says is beautiful and pursue it. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah. That's where the truth part comes in. And that subjectivity, honestly, sometimes it betrays us. If all we rely on is our own subjective opinions and feelings and we use that the basis to define beauty, sometimes that betrays us because even what we may think of ourselves may be based on deceptions and lies that either we tell ourselves or that society tells us. And neither may be true. 

But objective beauty, it's freeing. It frees us from those kinds of falsities and images that are pretending to be objective because they feel that way. When society tells us that we are ugly in this way or inflated beauty in this way, there's a freedom in being able to break free from those deceptions and to know that, "Okay, you know what? There's a beauty that God has declared over me in Christ that is still there. And even if I can't see it or feel it, there is a beckoning for me to discover it. And I might have to sit in this place right now for a bit because this is where I am. But just for me to know that my subjective of opinions and feelings as self-condemning as they may be, they're not the authoritative voices. God's voice on the aesthetics is authoritative." 

Kasey Olander: 

And a lot of times both of those extremes that you're talking about, thinking too much of ourselves or thinking too little, comes from the pride of thinking, "Well, I determine my own worth," or even, "I determine that other people determine my worth." And it adds a lot of pressure to us having to decide. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah, there's a beautiful imagery that you find recurring in the Scriptures, which describes us as the artwork, and God as the artist. And he's a potter. We are the clay. 

Kasey Olander: 

Ephesians 2:10. 

Brian Chan: 

Right. Yeah, Ephesians 2:10. There're references in Isaiah. And sometimes when that concept is turned around even, it's using the same kind of reference, Jeremiah 18, and it poses a different dynamic when it comes to understanding beauty for us to be a masterpiece of, an artwork of a master who's at work in us. There's something powerful about that versus simply me being in isolation self-declaring. And that's part of the relational quality. Part of that relational quality is artwork to artist. And there's a trust in that, a trust that even on days when I don't think I'm good enough, well, my artist, my master artist is good enough, more than so, and he's still at work in me. 

Kasey Olander: 

Right. He saw fit to sustain you and to carry you through and to give you whatever giftings, regardless of how we may feel on a given day. And that is, again, something that is anchoring and stabilizing for us instead of having the whimsy of succumbing to other people's opinions or our own. 

Brian Chan: 

Right. Yeah. 

Kasey Olander: 

And that's sort of the humility piece that you were talking about earlier too, that God is outside of us, but he's somebody that we can trust and come under his authoritative word about what is objectively beautiful. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah, yeah. 

Kasey Olander: 

Man. So you talked about this journey of discovering beauty. What are some maybe practical ways that you would encourage our listener to discover beauty? What's the next step in our quest to discover beauty? 

Brian Chan: 

I always say the Bible's a good next step. 

Kasey Olander: 

That's a good call. 

Brian Chan: 

And sometimes when I'm teaching aesthetics from the scriptures and people are like, "I've read this passage a thousand times, I never saw that." And it's really seeing it with that lens and it's not trying to look for it per se, like where you have to make it up. You don't make it up. But when the language is there, the language is there, the illustrations are there, and it's being able to see that. And I think that most of us probably read the Bible with certain lenses, and so some of us are reading it because we want comfort. So we read it like it's a self-help book. Some of us read it because we want information. So it's like an encyclopedia. Not many of us perhaps read it as story. So we pick up the power of narrative if we read it as story, like you would experience a good film or a novel, all those literary elements that are in there to make certain theological truths come out. 

And rarely do we perhaps see all the word imagery that the Bible provides and the language that has aesthetic appeal. But once we start to see it, we can see that the scripture has a lot to say about art, aesthetics, and beauty. And I think God has provided a whole lot both in creation and culture to experience him and to discover him. It, I think, has to do with looking up sometimes from all the busyness of life and worries and take time to notice, to notice the handiwork of God all around us, whether it's in the rising of a sunrise, I almost said sunset, rising of a sunrise or in the starry night sky. Or sometimes when you're just seeing a family together with their kids and when goodness is there, when I'm crossing the street and the driver decides to let me go by and not speed right in front of me. There's some level of goodness that's there. And I attribute all goodness and truth and genuine beauty to God and there's something to be celebrated. 

