The Lausanne Arts Network exists to catalyze and connect artistic Christians and evangelical influencers concerning the role of artists and the arts for global mission—through gatherings focused on biblical prayer, reflection, training, and ministry action.
We hold two mandates. The first is to the artists of the world. We aim to catalyze and call artists back to the service of the church in global mission through their specialized, God-designed creative imagination, intelligence, and artistic abilities and gifts. We aim to equip artists biblically on the role of the artist and artistic expression in life, worship, and ministry.
The second mandate is to the church and to the mission and academic leadership of the world. We aim to call the church to re-engage artistic kingdom servants for the sake of empowering culturally relevant worship, evangelism, and compassion throughout the world. We aim to assist current mission and church leadership to realize that for the body of Christ to express itself fully in line with God’s design, we must involve the church’s artists as strategic ministry practitioners of the church.
Drama, dance, story, music and visual image can be expressions of the reality of our brokenness, and of the hope that is centered in the gospel that all things will be made new. The Cape Town Commitment II-A-5
Few mission agencies provide occupational positions for artistic ministry or mission specialists for program strategy development, church planting, culture engagement, compassion, social justice, evangelism, or indigenous worship and congregational life, even though these ‘human expression specialists’ exist as some of the most imaginative and creative leaders of the church.
By carrying out these mandates, the Lausanne Arts Network aims to facilitate a fullness of the church through the warm engagement of artists back into the life of the church, and back into the work of the church, namely global mission. We encourage both artistic leaders and leaders of the church to come into effectual partnership in the acts of worship, biblical reflection, theologizing, strategizing, ministry planning, and ministry action.
