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"THE OH OF ART!"--MO        January 15, 1975        No.325A--DFO

Copyrighted January, 1975 by The Children of God
P. O. Box 31, London WC2E 7LX, England or GPO Box 3141, San Juan, Puerto Rico 00936

Dear Artists: Greetings in Jesus' Precious Name!

       1. YOUR RECENT ARTWORK IS BEAUTIFUL as usual, and certainly makes our Letters more interesting to children and grown-ups alike, I'm glad you've put lots of contrast on the covers to make them stand out for street sales.

       2. NORMALLY, FOR THE BLACK AND WHITE SKETCHES I LIKE SHADING AND CONTRAST TO MAKE THEM STAND OUT, but I'm sure in this case you were trying to leave that up to the children who will colour them. I suppose it's wise to leave them as they are unless you think they can be improved a little along this line for more definition, so they won't be quite so pale or look a little washed out before being coloured. I have been just a little concerned about this, not just with these sketches but with all of our artists' sketches in black and white.

       3. ALTHOUGH SIMPLE LINE DRAWINGS ARE SUFFICIENT TO GET THE IDEA, PERHAPS WE COULD USE A LITTLE MORE GRAY SHADING for certain areas in order to give a little more variety in a sort of three-colour effect, black, white and various shades of gray in between, like a TV picture or a black and white movie. What do you think?--Or is this too much extra trouble? I don't want to put too great a burden on you with so much work to do and yet to be done in adding needed illustrations to the older Letters, and new children's illustrations for more colour books of the Children's Letters, as well as other material.

       4. WE'VE ALL BEEN SO BUSY WITH REORGANISATION, MOVES, INCREASED ADMINISTRATIONAL DUTIES, etc., I have not had enough time to work on the abundance of Letters we still have on hand, which are yet to become new Letters. And, from the looks of things right now, I'll probably die before I ever finish everything and leave you folks with enough to finish up to keep you busy for quite awhile.

       5. SO COULD YOU GO OVER SOME OF THE CHILDREN'S LETTERS WHICH WOULD MAKE GOOD COLOURING BOOKS and get inspired to give them a few more pictures to colour for our new precious primary prophets?--What do you think? Please do as you feel led of the Lord and with counsel from those there with you! Thanks and God bless you!

       6. IF YOU'D DO THIS, IT MIGHT EVEN INSPIRE YOUR LAZY OL' LION TO GO TO WORK on some of these older Letters and get'em out while he's still alive! Your pictures really do inspire me! They're so in the Spirit and so Spirit-led of the Lord that I know they're inspiring millions of others also, thank the Lord! Even if my text is lousy, your pictures are gonna make our coming books the most beautifully illustrated in the world!

       7. IF YOU WANNA GET A LITTLE THRILL AND VISION OF FUTURE POSSIBILITIES, and if you don't believe ours can be the best, just take a look at some of our kids' bound editions. We were thumbing through several system paperbacks last night comparing type sizes and faces, and were amazed at how many words can be written with so few illustrations and most of them don't have even one!

       8. IT'S REALLY THE ILLUSTRATIONS THAT BRING A BOOK TO LIFE and give life to the dead pages and fascinate us like children, arousing our curiosity to want to know more and inspiring our lazy spirits to read the text to find out more of what it's all about and to understand the pictures better.

       9. SO I'M CONVINCED YOUR PRICELESS ILLUSTRATIONS ARE GOING TO BE USED AS MUCH AS MY WORDS to tell the story and no doubt interest more people to obtain our literature and to read the text just to find out what those pictures are all about! I am convinced people will be attracted more to read a well-illustrated text, and will never forget the pictures even if they forget the words. It's a known fact that we remember about 80% of what we see, but only about 40% of what we hear, and God only knows how little we remember of what we hear read! So may God really inspire you to portray the message by pen, more and more.

       10. I AM REALLY DEPENDING ON YOU ARTISTS, and I believe that perhaps the whole future of our ministry and its effectiveness and outreach will depend on a large part on how well you illustrate the message, perhaps even after people have forgotten how to read! Reading is fast becoming a lost art, as I well know from years of teaching high-schoolers who had not learned to read yet and perhaps never shall, and which is the average mentality and literacy of most of the world!