And they can be experienced aesthetically. It's not just a cognitive, "Oh, that's a good thing." There's something wonderful about it, about these things that are all around us. I remember once sitting as I was speaking at a church retreat and I'm having quiet time early in the morning in the sunrise and there's this hummingbird that's flying nearby me exploring the flowers and then it comes, flies right in front of me across the table and it just looks at me for a bit. It's flapping its wings in this like hyper speed. And it looks at me probably for a good 10 seconds and I say, "Hi," and then it flies off after that. But how wonderful is that? There's something really wonderful about it, and I mean, left an impression upon me that it interacted with me. And I think there are things that we can do to cultivate beauty in our own lives, whether it's art is a wonderful way and... 

Kasey Olander: 

Creating art, or? 

Brian Chan: 

Creating art, whether it's anything from painting drawings to, I love bonsai art. I reflect a lot on the many types of agricultural references or the references to trees and fruitfulness when I'm doing bonsai art. 

Kasey Olander: 

What is bonsai art? 

Brian Chan: 

Bonsai art is the Japanese and Chinese art of shaping trees that grow in a pot. Bonsai literally means tree in a pot. 

Kasey Olander: 

And so you're able to shape them... 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah. You can shape the trees. And there are, I studied under a sensei for this art and there are so many biblical scriptural references to bonsai art. And I videotaped him explaining stuff like the principles and bonsai, and I thought to myself, "Is this guy a Christian? I don't know if he is or not." But that's part of the beauty too, is finding God's truths appear in places you don't expect and as we're doing art. And galleries sometimes are places that I will go to have quiet times. They're designed usually so that you can enjoy a piece contemplatively, through contemplation. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah, they're not trying to rush you off. 

Brian Chan: 

Taking time to go on hikes to experience the sublime. But these are choices we make, choices for the aesthetics, choices for creativity. We can let life take us to wherever, life and all the issues of life wants to take us, or we can make certain choices to where we can incorporate certain things into our lives. And it's just finding that time, creating that space. And sometimes that space is in our homes even and what we bring into our homes. 

Kasey Olander: 

Like teeny tiny trees. 

Brian Chan: 

Teeny tiny trees, certain artworks that we can put in there and the books we read, the music we listen to. I think one of the most things that God has empowered people to do is to create culture. And there are aspects of culture that may not be God-honoring, but there are a whole lot of aspects of culture that is God-honoring, that do, I think, echo the wonder, the wisdom of who God is. 

Kasey Olander: 

I like that you're highlighting these things that are so intentional and a lot of them are really embodied, like hiking is interacting our entire body, our legs and our lungs, and you're seeing things with our eyes, whether it's the sunset or this work of art on the wall. And I think probably too, I don't know, I'm sure this is true of you, but I don't know if you've sometimes had a really good tasting food and you're like, "The Lord just loves me, this is amazing." 

Brian Chan: 

And that's a great statement, Kasey, in that statement of, "Gosh, God is so good, or God must really love me," because not only is that dish really well-prepared, because it could have been nastily prepared, but not only is it well-prepared to just the right amount of salt, the right amount of savoriness or sweetness, but God gave someone the talent to be able to do so. And that's an intricacy within our own souls as image bearers of God and how the spirit moves largely in the world, that we can create wonderfully good things. I have those experiences you just described when I get a really well-made cappuccino. I said, "Thank you, God, for this great cappuccino that just soothes my soul early in the morning right now." And I love you said the word embodied because that is a key word. 

Sometimes I think that we can be too in our heads when it comes to experiencing certain things, but aesthetics assumes something that can be experienced by the senses. You see, hear, taste, touch, it's tactile, it's kinesthetic movement as well too. And I love that word embodied because there's a holistic sense of being human when you do experience something that's embodied. And if you're a secret dancer, dance your heart out in your home. Experience that, experience the beauty of it to an inspiringly moving song. And it could be, you know what? For those of us who are addicted to sad songs like I am, dance to a sad song because it speaks to your soul and someone was talented enough and had enough insight to write a sad song even that identifies with sometimes how we are and feel. And there's something that is very healing about that. And that's beautiful because there is healing in it and restoration. 

