Excerpt of Recent eCorn Article: Mosaic

Our upcoming Spring Mosaic is happening on Saturday evening, May 12, so we thought we would spend a moment speaking with Manuel Luz, our Creative Arts Pastor about Mosaic, the arts, and life.

What is Mosaic?

Mosaic is an opportunity for the church and community to experience different expressions of the arts, from dance and drama to music and visual arts.  It is also an opportunity for the often hidden but talented artists in our midst to express themselves as well.

Why “Mosaic”?  (hands wave in air feigning quotation marks gesture)

I really like the title, “Mosaic,” because it implies a lot of things.  Artistically, it is an evening when we allow diverse artistic elements to come together, things that you wouldn’t ordinarily see in a weekend service.  Also, Mosaic implies who we are as a church, made of of many diverse individuals who come together to form a picture of the Bride of Christ.

Why is it important to do things like this?

Oak Hills is kind of unusual in a lot of ways, and one of them is in our expression of the arts.   We have an art gallery, a school of the arts, an annual arts camp, a Schlopp House Café, an affiliation with Imprint Theater Company, a creative writing group, and we’ve hosted the Sacramento Philharmonic and the Folsom Lake Symphony.  And of course, music, drama, and other creative elements are often used in our weekend services.

I think it springs from who we are and what we believe in.  We believe that God is an Ever-Creative Being, who made the stars and galaxies, the mountains and seas, the daffodils and the sunset.  He is an Artist God, the Maker of all things, and “through Him all things were created.”  When He made us in His image, He gave us the ability to create and express ourselves artistically, just as He does.  So we are God’s art, but also God’s artists.

But even more amazing is this: He designed into us a built-in aesthetic, something deep inside our souls that makes us wonder at the sight of a starry night, and breathe deeply at the beauty of the rose, and be awed by the sight of the mountains and the seas.  We all share these things universally, through time and culture, because God made us that way.

At Oak Hills, we believe that we honor God when we allow our artists an opportunity to share their art—to the church and to the world—to express themselves in a way that expresses the human condition and our place in this God-bathed world.

What’s in store for this upcoming Mosaic?  Any surprises you can tell us about?

At this point, I can tell you that we will present a variety of musical styles, featuring our Adult Choir and Off-Beat, our drum circle.  We have an open “All Call” with our Art Gallery so all you visual artists out there can submit their work to be displayed.  And I’m pretty excited that Kelly Archer will be directing a short one act play within Mosaic honoring our mothers (just in time for Mother’s Day!).  And of course, we’ll have hors d’oeuvres and beverages hosted by the Schlopp House Café and served by your favorite Oak Hills staff people at a gallery reception right before the program.

Sounds great.  Any last words?

Yeah.  There’s one other implication with the word “Mosaic” that I thought about the other day.  We had a time in a recent service when everyone was encouraged to write the names of people who are outside the family of God on Post-It notes and stick them to the windows of our auditorium.  It was quite a sight, seeing the hundreds of names on the windows.  In a sense, it was a Mosaic of people whom God dearly loves but are not yet His disciples.

I really believe that the arts has the power to speak to people in ways that the Holy Spirit can really use.  And I want to encourage everyone to invite their friends, neighbors, co-workers, and family to attend this event.  Because I believe that—even though won’t be sharing a sermon or that kind of thing—God is going to show up that night, and He will touch people with what we do.

The Spring Mosaic will happen on Saturday evening, May 12, beginning with a Gallery Reception at 6:30 PM followed by a Program in the auditorium at 7:00 PM.  Admission is free.  Note that this is in lieu of our normal Saturday night Service.