Fashioned and Formed

 

I don’t know how I could have missed this. Surely this landscaping is not new, I don’t think such a work of art could be completed in a day or two. The scene speaks to me of patience; patience with both the clippers and with time. These beautifully shaped plants were formed slowly, time after time, week after week.

We are much the same. I remember as a boy wanting to be big. I wanted to just wake up one day tall and strong. We want to play an instrument, but we want to skip that whole “years of practice” thing. Learning a language. Mastering a sport. Learning to paint. The list goes on forever. We would do a lot of things if it didn’t take time.

The scriptures speak of our transformation over time into the image of Christ.

“But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.”

“From glory to glory” doesn’t sound like an instant experience. It is the experience of a lifetime. We need patience with God and with ourselves that we will arrive fully formed when the time is right. Then we will be like the landscaping I admired; people will stop and take notice. Who knows what God will do with us as we are being fashioned and formed along the way?

Peace.