Lausanne Pillar 1: The Gospel for Every Person. 32x20”. Acrylic on birch panel. 2016
To highlight some ingredients that were placed in the painting: a central fisherman is casting his net over the entire world (each continent outline in gold), seen from an unexpected, sideways vantage, while a central cross comprised by the equator and international dateline anchor the work. The net sparkles with the burst of blue and white light scattered across the globe as seen from satellite photography of current population densities and prophetically declares our prayer that God’s love would enfold every people group on earth and flood the remaining darkness with the light of the gospel.
Here you can see more clearly the underlying global map with the continents oriented in a more familiar layout. The decision to turn the world on its side was a prophetic symbol of the way the gospel turns this world on its head, and the qualities of our “upside-down Kingdom” (service, humility, sacrificial love, generosity, forgiveness) are so often running at odds with the priorities of our world.
Here is the Lausanne Movement’s president Dr. Michael Oh presenting the Pillar 1 painting for the first time at the Younger Leaders Gathering in Jakarta, Indonesia August 2016.
Near each continent on the globe is a depiction of the indigenous people in their cultural attire.
At first I’d painstakingly painted the entire globe noting every curve and edge along the shorelines, and intentionally avoiding the manmade borders and distinctions history has imposed on the land. After hours and hours of prayerfully considering the vastness of this world and just how little I really knew of all these places, I felt the Lord lead me to paint it all AGAIN, but this time as seen from satellite photos at night, the blue/white lights illuminating our planet showing clearly where the greatest gatherings of population and our globally urbanizing and shifting world. I found myself again praying over cities, lights, the hubs of humanity across our planet, and only after completing these two passes over the entire painting did I begin adding my originally intended figurative elements. I didn’t realize it at the time, but God was stretching ME, not the work, so that I could more deeply appreciate and stand in awe of the scope of what it meant that the gospel is for EVERY PERSON on our planet. This vessel had to be broken and remade in order to hold the weight of the assignment to paint pillar 1!