Overflowing Vessels
A Tribute to Rudy Medlock
By Winfield Bevins
Every now and then, the Lord puts special people in our lives to help us navigate particularly challenging times and seasons. A few years ago, God gave me Rudy Medlock just as we were starting Creo Arts.
Rudy was a retired art professor, and in many ways, he became a mentor, friend, and spiritual father. He was like Gandolf to me and so many throughout the years, including those in the Creo Arts community. Rudy went to be with the Lord on March 30th and I would like to offer the following tribute to his life and legacy.
The first thing you would notice about Rudy was his contagious smile and laughter. Even in his 80s, he had the joy and gentleness of a child. Rudy was a retired art professor at Asbury University where he began teaching in 1971, and following 37 years of teaching and developing the art department, he retired professor emeritus. He taught all art classes, but specialized primarily in ceramics, sculpture, 3-D design, and stained glass, as well as taught hundreds of directed studies, and served as department chair throughout most of his time at Asbury. In the late 70s, he co-founded what is now CIVA (Christians in the Visual Arts) along with colleagues Ed Knippers and Eugene Johnson.
The Potter’s Inn
In his retirement he welcomed people to The Potters Inn B&B in Wilmore, Kentucky and continued to create art in his art studio located a mile outside of Wilmore, Kentucky, near Asbury University and Asbury Theological Seminary, and a few miles north of Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill.
Rudy’s art studio is the most amazing art studio I have ever seen. It is more than a studio; it is an experience. It’s like stepping into another world, like Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory but for artists. It’s a place where anything goes as long as it involves creativity and art. Imagine an old log house that is full of hundreds of pieces of pottery, stained glass, and paintings that Rudy has collected from his former students, plus random art that he found on Saturdays while hitting yard sales and flea markets.
When I visited Rudy, he was usually sitting at his potter’s wheel making pottery. On a recent visit, I asked him what lessons he has learned from being a potter. He said, “There is something about the physicality of taking clay and making it into a vessel to be used as an object for God’s glory. The greatest lesson I have learned from being a potter is that we are not just the clay, but we become his vessel that he pours himself through into the lives of others.” In essence, when we let God shape and mold our lives like a piece of clay, we become a work of art that reflects His glory.
So often we think of salvation in terms of what God has done for us; we sometimes forget what he is wanting to do in us: make us a work of art, something beautiful for all the world to behold. I believe with all my heart and soul that God wants to make our lives works of art so that we can become something beautiful for him, something that lets all the world see the beauty of God’s handiwork. As Rudy would say, “We become his overflowing vessels that he can pour out his glory for all to see.”
We Are Co-Creators
Rudy always reminded me that we are co-creators with God, who is the Great Artist and Creator of all things. In fact, he reminded me of this almost every time I visited with him. God, the author and artist of all living things, has created us in his image and has given us the desire to create and procreate. Because of this, art and creativity are essential to what it means to be a human being created in the image of God. In so many ways, art is a way to reconnect with the Creator of the universe as we attempt to emulate (on a minute scale) his practice of creation.
To be created in God’s image means that we were created to be creative and to make things. If we believe that men and women were created in the image of God, then creativity and artwork should be connected to this reality. After all, God is the Great Artist. Being created in the image of God means that we are called to join in God’s creative work as co-creators.
Author and poet Madeleine L’Engle wrote, “God is constantly creating, in us, through us, with us, and to co-create with God is our human calling.” Creativity is God’s gift to us and to the world, and what we create is our gift back to God and to the world.
So whether we are professional artists or not, we are all called to make our lives works of art and to bring beauty into our homes, into our work, and into the world.
For now, let us all go down to the Potter’s house so he can shape our lives into a work of art. You can watch a short film we made of Rudy working in his studio and talking about his faith called “Co-Creating with God” here. I want to close with a prayer that Rudy places in all of his chalices when he is finished making them:
Prayer of the Chalice
Father, to Thee I raise my whole being, a vessel emptied of self.
Accept Lord, this my emptiness, and so fill me with Thyself,
Thy Light, Thy Love, Thy Life, that these precious gifts
may radiate through me and over-flow the chalice of my heart
into the hearts of all with whom I come in contact this day,
revealing unto them the beauty of Thy Joy and Wholeness
and the Serenity of Thy Peace which nothing can destroy.
Amen.
Winfield Bevins is the founding director of Creo Arts and artist-in-residence at Asbury Theological Seminary. He is the author of several books, including Liturgical Mission, Ever Ancient Ever New, and his forthcoming book “Beauty Will Save the World: A Renewed Vision for Christianity and the Arts.”