Ideas Have Consequences

BEAUTY (10 Words to Heal Our Broken World Series)

• Disciple Nations Alliance • Season 2 • Episode 49

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How can beauty heal our broken world? In this episode, part nine of our 10 Words series, we explore the biblical foundations of beauty and its transformative power to change lives and nations. We challenge the notion that beauty is merely subjective, revealing how the Bible establishes a universal standard for beauty, truth, and goodness. Our conversation contrasts biblical and contemporary views of beauty, emphasizing its role in understanding God and creation. Through art, nature, and personal reflections, we show how beauty connects us to the divine and reshapes culture. Cultures that recognize God as the source of beauty thrive, and the converse holds true as well. Beauty is a gift for all—essential to our spiritual journey and daily lives, not just for artists or grand cathedrals.

Darrow Miller:

And there is an objective standard for beauty and that objective standard is true and good and it's life, it's not death.

Scott Allen:

Hi friends, this is Scott Allen, president of the Disciple Nations Alliance, and I want to welcome you to another episode of Ideas have Consequences, the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance. As we prepare to launch my newest book, 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World Restoring the True Meaning of Our Most Important Words, we wanted to go through each one of these 10 foundational words that are highlighted in the book, discussing their true meaning as well as how they've been fundamentally redefined in our contemporary culture. Now you might be asking why do words matter? Well, it's because words and definitions shape the way we think and feel, and that, in turn, determines our choices and our actions, and that shapes the kind of culture that we live in, for better or for worse. And so if you want to work for a positive change in culture in society, it has to begin by restoring the true meaning of our most important words.

Luke Allen:

Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of Ideas have Consequences. This is the mini-series on the new book that has come out. Actually, this is the first episode since the book is out, so I hope that you guys have already got your hands on a copy of that. The book is called Ten Words to Heal Our Broken World Restoring the True Meaning of Our Most Important Words. You can find that book on Amazon, I think. Pretty much anywhere else. You get books, good reads, it's out there, guys. The best place to find the book and learn more about the book and all the resources that we're launching with the book is on our book website, which is called 10wordsbookorg. 10wordsbookorg. You can go there. You can find the book, where to buy it, you can find the video series that accompanies the book. You can find the rest of this podcast series that we have been doing now for, I believe, nine weeks, and other resources as well, including the foreword for the book, which is written by Darrell Miller, and some of the book's endorsements. Speaking of those, I just wanted to read you guys one of the generous endorsements that we received for this book from Kelly Monroe Kohlberg. She is the founder of the Veritas Forum and the author of Finding God at Harvard and she wrote about the book.

Luke Allen:

Scott Allen's book hands us the key to reclaiming our culture and nation. True words give life, vision and purpose, but enemies of the gospel hijack words to destroy us. Revival requires Christians to speak words with true biblical definitions. Clearly, only God's truth is true love. I know for today's word understanding the true definition of this, for a lot of Christians at least. I'll speak for myself here. I did not think of this word as being an important, key biblical word that I felt like I needed to defend, because I just had not really thought about this word too much in a biblical context. Today's word is beauty and if you've been listening to Ideas have Consequences for a while, you know that we talk a lot about the three transcendence. Is that right, guys? The three transcendence truth, goodness and beauty.

Darrow Miller:

That's what people call those right. Okay, the three transcendence.

Scott Allen:

Is that right, guys? The three transcendence truth, goodness and beauty.

Darrow Miller:

That's what people call those right Okay, the three transcendence, yeah.

Luke Allen:

Culture of the kingdom. The culture of the kingdom is made up of truth, goodness and beauty and, as a lot of Christians know, truth matters a lot, goodness matters a lot. We talk a lot about love, but what about this word beauty, as I hope you'll gain a fuller understanding of today? It is extremely important for every single one of us to defend, to uphold and understand the true biblical definition of. So, as always, on these 10 words episodes. Dad, could we just start out? Actually, I got to introduce you guys. In case anyone's new to the podcast, I'll be your host today. My name is Luke Allen and, yeah, I'm the producer of this podcast and, for the purposes of this series, I am acting host, whereas our normal host, scott Allen, is in the guest seat because he is the author of this new book, 10 Words to Kill Our Broken World. Scott's also my dad, so, dad, thank you for joining today.

Scott Allen:

Great to be here.

Luke Allen:

Great to have you and Darrell Miller is my co-host and we are glad to have him on the show today because he is probably the beauty expert around here. He wrote the book, the recent book, A Call for Balladeers, which is a book about the importance of art and beauty in the kingdom of God. So, Darrell, glad to have your expertise on the show.

Darrow Miller:

Good to be here, Glad to have your expertise on the show. Good to be here.

Luke Allen:

Subject I'm interested in. It's a great one, I think. As far. As I grew up always around you guys so biblical worldview teaching was always something I was learning and hearing and listening to. But when I understood the true biblical definition of beauty, I think it was the first time that I really understood that a biblical worldview does apply to all of life, and it was. Everyone says they have that aha moment when it's oh, this makes sense. Now the biblical worldview makes sense. For me, the aha moment was talking about beauty with you, mr Miller, back in 2020. And then the future discussions that you and dad and we all had about that was kind of my starting place into a lot of this. So I love this word and I am so glad that this is one of the words in this 10 words book. Yeah, again to start things out, dad, as usual, would you mind just reading us the true definition of the word beauty and then the false, counterfeit cultural definition that we hear very often in the world around us?

Scott Allen:

Yes, sure, luke. And before I start, let me just say that you know, daryl, credit to you. You are the one that kind of led me down this road as well, and so much of what I put into this chapter came directly from you and from your book, call of the Balladeers. So this is really, you know, just in a lot of ways, what we're going to talk, what I'm going to talk about today, comes from you. So I just want to appreciate you for that, daryl.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, so with every one of these ten words, I try to define it biblically as concisely as I can, and then also culturally. How is it understood in our contemporary culture? It's often very different from what the Bible puts forward as the true definition. So, when it comes to beauty, this is how I put it biblically. And, by the way, again, I'm sorry I just keep adding these little caveats, but this was the hardest word to define and I think that I was thinking a lot about that. And I think it's because beauty by its very nature you know, when we talk like we're doing now and we think and we use our rational brains, it's really not a great. What's the word? I'm looking for a great vehicle for beauty.

