Creating David
“For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus.”
One day, Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni came across a slab of carara-white Italian marble. It had been cast away on the refuse pile. Several sculptors had hacked and chiselled at the rock over a number of years, finally giving up their efforts to create anything meaningful from it. But when the master artist Michelangelo looked at that same marble, he didn’t see useless rock; he saw “David.” In 1502 AD, he began his work on that shapeless rock, creating one of the most famous works of art in the entire world. It is housed in the Academia Gallery in Florence, Italy, meticulously guarded and viewed by over four thousand people every single day.
God is the greatest Artist of all. He starts with material others have discarded or abandoned. There may have been attempts by self-help gurus and social scientists to chisel something of lasting value and worth from the raw material, with limited success. The problem is vision. You can only create a masterpiece with a final image in mind. Without that image, the project is attempted from the ‘outside in.’ God looks at that same material, seeing the potential from the ‘inside out.’ He has the completed picture of the final priceless product. He rescues a person from the trash heap of life and begins shaping that person into a pre-determined masterpiece. The image He has in mind is not an inanimate statue but rather a living, breathing replica of His own Son, Jesus. Little by little, line-on-line, precept-on-precept, gradually but surely, that image emerges. There is not a person born into this world who does not have the potential to bear the image of Christ.
But this is where my analogy breaks down. The marble in the hands of Michelangelo was inanimate. It had no choice in the matter of creative refinement. But people do! God has restricted His creative work in human flesh to the level of the permission we give Him. In progress towards the ‘Jesus image,’ our will is never violated. The extent to which Christ is formed in each of us depends not on God’s willingness to craft the image but rather on our willingness to allow Him to begin, to continue and to complete the project, regardless of the discomfort or sacrifice it may involve.
A quote attributed to Michelangelo goes as follows: When asked how he was able to create David from a formless piece of stone, he replied: “You chip away everything that isn’t David.” Whether the quote is authentic or not, the principle is solid. That is exactly how God forms Christ in us. As we give Him permission, He uses the tools of circumstance, the power of His Word, the intimacy of prayer, the challenges of life, sorrow, grief and pain, and our interaction with others to chip away at everything that does not resemble Jesus. Unlike Michelangelo’s David, because we are animate, we feel the impact of each blow of the divine mallet. Unlike Michelangelo’s David, we retain the choice to continue or halt the process at any point.
As 2025 dawns, none of us has a clear understanding of the path we will navigate across the twelve months of the New Year. Yet we have this assurance. If we stick to Mary’s mantra, “Be it unto me according to Your Word” (Luke 1:38), God will be faithful to make substantive progress in shaping the raw material we offer into the image of His Son. Each event, welcome or unwelcome, will be a positive step toward the completion of a Masterpiece that increasingly reveals the heart of the Artist and brings Him glory.
According to the Apostle Paul, the conclusion is foregone: And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns. (Philippians 1:6)
Personally, I believe 2025 will start with a fresh goal. As I surrender to God’s will and purpose, “I shall be satisfied when I awake in His likeness” (Psalm 17:15).
Al is an experienced pastor and counselor who works out of our ABNWT District Resource Centre in Edmonton as the Pastoral Care Coordinator. A pastor to the pastors, Al is a friend, mentor, and confidante to all.