When Design Intent + Biblical Principles Align

I sit at my kitchen table, eating my cereal, drinking my coffee, watching my cat get worked up and start purring as she stares intently out the window at the occasional leaf blow by.  Even while I'm in my fourth month of seeking employment since graduating, I am in a position of blessing and comfort.  

And do you know what comfort does not produce?  Innovation.  We learn this in school, and it is occasionally reinstated, that need drives innovation.  After a nice lunch with a former professor, I realized that, as a middle-class suburban American, I don't see very much need around me - that is why I have had to consciously seek it out.  If you've read my blog, you know - mineral conflict, food and nutrition consciousness, social justice, and spiritual growth - and there are numerous other causes seeking those to support them pragmatically by action and through awareness and conscientious decisions.

As statistics and apologists would readily tell you, a life seeking solely comfort breeds complacency.  Instead of the blessings our predecessors have worked for of providing religious freedom, public order, infrastructure, and the pursuit of higher aspirations, too many sunken into a comfortable corner of the world laid out for them and forgotten the need to seek and thank a power greater than themselves.  Instead of using what our predecessors, our ancestors created to build upon for those needing our help, we get stuck in our own little world.

I wouldn't blame an individual for this.  As I mentioned, we need to literally go looking for trouble - find a cause worth fighting for.  Isn't it so impressive, admirable, and 'sacrificial' when we hear of the individual shamelessly defending others' rights, constantly using their time, energy, resources, and any opportunity they have to help Victim A, Marginalized group B, or Cause C?

But for most of us, while we are aware of plenty of exploitation and injustices, it is always an arm's length away.  How do we solve this?

Honestly?  I don't really know yet.  Not for myself at least.  There is a modern praise song for Christians that says 

"Give me one pure and holy passion, give me one magnificent obsession, give me one glorious ambition for my life, to know and follow hard after you." -Passion

So this is step one for us, as believers in Christ, to seek the Lord first and foremost.  My hope is that, with this as goal #1, we won't succeed at something that doesn't matter.

I firmly believe that we must see need, if not experience it in some way ourselves, in order to be motivated and our hearts ripe for service to others.  In the city it is easy to visibly see those in need, but I am simply a big believer in "getting your hands dirty" - volunteering, going to an activist meeting, asking others about their experiences, in order to appeal to our own ethos and engraining others' ever-present and overwhelming needs (that we can help alleviate) in our minds and hearts, as individual narratives.

This whole post is actually a big lead-up to introducing the training I attended this past weekend through the Public Interest Design Institute, led by designer Bryan Bell.  Besides my work with EMI, this institute and its SEED network, certification, and goals are the closest I have come thus far in my career as a designer to the union of goals and objectives of the Christian faith and a design organization.  It's wonderful because the group does not seek to create straight-forward, getting the job done-type work, but individual, beautiful creations to enrich the culture, lives, and quality of life for whom the project is designed.  

This means the designer is getting their hands dirty - most often from the case studies presented, the designer (architect, industrial designer, or otherwise) seeks out a problem, a people group, etc. and develops a unique solution that enhances the life of those people rather than forcing them into a new norm.  This is so important because it is meeting a people group where they are, and asserting that even the "other 90%," those who are not the usual clients of design work, still deserve beautiful and appropriate environments.

I wrote more extensively about this in my design blog, Fostering Presence, in three parts, if you wish to know more about the training and network.  

Do you have other ways of practically living out the call to help the poor, needy, and oppressed?

“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ Matthew 25:40

Below, an acoustic version of "Pure and Holy Passion."  This is not me, it is Ally Wright and she does a beautiful cover.  I also appreciate the headband action ;)