Shaped by Fire

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It was mesmerizing watching the glass being swirled and twisted on the end of the pole. This orange-hot liquid being shaped and crafted. In the furnace, swirled, back in the furnace, beaten and shaped, back in the furnace, for something so beautiful and fragile the process was rigorous. The master craftsman watching and shaping, inspecting and forming the artwork he had in mind.[1]  Just weeks earlier I had watched a similar process with clay being transformed into brightly coloured ceramic pots[2].  Glass blowing begins in the furnace and ends in a cooling kiln to harden, whereas ceramic pots end in a furnace to be transformed and hardened. Regardless of the process a furnace is involved!

That’s an “ouch” thought when I liken the process of glass making or ceramics to the way God uses circumstances to mould and shape us for his purposes.

The furnace, that place of “firey trial’, that overwhelming, difficult, gut wrenching place is the furnace that refines and purifies our inner moral fibre. In the piece of glass I was looking at, the inner core of each piece glowed.  You don’t get that without the heat.  Gold and silver, precious metals, diamonds and gemstones are all formed in the intense heat and pressure of the earth. This is the image and thought Peter used

“In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. 7 These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.” (1 Peter 1:6-7)

Jesus said that tribulation, hard times were part of the process of our life.  He endured firey trials and so will we.

Whilst I had seen the finished result of the glass blowing in the showroom I hadn’t appreciated their true value and worth until I had seen the process.  After watching the craftsman at work I went back to the showroom and marveled with fresh eyes at the workmanship, at the energy and time each piece had taken. I saw even more beauty because I understood what it took to produce the colours, the shapes, the clarity and the richness of each piece. I glimpsed the creative process and thought of the creator.

You and I are of infinite value – a value that is enhanced and added to by the process we go through watched over by the loving and skilled hands of our maker God. How we come through the process and show off God’s glory in it, is the story showcased in God’s kingdom and to the world we live in.

 

 


[1] www.lavaglass.nz

[2] www.morrisandjames.co.nz


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