The first person filled with the Spirit was an artist

By Reuben Oliver, photographer in Dallas

Here is a quick quiz. Who was the first person in the Bible to be filled with the Spirit of God?

Most people guess Moses. Or a prophet like Elijah. Or maybe a priest, standing in the temple in long robes.

The answer is a man called Bezalel. And he was an artist.

You have probably never heard of him. I hadn't either, for years. But once I found him, I could not stop thinking about him. This little series starts with him, because he changes the way we think about making things.

Who was Bezalel?

In the book of Exodus, God's people have just escaped from Egypt. They are camping in the desert. God tells Moses to build a tabernacle, a beautiful tent where God will live among His people.

It is not a plain tent. God asks for gold and silver and bronze. He asks for carved wood, cut stones and cloth woven in blue, purple and scarlet. He wants it to be stunning.

So who will build it? In Exodus 31, God says He has chosen Bezalel. Then He says something amazing. He has filled Bezalel with His Spirit, with skill and with know how, so he can make beautiful designs in metal, stone and wood.

Read that again. The Spirit of God came on a man so that he could make art.

Not so he could preach. Not so he could fight a battle. So he could design, carve and build something beautiful.

God started with art

This should not surprise us. Look at how the Bible opens.

The very first thing we learn about God is that He makes things. "In the beginning God created." Before we hear about His laws, His anger or His plans, we see Him making light, sea, stars, animals and people. And then He steps back, looks at it all and calls it good.

Then God makes people "in His image." That means we are a bit like Him. And the first thing we know about Him is that He creates.

So when a child draws on a wall, when a grandmother sews a quilt, when a chef plates up a meal with care, they are doing something deeply human. They are copying their Father.

Why this matters

For a long time, many Christians have treated art as a nice extra. Fine for a hobby. Not really "God's work."

Real ministry, people said, was preaching, missions and leading worship. Painting, filmmaking, music that was not for Sunday, and photography? That was just a job. Or worse, it was risky. Too close to "the world."

But Bezalel tells a different story. God did not just put up with artists. He chose one, by name. He filled him with His own Spirit. He trusted him with the most holy building on earth.

If God called art holy work in the desert, I don't think He has changed His mind.

What this means for me

I picked up my first camera when I was twelve, back home in Bristol. I did not know then that it had anything to do with God. I just loved light. I loved the way a window could make a plain face look like a painting.

Years later, I found Bezalel. And it made sense of everything.

When I stand in a field at golden hour, waiting for the light to drop just right on a couple, I am not taking a break from my faith. I am living it. I am noticing what God made, and trying to show it well.

That is why I care so much about getting it right. Not because I am fussy, but because I believe beauty matters to God. He covered a tent in the desert with gold and blue and scarlet. He could have used goat skins and called it done. He didn't.

Coming up in this series

This is the first of six posts I am calling Made to Make. Over the next few weeks I want to ask some big questions:

• Why did the Church step back from the arts, and what did it cost us?
• Is new technology, even AI, something to fear or something to use?
• What did J.R.R. Tolkien understand about making things that most of us miss?
• Why does marriage exist at all?
• And why do photographs matter so much to the people of God?

If you are a Christian who makes things, I hope these posts stir you up. And if you are a Christian couple looking for someone to photograph your story, I hope you will see that I don't just know my camera. I know why I hold it.

Next week: How the Church lost the arts.