Kasey Olander: 

And what a gift it is that God gave us all these senses and ways of being in the world that we can bring our entire selves, if that is, with tears, or with dancing, or with tasting things and experiencing temperatures and appreciating how beautiful the weather is, for example. 

Brian Chan: 

And there's one key element about us as you mentioned and listed all these different senses and how we experience and why it works well for us to experience beauty is because of as image bearers of God, we have the capacity to understand metaphor. We can take something that's physical, physically experienced, and understand and experience it in an intangible way that's deeply meaningful and revealing. It's because we can understand symbols, we can understand analogy and metaphors, we see more, we see more that's past the material and physical. Beauty always reminds us, I think, that the world is more than just material. Jeremy S. Begbie wrote a great book, for those of us who like to read, called Abundantly More. And it's wonderful because it captures the idea that art continually reminds us that we are more than just the physical, more than just matter and particles. 

And there are other books that will complement it that explain why we perceive it this way is because we have this capacity for metaphor that animals don't do. I have three tortoises and four bearded dragons. I don't know if they understand metaphor. They just want to see their lettuce. And they recognize me, but can they look at a painting and think of it metaphorically, look at a piece of wood grain. Like we could look at a wood grain or a cloud and see things metaphorically, a star or the moon. We can look at it metaphorically. 

And that's what the psalmist did. You read Psalm 19, Psalm 104, they see the world metaphorically because they see the physical, aesthetically experienced things echoing, crying out, singing of greater spiritual realities that are true and out there. So there's a connection between the intangible and the tangible. And when it comes to beauty, we experience both. And this is why beauty is not just the sentimental, the pretty and the superficial cosmetic layer of stuff. It's interwoven part of reality that God has created. And there's a richness to this when you experience it. 

Kasey Olander: 

Right. There's so much more depth than you usually think of if you think of it as just this superficial. 

Brian Chan: 

Right. 

Kasey Olander: 

And it seems like you keep highlighting too this thread of intentionality that we have to look up, we have to take stock of the things that are around us because there's a ton of different opportunities to experience beauty, but it just takes some noticing it intentionally. 

Brian Chan: 

Yes, the intentionality will, the beauty could be right next to you, but if you don't turn your attention towards it, you either not notice it, nor will you give attention to it, or there are things that we notice, but there're just other things that, "Oh, I'd rather get on with this instead." And we don't give it our attention. It's sort of like Moses noticing the burning bush. And then he turned his attention towards it and went towards it. And the scripture says that it's when God noticed that Moses turned his attention towards the burning bush then God spoke. Or it's like when God tells Jeremiah, "Go to the potter's house. There I will give you my word." It's when we turn towards the attention of the aesthetics, there's a deeper intangible meaning then that is conveyed from that experience. 

But I do think that that can be a spiritual battle as well as a fleshly struggle with our lives, the struggle of being just consumed by the mundane, the routine and the busyness and the worries and the fears of life. But it's also a spiritual struggle because there's nothing more that Satan would want than to not necessarily oppose you, but simply keep your attention focused somewhere else. 

Kasey Olander: 

Or distract you with a hundred different things. 

Brian Chan: 

Distract you with a hundred different things. And they all seem important. And some of those important things aren't even actual real things. They're just things we're worried about. They're the what-ifs. What if this happens or what if I don't do this? Or what if my boss thinks that? They're not even actual things that necessarily have happened? And I think attention, focus is really key- 

Kasey Olander: 

Would... Go ahead. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah, I was going to just add to that, just being able to see has to do with giving our attention to something. 

