Alisha and Asher at the “Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera” exhibit in Phoenix, Ariz., in 2017.
From a very, very young age when folks asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I would naively respond, “An artist!” Art has always impacted and inspired me deeply. I love love drawing and creating. As a child, the best gift you could give me was the big box of 64 Crayola brand crayons with the sharpener built into it. As I got older, the response to the question morphed into, “An art teacher,” and I even studied Art Education at university. Art is so powerful to me, it’s one of the few things that chokes me up.
My thesis at college centered around the life of Frida Kahlo, the famous Mexican painter known for her expressive self-portraits and iconic singular eyebrow. I still feel inspired by how her inner thoughts, personality, and character were expressed in vibrant (and sometimes haunting) colorful paintings which celebrated her love of nature and her culture. Heck, I have her tattooed on my arm! The first time I saw a Frida original (The Suicide of Dorothy Hale), I cried because I was so overwhelmed.
Then there’s Frank Lloyd Wright - his architecture stunningly integrates the characteristics of the nature that inspires it. We had the pleasure of visiting the Biltmore Hotel in Scottsdale, Ariz. (designed by Albert Chase McArthur, who had studied under Frank Lloyd Wright, a consulting architect for the facility), to celebrate one of our first wedding anniversaries. I was gobsmacked to see his vision represented in the details there. From the respect for the trees used to craft furniture to the way the stained glass encourages the outside to come in — inviting nature to live amongst us, celebrating God’s creation. Wow.
Alisha outside of one of Van Gogh’s workplaces in Brussels.
Finally, a trip to Amsterdam a few years back left me an emotional wreck after visiting the Vincent van Gogh museum. After all, one of my most visceral personal art memories was completing a colored-pencil still life of sunflowers in Ms. Prieshoff’s Junior High art class.
When most people hear the name Vincent van Gogh the majority of folks will think, “Ah, that’s the crazy dude who cut off his ear and gave it as a present to his girlfriend.” But really, his story is so much richer than that.
Van Gogh loved God so much that he wanted to become a priest, following in the footsteps of his father and grandfather. He then failed the exam to become a priest many, many times so, instead, he became a missionary. He felt so drawn to the plight of the poor that he gave away all of the money he was paid for ministering to a small church in a Belgian coal-mining town and slept in a haystack behind a bakery, eating the baker’s bread for free. His parish was so embarrassed by his behavior that they would raise money and give it to him so he could get a house. He’d then proceed to take all that money and give it away to the needy.
After he did that a few times, the congregation was so upset that they had him removed from his position at the church for having excess zeal. Can you imagine? Van Gogh was being so Christ-like that he showed up to preach with hay sticking out of his hair...and they fired him for it!
Embittered and impoverished, he left the church at the end of 1879. “I wish they would only take me as I am,” he said in a letter to his brother Theo.
Vincent van Gogh | The Starry Night (1889)
Then Van Gogh becomes an art dealer. He became so disenfranchised with how art dealers treated art like a commodity rather than a celebration of creativity, that it completely broke him. In his grief of having failed as both a minister and an art dealer, he proceeded to paint The Starry Night.
If you look at The Starry Night, right in the center of the picture is a church. All the other buildings around the church have lights in the windows, but the church is dark. Then, if you look up at the night sky, it's beautiful. There are swirls of color, light mixing with darkness, stars shining and illuminating the rich canvas...and yet the church is not illuminated.
When I look at this painting, I can’t help but think that somehow it conveys what Van Gogh felt when he looked back on his journey as a religious worker. Want to know more about Van Gogh’s walk with Christ? Check out this link.
When we first embarked on our missions journey over a decade ago, we quickly grew accustomed to leaving our earthly possessions behind. After many, many yard sales and the rehoming of our beloved pets Scurvy, Scallywag, and Harry, we set off on a truly Worthwhile Adventure serving first in the Czech Republic, then Lithuania, and now Barcelona. A dear mentor and former-neighbor from Trinity Mennonite Church in Glendale, Ariz., once remarked:
“We admire your commitment and well remember that we were so moved when you sold everything across the street. I think this was the first time I saw a young couple completely risk their future in discipleship and kingdom building. It made a profound impression on many of us.”
What an encouragement in a time of discomfort, reducing all our earthly possessions to only four suitcases and two guitars! If only we could live as boldly as van Gogh, seeking out a mere haystack behind a bakery…
In an attempt to follow Christ’s teaching in Matthew 19:21, van Gogh was ridiculed by the very church he’s trying to guide. Almost as if his congregation said: Sure, go ahead and help the poor, so long as you look like the rest of us and we all can continue living our comfortable lives. Multiple times this same church tried to move van Gogh further away from the teachings of Jesus, encouraging him to conform to the world.
And multiple times he rejected them.
What a strength of character and conviction of faith! It’s easy to understand why van Gogh would paint the church as an empty, stoic building void of life.