Scott Allen:

Now we can try to define it using words and rational kind of thoughts, but beauty doesn't speak to us so much through words as it does. It has its own language, and we'll talk about that in a little bit. We experience it emotionally, very often not rationally, and so to think about beauty rationally, you know I struggled a little bit, but nevertheless here's what I put down. I said it's a combination of qualities that is present in a thing or a person both externally and internally—we'll talk about that in a little bit—that gives joy, satisfaction and moves us deeply and often fills us with awe and wonder, because God is its ultimate source.

Scott Allen:

Beauty has an objective reality to it that transcends personal taste. Now, it's really that last part, I think, particularly that we've lost in contemporary culture. So the redefinition is this it's a combination of aesthetic qualities that appeal to one's personal subjective senses or tastes. Beauty isn't entirely a matter of personal preference and individual expression. That's the understanding of beauty that I grew up with and that, probably until just a few years ago. If you had asked me what beauty is, I would have said something like that Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so to speak.

Luke Allen:

Yeah, I would agree with that. It's a word that we don't really think has a lot of importance in the kingdom of God, which is, I mean, just saying that is like, oh, it does have importance. That is such a wrong statement. It has incredible importance, but we just don't give it that weight so often. I mean just saying that is like, oh, it does have importance. That is such a wrong statement. That is incredible importance, but we just don't give it that weight so often. And because of that, we'll often just like with a lot of things, if we don't look at it through a biblical worldview, we'll look at it through the worldview of the world around us, and the world around us says beauty is in the eye of the beholder. You hear that everywhere. So I think a lot of us are coming to this podcast today, or just coming to this word with that understanding. So I hope that we can help you open your eyes to this word. Mr Miller, it looks like you want to say something.

Darrow Miller:

Yeah, another way of saying it, luke, is we don't have a theology of beauty, so it's not something that we talk about.

Darrow Miller:

We have a theology of pragmatism about. We have a theology of pragmatism. So when you look at our churches, are they beautiful? No, not particularly. They're pragmatic. They can be a metal building, metal rectangular building, and so we want a shed to put people's bodies in. We don't have a theology of beauty, we have a theology of pragmatism and that's driven, I think, by a materialistic world where you want to maximize profits, maximize the number of people you can get in your building without in terms of the square footage, cost of square footage. Maximize the people in your building, because we lack a theology of beauty. So that's how I would express or translate what you said, luke.

Luke Allen:

I totally agree with that and I yeah, materialism is the antithesis of beauty, Utilitarianism- yes. The busy culture we see around us, the rush. It's really hard to experience beauty when you're in a rush, I think this is.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, this is one of the things that really hit me as I was working on this chapter was, darrow, you say that beauty is absolutely essential. You know, because I think in our modern, postmodern world we don't, we just don't see it as essential, essential, meaning essential like air or food or water or you know, these things that we absolutely need to survive. But, yeah, we see it as kind of optional, ornamental. You know, we prioritize it as something that, you know, if you can get around to it, it's nice. But, like you say, darrell, we put the practical way ahead of it. You know, the practical and the pragmatic.

Scott Allen:

But it's really true that when you look, when you go back to those three kind of we call them transcendentals, which sounds too heady to me, but it's these three kind of least common denominators of God and his kingdom. There really are those three there's truth, there's goodness and there's beauty. And I think, as Christians, we definitely understand truth. You know, we have, as you say, a theology of you know of that word, the truthfulness of the gospel. It has to be true, we definitely do. When it comes to goodness, holiness, justice, that's something we think a lot about, righteousness. But when it comes to beauty, you know, then you know there's just this big blank. And yet I would argue and again, this comes from you, so much, darryl, it's, it's every bit as essential as those other two. You cannot understand god, or the world that he created, or our lives, you know, apart from from that word, beauty yeah, we, we put it in a box so often, we, with those three words again truth, goodness and beauty.

Luke Allen:

As far as what it means to be a Christian, we all know we should be, you know, truth tellers.

Scott Allen:

We should be our witness needs to be through truth.

Luke Allen:

Yeah and then goodness. Of course Christians need to be representatives of goodness to the world. But then beauty? We throw it in these boxes, like beauty's for artists or beauty's beauty's feminine, you know that's such a lie beauty, it's more of this feminine virtue and it's like no, if you. Just as clearly as we need to be conveyors of truth to our world, we all need to be conveyors of beauty to the world. We are all artists in a way uh, yeah, we are.

Darrow Miller:

Well, we have been created in the image of god, and god is the first artist. Yes, and what he created was beautiful. Yes, and he put us in the garden to be co-creators with him and, in a sense, the fall led to the creation of things that weren't beautiful, but, pre-fall being made in the image of God, we would create things that were beautiful, because it's a reflection of God's nature and character.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, the verse there that I chose to kind of highlight for this chapter has to do with God and the fact that he is beautiful. Let me just read this really quick here. I'm just trying to pull it up here. Yeah, the verse that I chose there was this one. It's out of Zion the perfection of beauty God shines forth. That's Psalm 50, verse 2. The perfection of beauty God shines forth. That's Psalm 50, verse 2. The perfection of beauty God is beauty. He defines it and, as you said, Darrell, he defines it. He defines what it is through what he's made. We understand beauty through his creation, which is by far the greatest work of art ever made.

Darrow Miller:

Well, I would say, it goes deeper than that, scott. It does Go ahead, Darrell His creation is a reflection of his nature. Exactly, that's the inward part of beauty, god is beautiful, yes, and when he created, he created beautifully. Yes, and he made human beings to appreciate beauty yes, that's talked more about that, dear.

Scott Allen:

Oh, you know. Yes, we understand beauty through his creation and we just, you know, marvel at it. Um, but but there's a apart from the creation itself, god in his own character, his own nature is beautiful. Expound on that a little bit.

