this was the last of my sabbatical sermons, that is, sermons that began with a reflection from my recent sabbatical. I struggled greatly to get to the final version of the sermon. I also suspect I preached a bit of what this week's Advent sermon might include. the book I referenced, Rembrandt Is in the Wind, was given to me by my colleagues Julia and Dennis, to read on sabbatical. I have not read all of the book, but I find it very stimulating. I am grateful for the gift and its help with my sermon-writing.
“Sabbatical snippets: Shaped and Formed”, November 20, 2024; St. Andrew Presbyterian Church; 2 Timothy 1: 3-10
3 I am grateful to God—whom I worship with a clear conscience, as my ancestors did—when I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day. 4Recalling your tears, I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy. 5I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you. 6For this reason I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you through the laying on of my hands; 7for God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline.
8 Do not be ashamed, then, of the testimony about our Lord or of me his prisoner, but join with me in suffering for the gospel, relying on the power of God, 9who saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works but according to his own purpose and grace. This grace was given to us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, 10but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Saviour Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
Introduction: Arches National Park is an amazing place to visit, although it can be a little hot in the deserts of UT in July!
The park contains more than 2,000 natural sandstone arches, including the well-known Delicate Arch. Arches national park contains the highest density of natural arches in the world.
If you read the story of how the Arches came to be, you discover the slow movement of nature to form this arches. Scientists tell us that the story of Arches begins roughly 65 million years ago. At that time, the area was a dry seabed spreading from horizon to horizon.
I won’t try to explain how the area we see as Arches national Park rose up to what we see now, Primarily because I’m not sure i could explain it correctly.
But, I was fascinated that the arches we now see now are the result of erosion and water that has been at work for centuries. Rain and snow find feature in the rocks, then freeze and expand, with small recesses growing bigger with each storm. Over time, fractured rock layers turn into fins, and fins into arches.
Arches also emerge when potholes near cliff edges grow deeper and deeper until they wear through the cliff wall below them. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arches_National_Park)
As I reflected in amazement over those arches, I was reminded how God shapes and forms each of us and the world in which we live.
Move 1: The shaping and forming take place over time.
a. Shaping and forming do not always happen overnight.
1. for every Saul who has a dramatic moment and is changed seemingly in an instant, there are numerous stories about God at work over time.
2. the Exodus story and the movement to the Promised Land is one of the formative stories of the biblical text.
the Israelites wandered 40 years in the wilderness.
after having been in slavery in Egypt for several hundred years.
3. some scholars suggest that the time in wilderness was necessary to shape God’s people so that they could prosper in the Promised Land.
they had to spend time in the wilderness reclaim their faith as God’s people and rebuild their relationship with God.
they had to reshape their understanding of themselves from slaves to people who could thrive in the Promised Land.
4. Another powerful story in Israel’s self-understanding as God’s people was the return from exile to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem.
70 years in exile
70 years of being shaped and formed by the experience, both learning how to be God’s people in a very different context and looking toward the time when they would return and rebuild the Temple.
b. God works over time shaping and forming us.
1. today is Christ the King Sunday - the last day of the liturgical calendar.
2. the liturgical calendar we follow in worship gives us a yearly cycle to remember and tell how God has been at been work and points us to see the God who is still at work.
3. today, we proclaim that Christ is King and lift up his life as the example of where God’s shaping and form of us leads.
4. We are being shaped and formed to look more like Christ,
live more like Christ
extend ourselves in the world more like Christ.
c. We know we are not there yet, but God is not done.
1. when you look in the mirror each day, you see a person who is still being shaped and formed.
2. When we look to the world, we see a world still needing to be shaped and formed.
3. So we give ourselves over to the God who continues to shape and form us.
Move 2: Being shaped and formed takes holy imagination
a. I suspect most of us are familiar with Michelangelo’s sculpture “The David”
1. Perhaps you have seen it in person in Florence or seen photos of it.
2. Considered by many to be the greatest piece of sculpture ever carved.
3. I remember seeing it the first time and finding myself staring at this sculpture, mesmerized by the marble David who seemed to be breathing.