Kasey Olander: 

Which also sounds like it's something that we need to intentionally cultivate too. It's not something that just happens to us that we're going to all of a sudden become really focused on what matters. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah, and when you said that word cultivate, it makes me think of community. Community can help with cultivating our attention, doing it together. Like going on a hike, you don't have to do it by yourself. How about you go with some of your friends? Community, I think, helps. Some of my thoughts, I recently moved from LA, so some of my thoughts goes to the beach, sailing out on a boat, stuff like that. And no matter where you live, whether it's southern California, or you live in Oklahoma where everything might be flat. And I believe that God has created a beauty that's characteristic of any environment that you may be in. And I think that's the goodness of God, that he doesn't leave you in the world without beauty. 

Kasey Olander: 

Sure. It's not only mountains are beautiful or only the beach is beautiful. 

Brian Chan: 

That's right. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. 

Brian Chan: 

The beauty can be in the small as well as the great, as well as the grand. It could be in the small as well too. And it's taking notice of sometimes those small things like a hummingbird flying by right in front of me just to have 10 seconds with me. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. I love that you're broadening our definition and our thoughts about beauty so much, that it's so much deeper and richer than you might initially think on the surface, but also it is also so much more accessible than maybe we might be afraid that it's not. So you talked about community and friendship, and there's definitely, I mean, we could talk a lot more about friendship in a different episode, and we have actually done an episode on friendship. So thanks for bringing that up. But there's so much beauty in the way that we can experience friendship and community with our brothers and sisters in Christ, for example. But as we think of people in general, are all people beautiful? 

Brian Chan: 

Are all people beautiful, yes, in the sense that every person has being, and that in itself is beautiful, to exist in your essence is beautiful. 

Kasey Olander: 

Sure. Not just being in the image of God, that's interesting, but also just existing. 

Brian Chan: 

Well, part of our being is actually defined by being made in the image of God. So there's no human being who exists who is not made in the image of God. The choices we make later on determine what we become. The image of God is still there, and that's how we have being and essence. And then there's a beauty in us that is perhaps what I would call a potential beauty that God sees in every one of us that can be redeemed, unlocked by Christ and magnified and developed and cultivated by the Holy Spirit. And so beauty has a temporal aspect to it. It is both past, present, and future. 

So in the redemptive narrative, we're beautiful in the past in the sense that we are made in the image of God, and that always stays with us. In Christ, we are beautiful in the present because we're being made more and more so into the image of Christ. That's your Ephesians 4, it's you're putting on the new self in Colossians 3, that's your 2 Corinthians 3:18, and there's a future beauty, your 1 Corinthians 15, where we will all one day receive glorified bodies in our final consummation. So there's an origin, there's a present dynamic, and there's a destiny. 

If you haven't found Jesus yet, well, you still have what makes you human, the image of God in you. Finding Jesus then will grant you a present beauty that will be for all eternity that will be finally realized when God's work is all done and that process is made possible through the work of the Holy Spirit. So there's a real rich, I think, aspect to understanding what biblical beauty is that's all-encompassing. And it gives me a lot of hope in the sense that we have up and down days. Life is like that. But to know that part of the temporal aspect of beauty is there's a future destiny that is certain and declared and it's just as good as real because it will happen, boy, that's a lot of hope that where I will end up, I will be fully, completely a beautiful person. I'm already beautiful, made in image of God, I'm being made more and more beautiful each day in Christ by the Holy Spirit. And I'll be fully beautiful, glorified, because of Christ and through the Holy Spirit, according to God's Word. That's far more than cosmetics. 

Kasey Olander: 

And that is beautiful. You talked about beauty in the way that we relate to God, to beauty in the way that we relate to ourselves, and also beauty in the way that we relate to other people. So even on days when people are frustrating us or if I'm feeling impatient or whatever, I can still, there's some human dignity that if I pay attention that I can remember. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah. Yeah. I love how you said that too. I mean, there's a realness to that. And some days when people, there is also genuine ugliness, and part of the honesty is sometimes I'm not at my best and sometimes other people, maybe it's your spouse that's dealing with some aspect of that's ugly in you, your short temper or you're irritated and whatever it might be, we're human, on this side of heaven we're still being shaped. 