Darrow Miller:

Well, I think this is when we talk about the culture of the kingdom. Truth, beauty and goodness are a reflection of God's nature. God is truthful, he is trustworthy, he cannot lie. God is good, he is moral, he is holy. And he is beautiful, but again because we have this mindset that's been shaped by a materialistic world. We don't see beauty. We might appreciate it when we see it, but we don't think about beauty as being rooted in the nature of God and that there is an absolute quality of beauty.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, that's right, that's right. Yeah, just a little bit more on that inward part of beauty. You know that exists in the character of God or the nature of God. You mentioned several words. I would add you know compassion, darrow. You know this is the first word that God uses to describe himself to Moses on Mount Sinai the Lord, the Lord, the compassionate, gracious God.

Scott Allen:

For many years as a Christian, I was just struck by Christ on the cross, just hanging there on the cross, dying for the sins of the world, and just deeply moved by that. That picture of God himself, the creator of everything, hanging there on that cross, for me and for you and for all of us, and somebody you know. If you ask me to describe my feelings about it, I would say this is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen, and there's an irony in that, because it's hideous right. I mean to see somebody crucified, you know, executed in that most horrible way, most horrible way on one level is not beautiful, it's repulsive. But what it demonstrates is that inward beauty of God, that he is the kind of person who is willing and has done that for us.

Scott Allen:

And we see this in people too, you know, if human beings lay down their lives for others. We recognize that as something that's—it's beautiful to the point of taking our breath away. There's an awe in it. So and you know Peter talks about this, you know the Apostle Peter when he talks about you know he's talking about kind of let not just your beauty speaking to women here talks about you know he's talking about kind of let not just your beauty speaking to women here would be external, you know, and braided hair and whatnot, but let it be internal, right in this quiet spirit and stuff. So he talks specifically about an internal kind of beauty, a quality of beauty that again, we see both of those in God himself. Those are both really, really important.

Darrow Miller:

Well, it's internal to God, it's his nature, right, but he manifests that in his creativity. So it's external to God. And that he created beauty in the universe, yeah, yeah. And, like I said earlier, I think most people recognize beauty when they see it.

Scott Allen:

Yes, and love it too, and they love it If they're sitting on a beach and watch a sunset.

Darrow Miller:

They're just transfixed by the beauty of that. Watching a baby be born, I mean that's the bloodiness of the cross. Watching a baby be born, I mean that's the bloodiness of the cross. You have a baby being born and that's a bloody experience, but when that baby comes out of the womb you stand in awe and wonder. Here is new life. This is beautiful. This is a miracle.

Scott Allen:

Right, dara, that reminds me of a story. You know this story well, but it really struck me as I was working on this chapter, the story of Whitaker Chambers. And for those of you who don't know, whitaker Chambers was a—I believe I've got his name right here. He was a—back in the—during the time of the Cold War. He was a Russian spy. He was in the United States. He was a communist, hard-bitten communist, atheist, really, you know, hardcore materialist, didn't believe in God at all, you know, hated God, believe in God at all, you know, hated God. And he became a Christian.

Scott Allen:

And in his testimony he talks about how God touched him, not through a rational argument, you know, but through beauty. And he speaks about his daughter's ear. You know, it just struck him at breakfast. He's sitting eating his breakfast, I think it was. His daughter at this time was an infant or a toddler, you know, very young, and sitting in a high chair or something like that, and he was just, you know, hardly paying attention. And then he just looked at her ear and there was this beauty there that he couldn't describe and it didn't make sense in the material paradigm that he had lived with, and it was that that led him to God. I mean, that was the gateway to all the other truth. You know, for him was that experience of yeah, so you brought that to mind. When you talked about an infant, you know, for him was that experience of yeah, so you just bring, you brought that to mind when you talked about an infant, you know Well and what he was.

Darrow Miller:

What happened? He was surprised by joy. Yes, because he saw he had joy as he recognized the beauty that was. His response is wow. I've never seen that before. I was in Columbia, medellin, Colombia. I know you were there a month or two ago, scott, and doing the only time I've done a full week's lecture series to a group of artists on a call for balladeers. It was the lecture before the book was written and I was, I think, the second day into the lecture series and I started talking about beauty and there were about 120, 130 young Christian artists either want to be artists or professional artists and everything in between, from 12 different Spanish speaking countries. And I'm talking about beauty, the way we're talking about beauty right now. And one young woman put her hand up and said Daryl, I don't understand what you're talking about. She said beauty is in the eyes of the beholder.

Luke Allen:

Yeah.

Darrow Miller:

And I said why are you saying that? Well, because it is. This is just reality. You see, one thing that's beautiful and somebody else sees it as ugly. And beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. And we got into a very serious discussion and I had to stop my lecture because this discussion became so serious. Because this discussion became so serious and I recognize that almost all of these young Christian artists, Christians and artists, thought that beauty was in the eyes of the beholder. These were kids who knew Christ. These were kids who went to church, had been taught in church, went to church, had been taught in church, and yet they held an atheistic position that beauty is relative. Now, you mentioned a minute ago we know truth, we know morals. None of us. Well, I shouldn't say that Most Christians would say that there is objective truth, though a lot of more and more Christians are saying no, truth is relative, and people will say morality is relative and thus beauty is relative. This is the mindset of the modern world.

Darrow Miller:

Everything is relative, there is no standard modern world, everything is relative, there is no standard. Well, here are these Christians who would probably say that truth is objective and there's a morality that's objective, but beauty is not.

Darrow Miller:

And we had to stop the conference and I sent everybody outside to personally be by themselves and reflect on the discussion. Is there objective beauty? Is beauty only in the eyes of the beholder? What if God is beautiful? What does that mean? And we, just we stopped the whole conference for three or four hours. Yeah, because I needed to break through with these young people. Hey, what you're thinking is not true.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, darrow, I mean I would have been right there with them. Again just recently in my own Christian life, and I've been a Christian for many years. Again just recently in my own Christian life, and I've been a Christian for many years. I think this is one of the words where the false definition, this entirely relative idea of beauty. It's both relative meaning. There is no objective kind of reality to it. It's completely relative, subjective, and it's also non-essential in a sense. It's ornamental and it's also non-essential in a sense.

Darrow Miller:

It's ornamental.

Scott Allen:

I think probably the vast majority of Christians would be right there with those students in Medellin. Even here in this country, I think this is one of those words that's been so redefined that it's come right into the church and completely shapes the way we as Christians think about it as well, like in a really profound way.