       11. WHO KNOWS?--MAYBE SOME DAY THE WORLD WILL ONLY HAVE YOUR PICTURES TO GO BY! They may even ban the text or throw it away, but they'll always want to keep those beautiful pictures and they will always bear the message long after you and I are gone!

       12. I BELIEVE EVERYONE KNOWS THAT IT WAS THOSE NUMEROUS CLASSIC ILLUSTRATIONS WHICH FIRST MADE LEWIS CAROL'S TALES POPULAR. Those originals sketched by an artist whose name is still unknown to most of us or perhaps even forgotten, but whose work still lives on in those classics which we can never forget! This is also true of other famous well illustrated classics and originals such as the various famous fairy tale books of Hans Christian Anderson, Grimms, Mother Goose, Don Quixote, etc.

       13. MOST OF US STILL CARRY IN OUR MEMORIES THOSE VIVID ILLUSTRATIONS VIEWED AS A CHILD which first brought those thrilling stories to life for us on Mother or Father's knee, or even flat on the floor before we could ever read the text! Many of our original conceptions of the Bible stories still live vividly in our memories as portrayed by the Sunday School picture calendars or the old illustrated Bibles with the artists' classics.

       14. LIKE THE OLD MIRACLE PLAYS OF THE MIDDLE AGES performed by travelling troupes portrayed for the first time the stories of God's Word to the time the stories of God's Word to the ignorant and illiterate savages of an early barbarian world, so the first old church paintings, windows, wood cuttings and engravings served to bring to life in vivid vision the stories of the words which might otherwise have been forgotten.

       15. IN FACT, THE ONLY RECORD WE HAVE OF SOME ANCIENT PERISHED CIVILISATIONS IS THEIR PICTORIAL HISTORY on some of their carved monuments. Many a masterpiece of art has lived on long after its originator and his culture were gone. Many of the art works of even the ancient masterpieces of literature have long out-lived their original texts and still live on in the memories of man while their authors are long forgotten.

       16. SO YOU ARTISTS ARE CARVING A HISTORY OF THE REVOLUTION, whose author may some day be forgotten along with you, but whose ideas will live on until Eternity in the messages you have made by hand, praise God? Thank You Lord! So may God help you to be impressed with the importance of you task and help you to speed the production of these priceless illustrations from your precious pens! I trust the Lord will truly inspire you in your labours with that same supernatural power with which He inspires me in the visions and the words that He gives.

       17. STRANGELY ENOUGH AND YET APPROPRIATELY ENOUGH, IT IS THE VISIONS OR PICTURES THAT GOD GIVES ME THAT I REMEMBER THE MOST CLEARLY and which are still vivid in my mind to this day. I seldom can remember even a word that was said of the text or the prophecy, even the morning after, and if it were not for our dear little Maria, our faithful little scribe, the words would have been lost long ago and never have been heard at all! So you see how important it is that God gives me the pictures. Even if I should forget the words, pictures live on in my memory forever. Of course sometimes when she re-reads me the text it even recalls the pictures that I had forgotten, but which were an integral part of each revelation and without which I have seldom gotten anything from the Lord.

       18. NEARLY EVERY IDEA, REVELATION, MESSAGE OR LETTER THAT THE LORD HAS GIVEN ME HAS FIRST COME IN PICTURES which the Lord then described to me, or to which He added the words or gave me the wisdom to understand and explain and interpret. So if pictures envisioning the truth of God's Words are a vital and essential part of God's message and means of revelation, as were the simple word pictures that even Jesus and many of God's prophets used to portray their thoughts certainly pictures in which to pass these on to others as best we can should be an indispensable part of our own ministry in getting out the message as clearly and vividly and unforgettably as we can. Amen?

       19. SO GOD HAS NOW GIVEN YOU ARTISTS THE OPPORTUNITY TO WORK AS YOU NEVER WORKED BEFORE, in complete freedom of Spirit, in order for you to help millions to litness to the whole world! God is giving you the marvelous opportunity to fully manifest your God-given talents as never before! May God give you such supernatural inspiration, power, strength and miraculous vision to take such Spirit trips as you have never had before to see what God has already shown me!

       20. MAY HE GUIDE YOUR PEN LIKE SPIRIT-WRITING POSSESSED OF THE SPIRIT OF GOD to catch the vision of what He is trying to show the world and put it on paper for them all to see in a way they will clearly understand and arouse such compelling interest as to never forget! As He commanded one prophet, "Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run that readeth it!" Hallelujah!

