Our psalm reinforces that idea – Now I’m going at it a little backward here - Your eyes beheld my limbs, yet unfinished in the womb…they were fashioned day by day when as yet there were none of them. God is that potter, molding, fashioning, creating us in the womb. Our response should be “I will thank you because I am marvelously made…”
But there’s more than the creation in the womb. After we have been born, we are still being created, day by day, hopefully becoming who God intends us to be come. And when we have learned to walk and to talk, -- God wants to walk with us and teach us about himself and help us to learn his ways. And at any point, God has searched us out and known us and discerned our thoughts from afar. He traces our journey and knows every word on our lips. And what God really wants is for us to seek his thoughts and to dwell on them and to learn them and from them.
But our story from Jeremiah is also a story about freewill. We are free to behave and to act in ways that seem right to us – or in ways that are wrong. Sometimes in expressing our freedom of will, our freedom of life, we do things that displease God, that take us out of his will for us. Sometimes we choose to walk away from God or maybe just ignore him. But that’s the freedom of choice that God gives to us. He does not force us to do what he wants us to do.
Several years ago I read a novel, popular at the time, called The 13th Apostle. I don't even remember who it was written by, maybe by Michel Benoit. I think it’s trying to be a sensational novel like Dan Brown's DaVince Code, but I thought I might as well see what it had to offer.
It also has the same drawbacks that Brown’s movie was criticized for – there were slow parts because of evaluating the evidence of a newly discovered scroll. But from this book, I took away one statement I want to share with you: “A person is not punished for their deeds, but rather by their deeds.” I know people who can testify to that. God doesn’t have to punish his children for doing wrong – their deeds (or misdeeds) punish them and testify against them. God doesn’t have to do anything. But those very same people can also testify that our loving God was there to pick up the pieces when they finally returned to their senses and it was through His grace that they were able to turn their lives around.
Jeremiah paints a picture of a God who pays attention to what individuals are doing and who will, when he sees errors in your ways, begin the process of remaking you. When I was preparing for this sermon, I spent a morning at Gander Studio making an object - I'm not even sure exactly what it is, but it will be suitable for holding objects on my desk. I had to start over several times, and as I neared its completion, I found that there were areas that were too thin, and I would have to add a little clay and smooth it and blend it into the project. There were others areas that were too thick and I had to work at it to thin it out. My creation is quite primitive, not like those of my friend Judy King. Judy specializes in creating Biblical Characters in context from modeling compound. She makes people from the Bible come alive through prayer and meditation and a God given gift.
I had asked for permission to come observe her at work making a figure from start to finish. It was a delightful day and I was fascinated by the whole process and the tools and incidentals she used. She had a collection of buttons that she used to make impressions in the clay. She took longs walks on their property to pick up sticks, leaves, rocks, whatever she saw that she felt like she could use.
If she was making a part of the figure that didn’t come out right, she would rework it until it looked right. Each figure was a creation of love – a work of art – not unlike us – God’s creation of love. One of the hardest things for some of us to learn, is that we are acceptable in God’s sight – not because of anything we have done, but because we are made in the image of God.
What we do after that and what we become is up to us. We can grow into the image God envisions for us and walk in his ways, or we can choose our own path. But when we walk away, God begins to shape a new path for us to bring us back. The one thing that God will never do is to turn his back on us. He always provides a way for us to come back to him. We can never stray so far that God cannot find us -- and we can never sin so badly that God does not want us.
Jesus tells us in today's gospel that following him is not easy. He calls us to commitment. We have to make sacrifices, and choices that will not be popular for those who do not know God. But as we grow to understand the depth of His love for us and allow his hand to guide us, those decisions become easier each time. We have to be willing to follow him with a love that echoes his own when he gave himself as a sacrifice for us.
In God's kingdom, the door is always open for our return when we allow God to be Lord of our life. Amen.
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