The Sculpting God

Hello Weekend Readers. I know many of you are still in very cold temperatures and I’m hoping you are staying warm. So many are still out of electricity and roads are just too hazardous to get out to work or even to the grocery store. I think that heavy ice is more dangerous than the snow itself! This winter weather brings me to ice and those who chisel it!

Growing up in northern Wisconsin is one way to teach a person about cold and ice and how deadly it can be. Yet, we would go over to Minneapolis, MN or up to Bessemer, MI and find a beauty in the ice that took our breath away (along with the cold wind to boot!). I stood mesmerized at the chisel in a hand that was strong and well covered with a leather glove as he carved cold-cold-ice into something so beautiful—it ‘melted my heart’ on a cold day. No longer was that huge frozen cube of ice just a block, it was pure beauty, tender yet powerful.

When I went to Washington D.C. I saw that same beauty in carved marble. How did they do this? Marble may not be cold as ice but it’s way heavier and impermeable. Then my thoughts went to a young man, Michelangelo and his beginnings which, if you love history, you may have read his story. And yes—it began with a big hunk of marble!

That marble lay in the courtyard of the Florence, Italy cathedral for almost a hundred years. The sculptor commissioned to carve it had made a mistake while attempting to carve the stone, and most people thought it was beyond repair. But in 1505, another young sculptor by the name of Michelangelo came across the piece and asked if he could do something with it. Most of the older sculptors tried not to laugh at this young man, and they told him it would be futile, but go ahead, give it a try. He took up the challenge and for three years, he worked steadily, carefully shaping the marble into an 18-foot-tall image of the young shepherd boy David – a sculpture that would define the great artist’s career.

One can only wonder what those elder sculptors said about this young man? I hope they admired his moxie and learned a valuable lesson at the same time. You see, much like young Michelangelo, God is our Master Sculptor! Like that slap of marble, God finds us broken, lost and in desperate need of fixing. He draws our faith closer and closer, and then begins to “chisel us” – scraping and chipping away our imperfections and molding us more and more into the image God wants us to be.

Remember those words from Isaiah 64:8 [Voice] “Still, Eternal One, You are our Father. We are just clay, and You are the potter. We are the product of Your creative action, shaped and formed into something of worth.”

Let’s face it, this sculpting—where God molds us, pushing, chiseling and indenting the clay is not the most pleasant experience! When have we cried out “Ouch, God enough!” and yet God says, “not yet child, there is more to be done.” What is God taking from us with that chisel? It’s much more than our imperfections, and a lot more about the idols we have that we don’t even realize we “replace in God’s place” in our lives. We can’t root that idolatry away because we are so connected to it we think we couldn’t live without it.

And that is when our Master Sculptor steps in. Thank God who knows what has to be done for us! Yes, that ‘chisel’ can hurt but it is for our good, not to harm us. We need to trust God to mold us throughout our life into the masterpiece God has created us to be. And most important–we must thank God daily for setting us free from the imperfections that hinder us!

In closing, let’s look at Jeremiah 18:1-6 [Voice]. This Scripture tells it all!

“The word of the Eternal came to Jeremiah. The Eternal One: “Go down to the potter’s shop in the city, and wait for My word.” So I went down to the potter’s shop and found him making something on his wheel. And as I watched, the clay vessel in his hands became flawed and unusable. So the potter started again with the same clay. He crushed and squeezed and shaped it into another vessel that was to his liking. In that moment, I heard again God’s word for His rebellious people. The Eternal One: “O people of Israel, can I not do the same to you as this potter has done? You are like clay in My hands—I will mold you as I see fit.” AMEN.