Darrow Miller:

And I thought it was relative until 10 years ago.

Scott Allen:

Yeah right, I'm 80 now.

Darrow Miller:

Right, I was in my late 60s, early 70s, and I still thought beauty was in the eyes of the beholder.

Scott Allen:

No one had challenged me yeah.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, and I started, you know, in writing the chapter. I, you know, I really kind of began thinking about this whole beauty is relative. And I started thinking that, you know, if you're pushed on that you recognize that there are certain things that are beautiful and there are things that are not. Now, I know that we live in a rebellious world and there's certain, you know, kind of very fringe people who will make completely ugly things into art, so to speak. And you know, obviously examples come to people's minds when I say that.

Scott Allen:

But you know, just take, for example, you know, you're walking through the forest, you come upon a stream and it's crystal clear, it's blue, it's just, there's vibrant colors, there's rocks and there's waterfalls, and it takes your breath away. Now you come across another stream and we've all done this that's clogged with pollution, it's got trash everywhere, the water is orange or some kind of weird color and it stinks. And if you push people on that, you know, is beauty relative, you know, is it in the eye of the beholder? They would say no, there's an objectiveness to this, right, there's kind of one is beautiful and one is not, you know, and I think that simple illustration is kind of something that helped me anyways to kind of get on the path to challenging this idea that beauty is entirely subjective. And you know, in the eye of the beholder, no, I think we all recognize, we all know, when we see something that's ugly or hideous, the opposite of beauty.

Scott Allen:

I think too. You know, it becomes confusing, because when we say beauty is objective, it's not one thing, you know. In other words, it's not like you can see something as beautiful, but I, you know, In other words, it doesn't. We still have our tastes, if that makes sense, right?

Luke Allen:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Scott Allen:

Kim and I, my wife you know we have different tastes Something that she thinks is beautiful, I'm like, ah, it's just not my Like. For example, I tend to kind of like modern architecture.

Darrow Miller:

She hates it, you know so.

Luke Allen:

She's right Scott.

Scott Allen:

Anyways. But what I realized about that is that when we say beauty is objective and not entirely subjective, we're not saying it's again one thing. We're saying that there are principles in the Bible of beauty, of what makes something beautiful. How those principles are applied, whether it's in any kind of creative activity music, art, you name it, you know. How those principles apply can vary widely, right, you know, and that's where you can get into taste. Can vary widely, right, you know, and that's where you can get into taste too and go. Well, I prefer this over that. Help me out here, darrell, because I know I'm struggling a little bit, but I'm just trying to.

Darrow Miller:

I want to push back on what you're trying to say.

Scott Allen:

Okay, so I don't know if I'll help you. Ah, okay.

Darrow Miller:

We talk about the culture of the kingdom as being truth, beauty and goodness yes another way I speak of it is trinitarian culture.

Darrow Miller:

you have god, one god, three persons, trinity father, son and holy spirit, and you can talk about them individually, but you can't separate them. And so when I use the phrase Trinitarian culture, it's the same concept. You can talk about truth separately from goodness and separately from beauty, but you can't separate them, because truth is beautiful, right, truth is moral, beauty is good, beauty is true. So these things define one another, just like God is one. And then you have the Trinity, so you can talk about beauty separate from truth, but you can never separate them. And if you really want to understand beauty at its deepest level, you have to understand truth and goodness At its deepest level. You have to understand truth and goodness, yes, and so I think there is an objective standard and part of it, part of that objective standard, just as there is truth and we would say that there's objective truth as opposed to truth being only subjective.

Darrow Miller:

beauty is good. Beauty is true. Now, might you have your own tastes? Yes, but you're talking about tastes there. You're not talking about the biblical concept of beauty.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, yeah. Well, I do think that's where people get confused, because we all have our tastes right, and when you say, well, beauty is objective, then I think some people get confused and they think, well, it's only one thing, it's not modern art, it's something that looks like Gothic cathedrals, and I think there's some confusion there. No, it can be many things. It can look or sound or appear in a variety of different ways, but it's not anything. It's not anything. There are again, the way I understand it, Dara, is there's principles of beauty that come from God and His Word, and how those principles get applied can vary, and that's where, again, it's not one thing. There can be some. You know there's diversity in this here as well.

Scott Allen:

I don't want to dwell too much on this, because there's a lot more to talk about. For me anyways, darrell, that was a helpful thing, because, you know, I think people trip up on the word objective in the sense that you know it's this, not this, and again I think it's more helpful to think of it well. Francis Schaeffer was often helpful in this respect too. It's this finely balanced thing. It's not necessarily this or this.

Luke Allen:

Let me see if I can give an illustration to flesh this out a little bit. Yes, let me see if I can give an illustration to flesh this out a little bit, because when you do hear, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Like you were saying, dad, a lot of times we're just, yeah, disagreeing over taste. Right disagreeing on taste. One of the awesome things about beauty is it is extremely diverse.

Scott Allen:

Yes.

Luke Allen:

Which is beautiful, you know in its various forms, whether it's taste or sound, or you know emotional beauty or whatever. It is Um anyways. But but at its base, beauty does have defining principles. That if something is beautiful, it will be within the parameters of these principles.

Scott Allen:

To that come right to mind Just to add on there. Like that goes back to that stream illustration I used. Right, you know exactly.

Luke Allen:

A different illustration is you were saying modern art.

Luke Allen:

And personally, I'm not a fan of modern art most of it and I see some of it and I like it. But when I'm looking at like the Dada movement of the early 1900s or the splatter movement of painting, splatter art or the splatter movement of painting, splatter art, Two of those principles of what qualifies something to be beautiful are order and excellence. And I was walking through town last week and I saw a huge canvas painting and the entire thing was painted brown and then on top of that there was three black smudges and probably selling for a thousand dollars.

Luke Allen:

And I thought to myself that is not beautiful. Why is it not beautiful? Because it does not require excellence to make and there was no order to it whatsoever. So some people would say that looks beautiful to me and I would say no, that doesn't fall within the broad parameters of beauty. Sure, you can make more impressionistic art that looks more of a modern type, art that requires order and requires excellence.

