Article Written by Bekah Perring from Christ Church Balham.
On Saturday 23 March 2024, Christ Church Balham hosted their first ever ‘Easter Exhibition’ in our local scout hall. This was borne out of two desires. First, to invite non-Christian friends to something at Easter that had a similar feel to Christmas carol services. Second, to have the opportunity to express our creativity or artistic skills – which isn’t often possible in our culture, unless you do so professionally, and feels especially rare in our churches.
We began, over Lent, by inviting our congregation to ‘respond creatively to an aspect of Easter’. Being creative is a very personal and vulnerable matter, and at the start it felt hard to encourage people to create something – especially when they couldn’t necessarily imagine what the event would be like or what ‘standard’ of work would be produced. We therefore emphasised that we are all creative as we are all made in the image of a creative God. While not everyone draws well or plays an instrument, this was a chance for the church family to explore personally different ways of being creative. It was also an opportunity for those who express their creativity more frequently to showcase that work. Our overall vision was to make passages of Scripture come alive as people really dwelt on what Jesus accomplished for them on the cross and then communicated an aspect of the Easter story in new words or movement or image.
As we don’t have a church building, there were a few extra hurdles to jump in organising an event. We had to work out not only what venues were available but also which would feel right for the event and be a good location for guests. Our local scout hall, which is where our midweek toddler group meets, wasn’t our top choice. We worried about it looking drab, and having tables and chairs piled up in the corners. However, adding some uplighters, fairy lights and the soft sound of mood music turned it into a fairly professional-looking event! We also managed to borrow different items for the event from nearby Co-Mission churches, friends and family. That in itself showed us a little of the joys of being part of a wider church family.
We used snippets of people’s work to advertise the event, sharing these images on social media and putting up some posters. Ideally we would have done this earlier to create more of a buzz in the community, but the church family invited many colleagues, friends and neighbours. While organising a new event also felt like a massive step into the unknown, it was a comfort remembering that who came and how it went was God’s responsibility.
On the day, a team gathered to set up the room, then people came to display their work. We ended up with an incredible and vast collection! On display were poems, paintings, a tapestry, some needle-felted Easter scenes, a woven crown of thorns and an interactive ‘draw the Last Supper’. Others had produced videos and animations that were playing on a screen, with headphones available for people to sit down and watch. In the second half of the evening we had some performances: spoken word, a saxophone solo, an original song and a dance piece. Children had produced work too, such as an Easter garden and some paintings. We purposely did not have a talk as we wanted people to experience the Easter story through the various art pieces, knowing that art has the power to stir our hearts.
It was such a joy to see people walking round and engaging in work that was created to showcase Jesus. The room was filled with Christians and non-Christians joined together in discussing Jesus’ life, death and resurrection, and what this all meant. Uniquely, such conversations felt normal. Amid the busyness of London life, here was space to really meditate on and be moved by the life of Jesus. We therefore would love to make this a yearly event to share the Gospel in our community. Culturally Easter often feels very flat compared to Christmas, but our exhibition proved to be a creative celebration of this pivotal event!