Redemption-Theme of Artery 2006

Redemption is often considered in the same terms as reconciliation. From the depths of pain and strife, separation and estrangement, we find a way to connect, and in connecting, find a way toward newness of life.

While those of us who are Christians believe that redemption is found at the cross through a reconciled life in Christ, there is room here for more than one worldview. For those of differing beliefs and backgrounds, redemption can take on new forms and meanings. It is the saving or improving of that which lies in disrepair or irreversible decline-a neighborhood gentrified beyond recognition, a government bent on a willful path of war, an often ignored hand that reach out for just a little bit more that the world might be willing to give.

It is in the vision of the individual artists that we begin to see for the first time that redemption is not merely symbolic. It is, no matter the medium or the ideal behind it, a true heart change-a willingness to suspend the self and reach out from within to replace the brokenness of the self and society through the wholeness of redeemed life.

Kristen Ball