Luke Allen:

A lot of people in this debate are always like oh, it's the Renaissance art right, the great realists of the Renaissance and the 1700s, those periods, that was true beauty, you know, and nowadays, it's all junk and I'm like no, there's definitely still beautiful art out there, as long as it falls within the parameters of what qualifies something to be beautiful. So some of those principles that I'm talking about here I just stated two of them. What are some other ones that are.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, I agree, I think that's very helpful, Luke. There are objective principles of beauty. You know, I do think order is one, because God is a God of order and not chaos. He brought order out of chaos and so we recognize something as orderly, as beautiful. I often think of, you know, just a bedroom or a house. You know, if a house looks like a hurricane just kind of whipped through it, you know, and everything is completely disheveled and dirty and muddy, and you know, none of us would go, oh, that's a beautiful house, wow, right, I mean, that would just be nonsensical. But if there's an order to it, you know, tastefully decorated, you know, then we recognize the beauty in that. I think back to my stream illustration. I think purity is another one. There's something beautiful about purity the stream was pure, it was not polluted.

Scott Allen:

So there's been a long, rich history of trying to tease out these principles of beauty. You know from, you know, and they are. And the principles are objective, they're not subjective. But again, how they get applied, there's great diversity there and people can have their tastes about what they prefer or not.

Darrow Miller:

So, anyways, go ahead, Darrell, that helped me anyways, Darrell, as I was looking into this. Genesis 1 says In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 2 says and the earth was formless and void and darkness was over the face of the deep. And then, in Genesis 1-3, there was light. When there's darkness, you cannot distinguish anything. It's light that allows us to distinguish things, whether it's different colors or whether something is hideous or something is beautiful. It's the light that allows us to distinguish. So the first thing that happened is light, but the light isn't created at that point. The light at that point is the glory of God, Because the sun and moon and stars are not created until a few days later, and the earth was formless and void.

Darrow Miller:

And what did God do? He took the formlessness and put form to it. Yes, the words we use. There's disorder and order, order, and you mentioned it just a minute ago. It's the order, yes, that gives the order, creates beauty, it brings beauty. Disorder leads to chaos, and so it's a continuum. Rather than this side is beautiful and this side is horrible, there's a continuum and beauty moves towards the continuum of God's glory.

Scott Allen:

Yes.

Darrow Miller:

On one end. What's the word you used a few minutes ago? The wretchedness, the Hideous, hideous. That's moving to chaos, to disorder. You have a movement from life to death. It's life to death, and order relates to life.

Darrow Miller:

And death is what happens when disorder comes to the body, when it begins to break down and eventually you have death and we're all on that spectrum. You're going to have a new baby in a few days and that baby will be at the peak of alive when it's born. I'm on the other end, I'm 80 years old in that baby and I'm on the other end and things are breaking down all the time. So you have light and darkness, you have life and death, you have order and disorder, and beauty is related to order and life.

Darrow Miller:

And if you look at some of the art today, some of the music today, it's all about darkness, it's all about death, it's all about evil. Where is this coming from? It's coming from the pit. But we just look and we say, well, some people appreciate that, I don't, but some people appreciate that. Well, what is it they're appreciating? And why do they love that? Because they're in a culture of darkness, a culture of death. And I think this is where beauty can slap us in the face and wake us up and say, hey, no, beauty is real and there is an objective standard for beauty and that objective standard is true and good and it's life, it's not death.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, yeah, you know. On the false definition of beauty today, darrell, it ties in with when we talked about the word human and how human's been redefined as well from image-bearer of God to, you know, a highly evolved animal, or now, in this postmodern world, we live in an autonomous, willing creature. You know, a kind of a small g god, you know, and when we think of humans in this way, you know, what's important is a personal expression, and so much of that gets caught up in this whole discussion of art in terms of it's just a way of me expressing myself. But here's the problem, you know, as fallen people, when we express ourselves, it often comes out as ugly, hideous. You know, if that's, all it is is personal expression, which is what some people say. It is right, you know, then that's typically what you end up with. I do think, though, that there is an incredible opportunity today to see beauty in terms of a real apologetic, if you will, a way of bringing people to God, especially that, you know, in our postmodern world, people are—they don't really believe—you know the truth, this idea of objective truth or rational arguments. You know, when I was growing up, people were still swayed by a book like Evidence that Demands a Verdict by Josh McDowell. You know, we need to, you know, make a rational argument. Today not so much. And I think today, now, beauty becomes very important because, even though you know there are. You know, as we were just saying, we live at a time when there's a lot of this ugly, postmodern art music there's still.

Scott Allen:

You know, I was just, for example, I was just driving home here in Bend, oregon, where I lived, just a couple of nights ago, and it was right at sunset, and the sunset was stunning. You know, it was one of those sunsets we've all seen them where the sky just lights up, it's just bright, pink, and there's these clouds. And so I'm driving home and I notice, first of all one car, then two cars and then the whole. You know, all the side of both sides of the street are, you know, the cars are stopped and everyone's out of the car. You know, taking pictures of this, right, and it was a reminder to me that we all love beauty, you know, we recognize it. There's a deep longing in us to stop, just stop. Look at that. Look, we want to show it to other people. Look at that, you know, take the picture, share it with everyone? Did you see what I saw tonight? Look at this, and I think this is a you know God.

Scott Allen:

First of all, god made us this way. That's super important. God made us. He didn't.

Scott Allen:

God didn't only communicate to us through his spoken word, he created, he communicated to us through beauty and he made us to understand the language of beauty. You know, we talk about truth and goodness and beauty, dara, of the three aspects of the kingdom. There's three other words that correspond to that. There's logos, which is the Latin word for word, that corresponds to truth. Ethos, which corresponds to goodness you know where we get the word ethics from and pathos, which corresponds to beauty, which has to do with deep feelings and emotions, too deep often to put into words frankly.