       21. WELL, PRAISE THE LORD! I DIDN'T EXPECT TO GET THAT INSPIRED ON THE SUBJECT OF ILLUSTRATIONS, but you'll find God's Word full of them! I'd like to see our Letters as full of them as possible as well, particularly for the sake of our young and growing children to help them get and remember the message and to inspire them to pass it on to others. Praise the Lord!

       22. SO MAYBE THIS WILL INSPIRE ALL OF OUR ARTISTS TO REALISE HOW IMPORTANT THEIR WORK IS in furthering the work and words of God, The Lord has certainly emphasised it and Abrahim couldn't have been any more specific in his commandments in "Chinese Spirits" about having more pictures!

       23. I'M SURE YOUR PICTURES HAVE MANY TIMES BEEN A GREAT HELP IN ATTRACTING YOUNG PEOPLE to take the literature and to help them visualise the message so that they were inspired to follow it. So you shall surely share a great portion in the rewards that shall be given in the Hereafter for a job well done which has reaped much fruit! It will surely reap millions more whose fellowship we shall enjoy in God's Family, both now and forevermore, and for which both you and they will he eternally thankful and God everlastingly grateful! Hallelujah! Praise God!

       24. GOD'S WHOLE CREATION IS A WORK OF ART and continually portrays His message to all of us, "Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them, for God hath showed it unto them! For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse!" Hallelujah! Praise God! Not only the Bible but all God's whole creation is full of illustrations of His truths, pictures which tell the story, portraits which portray the truth! Hallelujah!

       25. SO I AM THRILLED WITH YOUR ART, from the simplest funniest little cartoon to the most lavish and beautiful scenic wonders! I'm expecting that our so-called "religion" is not only going to be notorious as the sexiest, freest, most zealous and dynamically revolutionary religion in the world, but also the most artistic and best illustrated!

       26. WE'LL HAVE PICTURES OF EVERYTHING THE PEOPLE NEED TO KNOW OR EVER WANTED TO SEE about everything from God to the birth of a baby! That's one of the most vivid illustrations of all spiritual truths: The birth of a human spirit by the power of the Spirit of God through the seed sown through these illustrated words in their hearts and portrayed before their very eyes through your own incomparable art, the wonder-working work of your fingers to delight the heart of man and give him the joy of Salvation! Hallelujah! I just can't say enough about it!

       27. PERHAPS IN CLOSING THIS EXTREMELY SERIOUS SUBJECT I MIGHT CHEER YOU WITH A LITTLE SMILE and perhaps even a hearty laugh with a little joke I heard recently about religious art: A little child was looking at a picture of Jesus when a skeptic viewing his fascination sneered: "That's not really Jesus!--That's only some artist's conception of Him!" "Well," said the little child, "that's funny, because it sure does look like Jesus!"--Which was all that was necessary as far as the little one was concerned!--And he got the point and it satisfied his childish mind and heart that it was enough like Him to suit him and his own childlike conception of Jesus!

       28. SO IF SOMETIMES YOU'RE NOT COMPLETELY SATISFIED THAT OUR ART IS EXACTLY LIKE THE REAL THING and perhaps only a poor representation, at least the people will get the point: It looks like it!--And that's all it has to do, the best you can to make it look as nearly like it as humanly possible in these frail vessels of clay so the folks will at least get the general idea as nearly as possible.

       29. DON'T EVER GET DISCOURAGED THAT IT'S NOT PERFECT, for neither are you nor I, although we too are supposed to be illustrations of God and His Love! We just do the best we can by His help, and that's all that He asks and that's all anyone should expect.

       30. SO KEEP 'EM ROLLING no matter how imperfect they may be, and let's just hope that it'll look like Jesus even if it's not perfect or exactly right as we might like it to be. At least they'll get the picture and the point if you'll try to portray it as best you can with God's help, which is the same way we all try to live it!--And we're thankful for you and the tremendous amount of hard work you're all doing to make these impossible dreams come true and be seen by the mind of man! Hallelujah! Keep up the good work!

