Timothy Stoner

The Pen is Mightier than the Camera

Posted on 15. Feb, 2010 by Tim Stoner in Blog, art

Why is that when God, who speaks a shattering word to the earth– such that all the atomic and subatomic particles line up in trembling obedience–talks to man, He tells stories? The difference is in His intent: from non-sentient matter, absolute submission, but from human beings, He wants voluntary, loving devotion. God is after our hearts. So He woos, courts and entices us. Eventually this speaking God stops communicating from a distance. He distills His words into a Word–a human personality who enters the story to make visible the One who is seeking to win human hearts. The Author who is also Lover stops writing stage directions, giving cues and crafting dialogue, He becomes the main character in the drama. But, when He begins speaking He does not stop telling stories.

This reminds us that words matter—a lot. As Bono remarks in commenting on Frank Sinatra’s luscious and sensual vocalizations, “It all begins with the word.” Images (and music) serve to enhance the word, they do not supplant it. Put another way, images are the hired help for words. One good image may be worth a thousand words, but one anointed word can save an eternal soul and transform an angry rebel into a saint–a white-hot lover who will worship God for ever and ever and ever.

This is vitally important for those who seek to reach a visual generation, a demographic that is oriented to image over substance. They have been convinced that words have been drained, demoted, deconstructed; that narratives have been flattened out into empty, subjective and meaningless strands of random confetti. But, what we know, or should know, though we can be easily induced to forget, is that we humans, regardless of age, culture, or gender, bear within us the bright stamp of deity. We are icons that image God in certain basic and inescapable ways. Written into our genetic code, or perhaps we could say, spoken into our very being, is a visceral orientation to language.

We are creatures wired for sound. We were genetically imprinted from birth to fixate on words. We are actually designed to vibrate like guitar strings to a certain tone that has a unique timber and weight. It is the resonant voice of the Father. So we spend our whole lives restlessly straining to hear what we were meant to live upon and find meaning in. Sadly, it is mostly drowned out by convincing rivals, throbbing competitors and silvery slick hucksters. But, there is more to the story, we also are listening with heart-breaking intensity for the musical notes in the barely remembered voice of the Beloved. For, while we are children yearning for Daddy to come home and pick us up in His arms, we are also irrepressible lovers, longing to be swept up by our valiant and ravishing Prince.

In the beginning was the Word and so will it be in the End. While the movie Troy reminds us that one face (image) can launch a thousand ships, the Book of Eli completes the narrative for it responds: one book (filled with God’s words) can transform a civilization and save the entire world. The culture makers would have us believe that those under-thirty are exclusively visual. Their intent is to discourage us while deafening the ears of those desperate to hear a word with sufficient power to impose order on chaos , shine light into darkness and transform the ash dust of death into the radiant beauty of life.

In the tongue (so says Solomon)—but also the pen–lies the power of life and of death. Communicators aiming to reach the heart are called to mine this power and unleash its creative, life-giving energy. The Christian artist’s answer to a post-literate (post-modern) generation certain that image trumps all and that universal stories (meta narratives) are a delusion, is to creatively unveil the stunning synthesis illustrated by the incarnate Son who perfectly united image (demonstration) and Word (proclamation).   

Tags: images, post modernism, visual generation, words