Scott Allen:

And God made us that way, and I think you were the one, darrow, in your book, that you illustrated this when God gave the Ten Commandments to Israel at Sinai. You see all three of those elements in terms of the way God communicated. You see, obviously, logos, the words that he wrote on the tablets, you know. So there was that form of communication. There was ethos, in the sense that what he was communicating was the objective standard for what is good. But then there was pathos in the sense that he did it on a mountain with fire and smoke, and you know he didn't need to do that, right, you know, and it created a sense of deep awe and reverence and fear on the part of the Israelites who were there, and how important that is. It's a reminder to me that when we communicate the truth about God or anything, all three of those are so important, and I would make the case that the pathos, the beauty, is probably even more important in our present age. That's the gateway, I would say, to the other two in our postmodern world.

Darrow Miller:

I'm going to tether back to something you said a few minutes ago, Scott. It made me think of a guy that lived in our home years ago at LaBrie. He was a Dutch artist named.

Darrow Miller:

Vindemol. I haven't thought about him for years, but I remember he was in our home. He was married, he and his wife were there and he said do you want to see my portfolio? And I said sure. And he said do you want to see my portfolio? And I said sure, and he opened it up and it was a portfolio filled with death. He had pictures of human heads that had been severed from the body and all the sinews were still there dripping and everything was about death and the death of man.

Darrow Miller:

And Vim became a Christian at LaBrie, in our home, and I don't know, maybe a month later, six weeks later, he said to me, darrow, I'm having to learn to draw all over again, because the culture inside of him had changed, His heart had changed. And he showed me a sketch he had done. There was a simple line on a beach with the sand on one side of the line it wasn't sand. And then back from the line were two larger rocks topped with two smaller rocks, and I said what is this, vim? He says it's two people looking at the ocean and he was starting over again. How do you draw a human being? How do you communicate life rather than death? And that was such a powerful thing for me to hear his testimony of what God was doing in his life, but how that meant a transformation of what he was to do as an artist.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, what comes to my mind as you're sharing that story, darrow, is the passage in Ephesians that says you know you were dead in your trespasses and sins, but God, who is rich in mercy, when you were dead made you alive. So this idea of regeneration that happens through faith in Christ and you move from death to life. And when you're dead, like your friend there, darrow, that's what you draw, that's all you know how to draw.

Darrow Miller:

That's all you know how to draw, because that's your world. That's your world.

Scott Allen:

Yeah.

Darrow Miller:

And that's why I was saying you know, so much of the music today, so much of the art today is coming out of a dark place, a soulless place, people who are in despair, people who are hurting, and they're drawing that. They're painting that, they're doing music that projects that, because that's what's inside of them and we want them to be able to produce things that reflect life, that are beautiful, that have order to them and not chaos. Life and not death, beauty and not hideous. And that's part of coming to Christ, is having that transformation that Vim Damol had and it's changing everything about his personal life, obviously coming to Christ, but it's also changing him as an artist. What message am I going to say now and how am I going to convey this? And he had to learn to start all over again but he started drawing people human people.

Scott Allen:

He started drawing human beings and it's situated in god's creation, appreciating the beauty of it too.

Luke Allen:

So yeah, that's right, I, I just just because this is where my mind is going is uh, we're not exactly saying that you can only portray yeah, we're talking to artists right now portray life light. You know only those things in what your art is. I think our art should portray real life, but the object of what we are glorifying in the art piece should be God, life light. You know, hope, justice. Um, I think for you know, one of the greatest books of the last 100 years was JRR Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. That book is not exactly light and fluffy, but what?

Darrow Miller:

it does is it contrasts. There's all sorts of hideousness and ugliness in it, but it's well done.

Luke Allen:

And it shows real life, right, real life in the contrast. Life is hideous and it's dark, but there's still hope in that and there's still purpose.

Darrow Miller:

and there's dark, but there's still hope in that and there's still purpose and there's still and you can point back to it and there's people fighting the darkness, yeah, fighting the evil, yeah.

Scott Allen:

Well, let's talk about that, because this brings us back to our there are eternal principles rooted in God, you know, for what is beautiful, and those are sourced in God's, in his nature, as we talked about his compassion, his grace, his justice. They're also sourced in his creation. Just through observing, you know what he's made the diversity, the color, the light. You know all that he's made Because it is the most magnificent work of art ever created, the most magnificent work of art ever created. So when we create, you know beauty or art. You know we should seek to learn the principles from his creation, from his art. And then there's a third source, and that is God's written word. You know that itself is a—God's word in the Scripture is a source of—it is beautiful and it's written beautifully and it tells an incredibly beautiful story.

Scott Allen:

And this is what Tolkien was, I think, when he spoke about his writing. This is what he was getting at. He said I'm simply trying to reflect the beauty in God's written Word in his story. So and Daryl, you know more of this than I do, but I think, with the Lord of the Rings in particular, in some ways it's a retelling of the biblical story, or it's certainly bringing out biblical themes and it's his way of expressing the beauty of that in his writing. And, of course, he worked. I love reading that book. I loved reading that book to the kids because it was so. There was such an incredible beauty. Every sentence was so carefully crafted and when you read it it just rolled off your tongue and there was almost a musical quality to it. I mean, it was. The artistry of his writing was I had not read anybody like him that nobody can write as well as he can. In my view, every time I finish that book I don't want to immediately start it again.

Darrow Miller:

And I want to read that book out loud too.

Scott Allen:

I want to actually say the words, which I don't really have that experience with other books, but that one I do. I really want to read it aloud because he, you know, he drew his inspiration. Talk a little bit about that, darrell. He, you know he Tolkien spoke openly about this.

Darrow Miller:

Well, he wrote a small book called Leaf by Niggle, and it's in there that he tells sort of his theology or philosophy of art His creation. Right, yeah, all good art can be tested by whether it brings joy. Does the piece bring joy? And he said, if you are standing in front of a painting and are just in awe of it, what's happened is that the painter has reflected something of the nature of God and something of the nature of creation. In that painting, in the fantasy, does the author of fantasy convey something of God's nature and character and something of reality? Those become the things that surprise us with joy when we see good art or read a good book, and I think tolkien understood that that was his standard and, uh, we can say wow that's amazing and I remember he said something else that you and I've talked about, scott, uh, and he said that he created, coined a word eucatastrophe.

Darrow Miller:

And he said that the Bible is a fairy story. In that sense, it's a story of redemption that everybody longs to be true. Everybody in the world longs for a redemption story that will bring order out of chaos, life out of death, you know, that will redeem me from my sins good triumphs over evil.

