A Thought on Spiritual Formation

I was walking at the beach this morning while listening to some music. The song 'How He Loves' (Kim Walker version) started playing, and as I watched the tide coming in and out; I began to think about God and spiritual formation. Our relationships with God are so much like the relationship the ocean has with the sand.

Here we are- the sand. We don't move on our own or have the ability to shape ourselves. We are filled with natural treasures, and we also contain a lot of crap that various people have dropped on us.

Then there's God- the ocean. It's powerful. It can be peaceful and calm or it can be violent and wipe out entire cities. It's both beautiful and dangerous.

The ocean hits the sand and it changes. The shore is shaped by the tide every second of the day. Some days the waves are huge and the shoreline changes quickly, and other days, the waves are more like ripples making subtle changes. One thing to notice, is that everyday it is moving. Everyday it is changing and the most amazing transformation happens just below the surface. If you ever stick your feet in the sand where the water is several inches deep, you know what I mean.

Our lives with God should reflect this constant ebb and flow. We are built to be like that sand; ever-changing, ever evolving as we are moved by God. Everyday God's Grace should sweep over us and shape us. Everyday we need to seek Him in His Word and in Prayer, so our hearts can be shaped by His love and our minds can be fed by His wisdom.

^"So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you." Romans 12:1 & 2 (MSG)

"And when God is personally present, a living Spirit, that old, constricting legislation is recognized as obsolete. We're free of it! All of us! Nothing between us and God, our faces shining with the brightness of his face. And so we are transfigured much like the Messiah, our lives gradually becoming brighter and more beautiful as God enters our lives and we become like him." 2 Corinthians 3:17 & 18 (MSG)