And beauty does alert us to that. It alerts us to also understand the opposite of that. If I'm not fully on this day at this very moment, fully beautiful in Christ-likeness, well, I'm also aware of what is ugly, that old self that the Apostle Paul in Colossians 3 tells us to put off and to put on the image of Christ that's the new self. So there's some daily choices I do make that are character qualities and virtues that either represent Jesus more or if I keep that old self on, it's fighting against it. There's a mentality I can choose according to Romans 8, a mentality that is according to the flesh or the spirit. So we do make choices, and there's a real active part. 

So it's not enough. It's foundational to say that I'm beautiful as being made in the image of God, but that's not all there is to it. It's not fully just passive. There's an active part in Christ by the Holy Spirit that I also play. And then there's parts that I'm fully yielding to and surrendering to God's artistry in my life and dependent upon that as well too, as the overarching fulfillment of my own narrative and redemption. 

Kasey Olander: 

Which goes back to the objective beauty that you were talking about earlier. If beauty is objective, it's not just dependent on how I feel that day or whatever my impulse says, but there's an objective going back to scripture and trying to make choices regardless of what my impulse is, making choices that honor God and do things that he calls beautiful and calls his followers to emulate. 

Brian Chan: 

Yeah. Yeah. 

Kasey Olander: 

So what resources would you recommend to our listener who's curious to explore more about beauty? 

Brian Chan: 

Well, there are a lot more out there nowadays than when I was a student and I first started studying the subject. And it seems like there's a movement of an interest in this subject, and not just in the subject of beauty, but the integration of beauty and faith. Boy, there are a lot out there, and Jeremy S. Begbie's a great author. N. T. Wright also incorporate a lot in his writings about beauty and justice and goodness. I have a book called The Purple Curtain. It's about a biblical perspective on beauty, but if you do search for it, if you just type Purple Curtain, you'll get upholstery. This is my failing in titling my book properly. So you have to type Purple Curtain and then my first name, then you get the book, otherwise you get a bunch of drapes. 

And let's see. Yeah, Begbie has a recent book called Abundantly More, I mentioned that one. InterVarsity Press had a book many years ago with a number of different authors in it. It's called The Beauty of God, I believe. Yes, The Beauty of God. And let's see, William Dyrness, William Dyrness spelled D-Y-R-N-E-S-S, Visual Faith, is also a great book. So a lot that I respect. Begbie has a book called Beholding His Glory. That's a great little book as well, too. Very thoughtful, really deep. And a lot of these books, the subject is so vast, honestly, that I have not really come across one book that encompasses it all. They all deal with some aspect of a theology of beauty that is a important and necessary aspect. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. Well, that's really helpful. Brian, do you have any closing thoughts before we end our time? 

Brian Chan: 

Oh, the time's almost up already. 

Kasey Olander: 

I know. 

Brian Chan: 

Take time to discover beauty because it leads you to discovering the beauty of God, which should impassion, inspire your heart to love him more greatly. The Apostle Paul warned that there will be a time where there'll be lovers of money, lovers of pleasure, and lovers of self, but not lovers of God. I think the avant-garde thing for Christians today is to be able to discover this wonderful, vast, magnificent beauty of God and to become mad lovers of God in a reductionistic age that needs to see that there's something far more in this reality in this world. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah, I mean, that's lovely. We've talked about, you said the topic of beauty is so vast. I feel like we've also covered so much ground even in this last 45 minutes. We talked about God as the initiator, the author of all beauty. We talked about how beauty pertains to our relationship with the Lord, with ourselves, and with others. And you even highlighted that beauty is something that is temporal. And so it's past and present and future and that future gives us a beautiful sense of hope. And so I hope that for you listening, that you take some intentional time, whatever it may be, to cultivate more beauty in your life, if it's in your home or if it's on your way home. And that that beauty would draw you closer to the Lord. And Brian, so this has been a wonderful conversation. I agree, our time has flown by. 

Brian Chan: 

I loved it. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. Thank you so much. 

Brian Chan: 

Such a delight. Thank you. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. And we also want to thank you for being with us. If you like our show, go ahead and leave us a rating or review on your favorite podcast app so that others can discover us. And we hope that you'll join us next time when we discuss issues of God and culture to show the relevance of theology to everyday life.