Artisan God

 

The picture above is just a leaf.  Something that is so ordinary, so temporary.  Right now, you see them everywhere!  Millions, hundreds of millions of leaves, bursting from the trees around us.  They add to the cascade of green which is summertime in the Great Plains.  But it was only a few short weeks ago that our landscape was bare.  Even now (though we hardly want to think of it) each gorgeous summer day marches closer and closer to Autumn.  Then this cacaphony of leaves that surrounds us will change, wither and fall.  And yet while they last, God has arrayed them with an innate beauty, if only we take the time to notice.  

That sort of innate beauty is found in all manner of things around us.  Consider the fragile patterns of an insect's wings, the sinews of a stalking lion, the majestic vista of a mountain stream, the hundreds upon hundreds of stars twinkling above us on a clear night, the sun setting the earth and sky afire with hues of orange, pink, purple, and blue as it slowly melds into the horizon.   

I mention this because I think it’s important that we recognize the Creative Genius of our God.  We know that he built the universe we live in and and called it "good.”  Genesis tells us he filled the oceans with living creatures, populated the sky with the birds of the air.  God created plant life, and animals of every kind, and Man too… Mankind to rule over His Creation.  

But in all of this knowledge about God’s creative power, do we lose sight of His awesome workmanship?    

Take some of these verses into account:


"Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation?
Tell me, if you understand. 

Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line across it? 

On what were its footings set,
or who laid its cornerstone- 

while the morning stars sang together
and all the angels shouted for joy?

"Who shut up the sea behind doors
when it burst forth from the womb, 

when I made the clouds its garment
and wrapped it in thick darkness, 

when I fixed limits for it
and set its doors and bars in place, 

when I said, 'This far you may come and no farther;
here is where your proud waves halt'"

Job 38:4-11

There is one glory of the sun, another glory of the moon, another glory of the stars; for one star differs from another star in glory.  

1 Corinthians 15:41

How many are your works, O LORD! In wisdom you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures. Psalm 104:24

When he made a decree for the rain, and a way for the lightning or the thunder:  Job 28:26

The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament shows His handywork.  Psalm 19:1

All of Creation reflects not only the power of God, but his “handywork”.  God’s intentional creative force knitting the world and the cosmos together in such a way that systems work together.  We get the sense that the mountains and seas and sun and rain and so forth and so on, were not merely ordained by God, but that they were fashioned by Him.  He decrees the path of the rain with a purpose.  The moon and stars are laid in place by the work of his fingers.  We get the sense that the mountains and foundations of the Earth are laid with a measure and rule.  Like a carpenter, like an artisan.   

Even as early as the Genesis account we see indications of God “working” in His Creation. 

In Genesis 2:7-8 –

And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being.

The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed.

So we’ve seen God measure and lay out the mountains and the seas.  Now, He is forming Adam out of dust, and planting the garden which Adam and Eve will live in. 

God is consistently seen not only as a creative force, but a personal, intentional Creator.  Carpenter, sculptor, gardener… an artist of the cosmos, but in all of this what is God’s greatest creation?  Through the dazzling spectrum we see around us what is God’s crème de la crème?  His magnum opus? 

Perhaps the Psalms can give us some insight…

What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?  You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor.  You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet:

Indeed, What is man that You are mindful of him, Lord God?  God has put the answer into His own words-

Genesis 1:26-27

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

We were made in the image of God, born to bear his likeness.  Jesus uses parables to describe how this might be possible.  In Matthew 13:31-33, Jesus uses creative, artisan terms, terms that point towards God the Gardener or God as a baker, we see Him explain how we bear God's image within us.

He told them another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field.  Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches."  He told them still another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into a large amount of flour until it worked all through the dough."

Jesus tells us that the Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed, small, hidden, but filled with great potential.  So much so that birds can find shelter. 

Or its like yeast mixed into dough.  The county fair is just behind us and I remember my days spent on 4-H baking projects.  My Grandma believed it was important that a young man know how to cook for himself, so every year I'd try my hand at various baked goods.  One year when I'd intended to exhibit some bread, I somehow failed to get the yeast right.  The dense, flat dough balls that came from the oven can testify, those tiny bits of yeast make a significant difference.  It seems hard to believe that something so minuscule, can create such growth and change when an expert baker mixes it properly. 

Throughout the Gospels, Jesus speaks of the Kingdom of God in this way.  As something small, something hidden, as seed sown into various soils or sown into fields and mixed with weeds by enemies.  In almost every case it needs to be tended to and cared for to come to maturity. 

In one of the few instances, Jesus speaks directly about the Kingdom is Luke 17:20-21

Once, having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, "The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, 'Here it is,' or 'There it is,' because the kingdom of God is within you."

The image of our Creator God continues to work in this sense.  He is the master gardener.  God plants the seeds of the Kingdom within us, the seeds of His very image are nestled deep within our own souls.  And then He tends to it.  We are fertilized, watered, sheltered, and even pruned by God the Father, Jesus Christ His Son, and the Holy Spirit of God. 

God reveals his artistic nature in another way to the prophet Jeremiah.

This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD:  "Go down to the potter's house, and there I will give you my message."  So I went down to the potter's house, and I saw him working at the wheel.  But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.  Then the word of the LORD came to me:  "O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter does?" declares the LORD. "Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel.  If at any time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down and destroyed,  and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned.  And if at another time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be built up and planted,  and if it does evil in my sight and does not obey me, then I will reconsider the good I had intended to do for it."

Here God is forming human history.  Raising and lowering nations, molding them to His Will as a potter would clay on the wheel. 

Below is a video of a potter throwing a clay bowl.  As you watch, imagine that formless lump sitting on the wheel as the dawn of human history.  Perhaps even as the beginnings of your own personal history.  Then watch as the master's hands go to work. 

I love how the bowl seems to almost 'bloom' beneath the potter's hands.  I talked to an artist friend about some of the details about pottery and throwing a pot.  She says that the clay is formed as it moves through the potter's hands.  The wheel provides the centrifugal force.  The potter guides the clay as it moves, not trying to force it into a specific form.  I also learned that clay is almost infinitely reusable.  As long as it is kept moist, clay can be thrown againg and again and again.  Even if it does dry out it can be reconstituted through a little time and effort. 

My friend is passionate about pottery and for good reason.  It's very natural, coming straight from the earth.  It's probably one of the world's oldest trades.   And pottery is very lasting as well.  It is one of the most durable things a culture can leave behind.  In fact, pottery fragments are one of the few things we have remaining from Pompeii. 

Isn't it interesting that God uses this metaphor to describe His work in the world? 

A process that is natural and almost as old as human civilization.  Artwork that can be worked again and again but once the bowl is perfect and fired it is durable throughout the course of time.  And an artform that uses outside forces as the energy for transformation under the steady hands of the master artist. 

In 2 Corinthians 4:6,7 we read:

For God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of knowledge of God's glory displayed in the faith of Christ.  But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.

God is in artisan.  He has crafted everything that we see, smell, hear, taste, and touch.  He formed you and me, each of us for a noble purpose.  We are vessels hand-crafted by Almighty God to bear His Image, to shine with the Light of Christ, to carry forth the Kingdom of God into the world everyday. 

Be Calm and Carry on...  

The opening photo is courtesy Julie Zimmermann.  You can see her very cool series which captures an image from every day in 2010 at http://www.juliegrace2010.com/