Darrow Miller:

Right good triumphs over evil. And he said and in the gospels we find that the fairy story is history it's true, it's a true story. Yeah, it's a true story. And here you have history and fantasy coming together at the cross of Jesus Christ. It's the glorious eucatastrophe. It's the glorious story of redemption. And it is true.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, the thing I love about eucatastrophe that word that he coined is the root of it is catastrophe. Right, we live in a fallen world, a world where there is death and sorrow, there's just catastrophes. There's cancer, there's war, you know. There's corruption, there's violence, you know, you name it. We live in a world of catastrophe. We all experience that. We don't want that to be the final word, and what Tolkien discovered in the scriptures is that it's not. It's not the final word.

Scott Allen:

There is the cross. Jesus hangs on that cross. That's the catastrophe. But then there's the resurrection. That's the eucatastrophe. That's God bringing good out of evil.

Darrow Miller:

Out of evil.

Scott Allen:

And that's what he conveys. And when he conveys that in the Lord of the Rings you can see it like, for example, there's just these parts of that book that are so moving. You know where Sam and Frodo are climbing up Mount Doom and you know they're just about ready to cast. The ring in the world is falling apart around them and frodo can't walk anymore because he's exhausted and he's just. You know, he's had to fight. That that's the catastrophe, right, you know. And then sam, you know, in this very heroic moment, picks him up and carries him. You know, and you just, there's such beauty. It brings tears to your eyes. There's so many things like that in that book that just touch you so deeply. That's what beauty does. Beauty touches you deeply, it speaks to you in a way that nothing else can it speaks to the depth of your soul, right, exactly?

Luke Allen:

which is why, like you were saying, dad, I think beauty it could be the the best ways for Christians to be a witness to our postmodern world today. You know we were talking about that interview we've talked about a couple times on the podcast. We have a couple things we talk about probably way too much on the podcast. One of those is Lord of the Rings.

Scott Allen:

I apologize for that One of those is Lord of the Rings. So sorry, but it works so well. Although I apologize for that One of those is Lord of the Rings. So sorry, but it works so well. Although repetition sometimes can be helpful, at least it is for me.

Luke Allen:

I'm guessing most of our audience also loves Lord of the Rings, so we're good. No, we've talked about this a couple times. This was Richard Dawkins a few months ago, saying that he thinks he's a cultural Christian and one of the reasons that he gave for why I am a cultural Christian is because he loves Christmas carols. And I think, like most people, we all love Christmas carols and even in our postmodern, you know, post-christian world, most people will be able to sing the words of Silent Night or Joy to the World or Way in the Manger. Because we love these songs, because they speak to us in a deep way, and people don't even like to use the word Christmas anymore, but they still like to sing the Christmas carols, even Richard Dawkins, it's a good illustration, luke Richard Dawkins, because you're not going to argue him into the faith through logos.

Scott Allen:

let's say People have tried right. Let's have a debate, let's argue. But here he is softening himself when it comes to beauty.

Darrow Miller:

In the sense of the music, the architecture.

Scott Allen:

He recognizes the beauty in England that was shaped by Christians who were living out their faith by creating beautiful things Oxford University, or these beautiful gardens, or whatever it might be. This music, that's what he doesn't want to lose.

Darrow Miller:

This music, that's what he doesn't want to lose. Generally, catholics, roman Catholics, have a theology of beauty where Protestants don't. And it was a Catholic bishop, bishop Barron, who I learned this from. He said beauty is the gateway to truth and goodness, that little phrase. And he said that most people don't like being confronted with the truth or they don't like people who are telling them they're wrong. Most people don't like telling people you're a sinner. Most people don't like telling people you're a sinner. So if you start with morality, you start with truth. You very often turn off people, but if beauty you start with beauty, that becomes the gateway to the other two parts of the culture of the Trinity.

Scott Allen:

Yeah, darrell, I'm going to actually point our listeners to that YouTube because I want to encourage everyone to just take a second and go watch that. It's called Bishop Barron on Evangelizing Through Beauty. It's eight minutes long. Just Google that Bishop Barron on Evangelizing Through Beauty. I think it's one of the most profound, little you know statements on this I've ever heard and I completely agree with him. So I would encourage everyone to take a second and go listen to that.

Luke Allen:

Yeah, and I'll link that in the show notes and just so we give credit where credit's due. That quote of beauty is the gateway to goodness and truth.

Luke Allen:

That was initially said by Elizabeth Lev when she said in the platonic triad of the transcendence, beauty is the gateway to goodness and truth. That was initially said by Elizabeth Lev, when she said in the platonic triad of the transcendence, beauty is the gateway to goodness and truth. And that's so true. I think that's especially true nowadays. So, just as we're wrapping up here, as always, how can Christians recover this true definition of beauty and live it out in our lives? How can we push back a little bit on this lie that beauty is only in the eye of the beholder? How can we do that?

Scott Allen:

I think. Several thoughts, luke and Daryl. I'd love to hear yours as well on this. But first of all, I think you know we have to really elevate the way we understand beauty. We have to understand it as every bit as important as truth and goodness. We understand beauty, we have to understand it as every bit as important as truth and goodness and, you know, for our Christian faith it's important to us, it's important to our witness, it's important to our lives, and so you have to think very seriously about beauty.

Scott Allen:

I think a second thing is that we often kind of shoehorn beauty, you know, or we say beauty is for Two horn beauty, you know, or we say beauty is for artists. I would say no, it's for everybody. We are all made to enjoy and to create beauty, and you may not ever be a great artist, that's fine, you don't have to be a great artist. But you can create beauty in very small ways, very simple ways. But you need to be very thoughtful about that. How can I bring beauty out of my life in terms of the way that I look or dress or act? So let's not just say, hey, this is for artists. Now there are people who do have skills and gifts and, darrell, you are really writing your book to these people. As artists, they need to be elevated. Too often in the church especially, we've kind of said your gifts aren't as important as pastors or whatever it is. That needs to be, you know, repented of and changed as well. Those are just three quick thoughts. Daryl, what are your thoughts on how we can begin to?

Darrow Miller:

change. I would agree with those and also add can we be people that create beauty in some small way?

