As an artist, I have a desire to show the world a color that’s never been seen before. Yet when I think back to the last time I was blown away by a sunset, I’d already seen and experienced every color in that scene.
It’s tempting to think that the key to impacting people is to show them something they’ve never seen before. But that just isn’t the case. There’s this brilliance in simplicity that surpasses anything new. In fact, I believe true brilliance is the ability to present simplicity.
Let me illustrate it this way. I went to a church in Dallas called Fellowship Church. Ed Young, the pastor, is really well known. He speaks at conferences, sells thousands of books, and is frequently a guest on TV shows. And if you listened to him preach, you’d realize he doesn’t say anything all that new. He doesn’t delve the depths of theology in his messages. There’s depth in his messages, but nothing particularly new.
But if you looked at his bookshelf, you’d see books that have real depth. You’d see books like Grudem’s Systematic Theology—a book bigger than the Bible that explores why we believe everything we believe. It’s more a reference manual than a novel, but Ed’s read the thing.
You’d never know it by hearing him speak. He chooses simplicity. He chooses to paint with the colors we’ve seen than to try showing us a brand new color we have no hope of comprehending.
Every artist uses the same colors. It’s the presentation that makes the difference.
It takes hard work and true creativity to make something new with the familiar. It takes true brilliance to make simplicity new. But it’s achievable if we focus on it.
This is really good insight – speaking as one who tends to think “more is more” and often gets bogged down in the complication of it all.
There are no new colors and “nothing new under the sun”.