The idea of post-Christendom is represented in The Starry Night for me. God is too big to be contained in a building because God is everywhere. The reality is the church in Europe (and in many other parts of the world) has been on a steady decline for some time — check out this video about our service in Barcelona to learn more about that. That means it’s time that we, as Christians, realize that we have to stop packing God into this little box with a steepled roof and learn to look up and see God in the stars shining all around us (and illuminated in the windows of our neighbor’s apartments). Too often confining rules, overbearing subcommittees, and the culture of “church” — things that emerged out of our need for structure and identity — push folks away from their very faith.
This is what happens when we try to fit God into a box.
Asher and Alisha explore the Andy Warhol exposition in Barcelona in 2019.
The same can be said of the definition of missions. Historically, missionaries were dutiful folks who went out on a shoestring budget to preach the gospel for the first time to those who may have never heard The Good News. That usually meant sending these missionaries to remote tribes or into far-off, uncharted territory, and then telling parishioners to mail them used and ironed teabags. Now, the ‘unchurched’ are found more frequently in urban populations and densely populated cities where folks may pass by four shuttered and condemned churches on the way to Starbucks.
Last fall, we and the local church community reaffirmed our commitment to serve them in Barcelona and one topic that emerged in the discussion is how we're not "the missionaries like the ones we used to have.” And that's very true. In the 1970s and '80s, many missionaries walked in the roles of a revered pastor with all the best scriptural references...and his dutiful wife. It's also true that society in 2021 society looks a bit differently than it did 40 years ago. Culture evolves in all aspects — from music to art to fashion. We must accept this is inevitable for missions, missionaries, and the church as a whole.
One time I received a comment at an international Anabaptist conference by a well-meaning Mennonite guy — he said, “Back in my day, we had to pay $2 to see the tattooed lady, but here you are in front of me for free!” (read more about our tattoos in this Anabaptist World article written by Josh). It’s true that we may not be what you picture when you close your eyes and envision missionary. Maybe that’s not such a bad thing. Do you think a homeless carpenter surrounded by a band of unruly youth was an ancient religious scribe or priest’s vision? Think again.
If I could talk to myself, ten years ago before I took my first mission posting (or pull up a haystack near dear Vincent), I would say:
“Mission work is not for the weary. It’s a work of quiet resolve. Unlike most jobs, that when the going gets tough one can justify things by saying ‘at least the pay is good’ or ‘but it’s got great benefits’ or even ‘well, I’ve just got to make it to retirement’ — to serve as a missionary, none of those things are true in an earthly sense. To be a missionary must be a response to a true and ardent calling. Otherwise, you may not make it through life with your faith intact.”
So, now as an adult, I may not be an artist or art teacher, but I certainly try to celebrate creativity in our ministry with the church in Barcelona. Whenever possible, I seek out ways to inspire visual worship and creativity within the Sunday services. After all, not all parishioners worship in the same way. And there have certainly been mornings when I arrive at the church with sawdust (not hay) in my hair after hauling firewood that morning…but thankfully no one has fired me for that.
I really want our community to seek out the light in its neighborhood, in the eyes of coworkers as well as the beggar on the street corner, and to stop looking inside the church for God, because God is all around us as long as we’re willing to look. God’s swirling and whirling in rich blues and deep hues, just like on van Gogh’s canvas! We must have faith to know that God’s plans for the future are not our own and it’s OK to feel uncertain and uncomfortable — especially when you realize former traditions and expectations have evolved with the culture (like music, art, and fashion…or the way a missionary looks).
Let us remember: the opposite of faith is not doubt, it’s certainty. And what need do the certain have for faith?
“If salvation, humanity, and God Himself are all enveloped in impenetrable mystery, why do we assume ministry — which stands at the intersection of all three — are a calculable science? Why are we unwilling to surrender to the immeasurability of our calling and discover a beauty and calling beyond the empty promises of Church, Inc.?”
In some ways, my journey seems to be running opposite of Vincent van Gogh. Vocationally, I’ve moved from artist to missionary (or I certainly had way more time to paint before becoming a full-time international church worker). However, in other ways, it’s very similar. I’ve learned to see how the brilliance of God cannot be contained inside a dark building. I now feel emboldened to live out Christ’s teachings in a way that can become a beacon and example to others — church-going folks and non-believers alike. I'm also hopeful for the future of our church community in Barcelona. Even though we're far from perfect, I see movement towards a dynamic, evolved future. And our “church” may not have a steeple, but it still focuses energy inward on Sunday mornings (like so many others).
This is something we’re hoping to shift as we reopen the Fundacion Menonita in a few months under the new moniker: Barcelona Anabaptist Center (stay tuned for more to come on that later).
In retrospect, we can pinpoint the spring of 2021 as the time our laughter disappeared — when our four-year ministry in Barcelona began to fall apart. As concerns regarding COVID-19 began to ease, expectations in the local church community changed. Gradually, things arrived at a point where our family needed to step away.
It's hard to laugh when it feels like the world is crumbling around you. It's an act that feels almost audacious considering the state of the world: pandemic losses, church divisions, guilt and anger over White privilege and indirectly benefiting from systemic racism, environmental collapse, rampant economic ruin, and war. How can one laugh when the world we live in is so far removed from the one Jesus describes throughout the gospels?