Time seemed to stand still as I gazed at this breathtaking sculpture of David.
b. Do you know the back story to the creation of this sculpture of David, the story about the the stone that Michelangelo carved?
1. In 1463, an Italian sculptor Agostino di Duccio was commissioned by the Florence Cathedral to carve one of a series of 12 OT characters to adorn the buttresses of the cathedral.
he traveled to Fantiscritti Quarry in the Carrerra region of the Alps and had the quarrymen hew a stone 18 feet long weighing 24,000 pounds to use for the statue.
this was a deviation from the contract that allowed him to use four separate stones that could be put together to complete the statue.
It took two years for the stone to be transported back to Florence, where the stone was put in the cathedral courtyard.
2. People flocked to see it, but as it was inspected, it was thought to be a giant, costly mistake — too narrow a stone; a hole in the middle; to massive a stone to be workable
it led to the firing of Agostino.
3. The stone became a fixture for the residents of Florence - as Russ Ramsey writes in his book Rembrandt Is in the Wind, the stone became “a symbol of incredible accomplishment and unmet potential.”
Ten years later another sculptor tried to do something with it, but got nowhere and was fired.
Twenty-six years later, a young sculptor named Michelangelo was tied to finish the project.
he would be the one to completed his marvelous, masterful, sculpture.
IT not only took time, but also the imagination of an artist like Michelangelo to see David in what was thought to be a wasted piece of marble and seeing in it the image of David. (Russ Ramsey, Rembrandt Is in the Wind, 17-39 tells the story in more detail).
c. the story of the stone used for the sculpture reminds me of who are and how we understand our world.
1. Both an incredible accomplishment and unmet potential.
2. We are God’s creation - each of us an incredible masterpiece reflecting the image of God.
3. The world is God’s creation, created in goodness and reflecting an incredibly complex and beautiful act of God.
4. But, we are also unmet potential - we know that who we are and what our whole is does not measure up to the image of God and goodness in which we were created.
We continue to live into the potential to which God calls us.
5. We need to look and listen for with holy imagination to live into the infinite possibilities God has for us and the world.
Move 4: We also see the role of the church shaping and forming God does.
a. We read in Paul’s letter to Timothy how Paul sees in Timothy the sincere faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you.
2. Paul’s observation reminds us that the community of faith shapes and forms us.
3. Likewise, we read the story of Joshua who is take Moses’ place of leadership and are reminded that Moses has been working with Joshua to help him develop the skills needed to step into leadership.
4. We need those who come before us, the Loises and Eunices and people like Moses who model for us discipleship as they shape and form us.
b. That, of course, is part of our calling as the body of Christ - to shape and form others in our midst, even as we go out into the world to shape and form the world by our work.
1. In some ways, the vows the congregation takes at baptism are a summary statement of what it means to be a community of faith taht shapes and forms.
2. when we stand and commit to be a part of the life of the one being baptized, we commit to praying for that person,
teaching that person the faith,
to walk beside them as they grow in their discipleship.
3. We often think of the baptismal vows in the context of baptizing infants and the vows become the reason we volunteer to teach Sunday school
or be a youth sponsor
or organize mission activities
or be a confirmation mentor
or take in interest in the young kids as they grow into young adults.
A powerful image of the connections that helped the younger generations, like Timothy, to lay claim to their faith and their calling as disciples of Christ.
4. But those baptismal vows also speak to the relationship the church has with anyone joining with us in this community of faith.
we join in ministry with that person.
we work together to proclaim the Christ’s presence in the world
we pray for each other
we grow together in our faithfulness.
c. It takes time for us to be shaped and formed by God.
1. It takes people in the community to care enough about each other to commit to the ongoing work being shaped and formed.
2. the God who continues to be at work shaping and forming us calls us to be part of that work.
Conclusion: Over time, the same forces that created these arches will continue to widen them until they collapse.
In 2008, the fall of Wall Arch in 2008 reminded us that this landscape continues to change.
David’s sculpture has cracks around the ankles that will one day probably lead to its collapse.
We live in a finite world,
but we follow the God of infinite possibilities, who continues to shape and form us.
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