       31. WELL, THERE IT IS, THE GREAT BURDEN OF MY HEART AND HOW MUCH I'M COUNTING ON YOU TO FULFILL IT! Will you do you best to try to live up to our expectations and please God by a job well and faithfully done that you may enter into the joy of your Lord forever in His eternal Kingdom with the multitudinous souls you have helped win with your art? May God help you to do so, is my prayer! God bless and keep you and continue to make you a tremendous blessing, more than ever before! All glory to His Name! Hallelujah! Thank You Jesus! Praise God forever! Let all the people praise the Lord!--And may all the wondrous works of your hands praise Him eternally! Selah!

       32. HAIL, ARTISTS, FULL OF GRACE!--The Lord is with thee, and blessed is the fruit of thy pen, the Truth, Christ Jesus!--Amen? And here are some good verses for you showing how much! the Lord believes in using signs and wonders and visions and banners and innumerable illustrations to portray His Word and attract attention to it!:

       ISA 11:10, 12: "And in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek...And he shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts..."--Hallelujah!--That's us!

       ISA 18:3: "All ye inhabitants of the world, and dwellers on the earth, see ye, when he lifteth up an ensign on the mountains...."

       ISA 13:2: "Lift ye up a banner upon the high mountain, exalt the voice unto them, shake the hand, that they may go into the gates of the nobles. "

       PS 60:4: "Thou hast given a banner to them that fear thee, that it may be displayed of the truth.--Selah!"

       PS 20:5: "We will rejoice in thy salvation, and in the name of our God we will set up our banners: the Lord fulfill all thy petitions. "

       SoS 6:4: "...terrible as any army with banners."

       EX 4:17: "And thou shalt take this rod (a pen!) in thine hand, wherewith thou shalt do signs."

       SoS 2:4: "...his banner over me was love."

       EX 7:3: "And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt. "
       EX 10:2: "And that thou mayest tell in the ears of thy son, and of thy son's son, what things I have wrought in Egypt, and my signs which I have done among them; that ye may know how that I am the Lord. "

       NUM 14:11: "And the Lord said unto Moses, How long will this people provoke me? And how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I have shewed among them?"

       DEUT 4:34: "Or hath God assayed to go and take him a nation from the midst of another nation, by temptations, by signs, and by wonders...?"

       DEUT 26:8: "And the Lord brought us forth out of Egypt with a mighty hand, and with an outstretched arm, and with great terribleness, and with signs and with wonders...!"

       DEUT 29:3: "The great temptations which thine eyes have seen, the signs, and those great miracles. "

       DEUT 34:10-12: "And there arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face. In all the signs and the wonders, which the Lord sent him to do...in all that mighty hand, and in all that great terror which Moses showed in the sight of all Israel."

       PS 105:26, 27: "He sent Moses his servant; and Aaron whom he had chosen. They showed his signs among them, and wonders in the land of Ham!"

       JER 32:17-22: "Ah Lord God! behold, thou hast made the heaven and the earth by thy great power and stretched out arm, and there is nothing too hard for thee!--Thou showest loving-kindness unto thousands, and recompensest the iniquity of the fathers into the bosom of their children after them: The Great, the Mighty God, the Lord of hosts, is his name, great in counsel, and mighty in works! For thine eyes are open upon all the ways of the sons of men, to give every one according to the fruit of his doings: Which hast set signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, even unto this day, and in Israel, and among other men; and hast made thee a name, as at this day; And has brought forth thy people Israel out of the land of Egypt with signs, and with wonders, and with a strong hand, and with a stretched out arm and with great terror; And hast given them this land which thou didst swear to their fathers to give them, a land flowing with milk and honey!"

       DAN 4:2, 3: "I thought it good to show the signs and wonders that the high God hath wrought toward me. How great are his signs!"

       PR 29:18: "Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he."

       HAB 2:2: "And the Lord answered me, and said, Write the vision and make it plain upon tables that he may run that readeth it. "

       PS 73:28: "But it is good for me to draw near to God..."

       JN 12:32: "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. "

       HE 10:22: "Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith.."

       JA 4:8: "Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you.."

       PROV 25:11: "A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver!"--Hallelujah!

       GOD BLESS YOU ALL AND CONTINUE TO MAKE YOU A GREAT BLESSING TO MANY! Thank you so much for all your help! I love you!--Your Ol' Picture, --MO

Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family