Focal Passage: 1 Peter 2:4-15
One of my favorite courses as a student at the University of Florida was an Ekphrastic poetry workshop the spring semester of my sophomore year. We met in the Harn Museum of Art on the edge of campus. For the first two and a half hours of class, we discussed anthologies our professor had selected and then workshopped a few students’ poems. For the last 30 minutes, we roamed the galleries for inspiration.
I usually gravitated to the oil paintings, prints or installations. Our professor gave broad prompts, allowing us an unprecedented amount of freedom to engage whatever medium or subject we wanted.
Each week as we passed around copies of our poems to be marked up by our peers, it was fun to see what work of art each person chose. Sometimes there would be a poem about a painting I had overlooked or a sculpture I had also been drawn to. Each week when we were let loose to wander again I began to see the works of art differently.
As we grow in our maturity in Christ, it changes how others see Christ. There was once a time we didn’t recognize the beauty of Christ, but thankfully someone in our life did.
I remember when the grace of sanctification first struck me. I randomly thought, “It’s so weird that God doesn’t just take us to heaven when we get saved.” He leaves us right where grace found us, or somewhere close. Though we’re no longer of the world, we’re still in it – called to look to Jesus and help others do the same.