Scott Allen:

Yes.

Darrow Miller:

Can we bring beauty into our office?

Scott Allen:

Yeah.

Darrow Miller:

Can we create beauty in our home? I think of the Dutch and putting flowers in their window, their windows. That's beautiful. And I remember down in Brazil, some people that we were associated with down there were starting a school after-school program for kids and they built a building out of concrete blocks and a concrete wall around it and it was just so drab and gray and they heard some of this material that we're talking about on beauty and they said we need to make this a beautiful place and they gave the kids paints and they put the kids to work to create art on this, these gray walls, to bring color and vibrancy into this schoolyard, yeah, and such a simple thing yeah

Scott Allen:

not taking a lot of money, but an idea of doing something beautiful, yeah and I do think there's a place to take it much more seriously than that. It starts very simple like that, Darrell, and I think that's really important for all of us. But oh, I was just listening to a pastor recently in a church that's growing very rapidly and they need to build a new building, and he was reflecting the kind of utilitarian kind of thought that you hear very often. You know, we just need a bigger box, A bigger box, A bigger box.

Scott Allen:

And I was contrasting that with the cathedrals of ancient Europe. They took a long time. I mean people that started those.

Darrow Miller:

They never finished them in their lifetimes no.

Scott Allen:

Because they took beauty that seriously.

Darrow Miller:

And they wanted to glorify God. They wanted to glorify God, they wanted to glorify God.

Scott Allen:

And those cathedrals are some of the greatest evangelists, you know, or box music, or whatever it is. I mean that stuff wasn't done quickly and easily. There wasn't a utilitarian thing to it. It took time, lots of time, but it was worth the investment. So I just want to challenge people to kind of question the utilitarian kind of impulse that we have, I think, and just go, you know, maybe it's worth the investment of time and money to create something that's really beautiful, that's going to last beyond, just you know, this throwaway generation that we have right now but that's going to last for a few generations here.

Darrow Miller:

And have a discussion yeah, have a discussion about that. Do you have a theology of utility, of pragmatism, right, or do you have a theology of beauty? What's the difference and what do those different theologies lead to?

Scott Allen:

Right, right, luke. What are your thoughts on this, because I know you've thought a lot about this too.

Luke Allen:

I'm just wrapping up a book that's been really convicting for me, challenging, helpful. We've talked about it before on the show. It's by Rosira Butterfield, called the Gospel Comes with a House Key, and in that book she describes what does she call it? The radically ordinary hospitality. It's radical because it catches people's attention. It's ordinary because we can all do it and hospitality is one of the easiest ways that all of us can share beauty with the world, with people. Um, who said that? I think it was hans von. Hans von, uh, what's his last name?

Luke Allen:

belts are said beauty seizes you and then it calls you and then it sends you. It seizes you, right? I think we all know of times when someone's just, you know, demonstrated simple hospitality buys us the coffee, you know, or sits down and talks with us and doesn't care about time, or makes us homemade bread, or, you know, has us over for a meal, and, uh, that that's, that's a very simple demonstration of beauty that I think can soften, you know, can can overcome a lot of uh, catch people, it catches people off guard right.

Luke Allen:

And seizes them, and especially in a world where of culture wars and of division of you know, you know this truth war is of, uh, just a world of culture wars and of division of you know this truth, wars of just a lot of. It seems kind of tribalistic right now.

Luke Allen:

You know, your team, my team. I think hospitality is probably the best way to preach the gospel, at least to introduce the gospel to people. So I want to get, I want to do a lot better at that myself and do it in a humble way. You know, a friend of ours, anna Santos, said beauty without goodness is just vanity. So we're not putting on a show here, but just just simple hospitality. That's really good, luke, yeah, yeah. So those are some simple takeaways that we can all start applying in our daily lives to bring beauty into our lives. Because, like we've said many times during this podcast, we can all start applying in our daily lives to bring beauty into our lives. Because, like we've said many times during this podcast, we can all create beauty. We are all called to share beauty with God's world. Yeah, guys, as I mentioned at the beginning, the book is out. Again, the title of the book that we're talking about here. This was the chapter on beauty. There's 10 chapters, a chapter for each word. The title of the book is 10 words to heal our broken world, restoring the true meanings of our most important words. Again the book, the website is called 10 words bookorg. Uh, on that website you can find places to go and buy the book and uh, read endorsements.

Luke Allen:

Find the video series for this book. We have a short, 10-minute video on the word beauty and how to define that properly. I think it's a great video. I've linked that in the show notes below. If you were inspired by today's discussion and you want to share a more concise version of it, I would suggest sharing that video. It's out on YouTube, again linked in the show notes. That's a great way to share this concept with a friend and invite them to start thinking about the importance of words. All of the videos for this book there's 10 of them, one on each chapter. Those are on YouTube. Those are a great way to share this book with people. The trailer is also out as well. Yeah, so the book just came out. Guys, if you have not got a copy yet, I hope that you're able to go and find it and hopefully share it with some friends. Dad does any final thoughts for today's episode. Do you have any final thoughts?

Scott Allen:

No, just appreciate you guys giving consideration to the book and the Bible study as well, which I'm putting the final touches on right now. So if you like the book, if you read it, really would appreciate a review on Amazon. That helps so much.

Luke Allen:

Yeah, a simple Amazon review really does help us get this book in front of more people. To do that, all you have to do is hop on Amazon If you have an account, find the little five stars, click on those, give it as many stars as you feel like it deserves and, uh, leave us a review as simple as great book, or uh, you can write more than that. Uh, yeah, those really help us get this out to more people here at the launch. Um, again, guys, thank you for listening to today's episode. Um, if you have not been able to listen to the other episodes in this mini series, uh, we've recorded eight of those so far. We have one more coming out soon on the chapter on love, so we hope you guys can take some time to listen to those. If you've listened to the whole series so far. Thank you so much for joining us. We really appreciate your time and attention and uh, yeah, we'll catch you next week here on. Ideas have consequences for another episode. Thanks again for listening.

People on this episode

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Scott Allen

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Darrow Miller

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Dwight Vogt

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Shawn Carson

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Tim Williams

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Luke Allen

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