¹⁰  For we are God’s workmanship (masterpiece), created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. –  Ephesians 2:10 (NIV)

One of the myriad of things I miss about my late wife Claudia (CJ) is her unique personality. She was truly “one of a kind”. It’s really interesting now that I’m beginning, slowly, to talk to other Christian women with the idea of dating and, God willing, be led to marry someone down the road, many of my good friends warn me “not to try to find another Claudia!” And I totally agree: there was only one Claudia Jean Webb Keef, and there will never be another! You see, the truth is that Claudia allowed herself to become God’s masterpiece. And, as I’ll get to further on, God desires to work us into his unique masterpieces as well!

 But none of us start out as a masterpiece, and CJ was not born one, and was not even one when I married her! (I can say that easily now that she is not here to slap me upside the head!) Most people who knew CJ well knew she was gifted with an amazing, powerful, and beautiful voice that she used to worship and glorify God all her life. But even there, it took her years of grueling music lessons and practice to refine her voice, as was the same with her piano, guitar, and all the instruments she came to learn. And when we got married, she had some things to learn. She could be rude and insensitive: she came into my bachelor pad, unannounced, and rearranged the entire kitchen without telling me. (And then threw away my beautiful silver Christmas tree! )Then when I painted the bathroom a beautiful bright orange hue, she had the audacity to laugh at it and make me change the color.  And it turns out, she was a lousy cook then as well! I still remember the fish that was frozen in the center; I ended up grabbing a Whopper on the way to the bowling league.

 All joking aside, as time separates me a little more from CJ’s death, I see more and more her willingness to allow God to change her over her lifetime. Becoming a masterpiece doesn’t happen overnight, it happens over a lifetime! Think of a wood carver: he begins with a large block of wood, then he can use many saws, chisels, awls, cutting tools, sanders, and even a blowtorch to shape and change the coloring of the wood, and then when he is done he can show his work to the world. BUT NOTICE, the wood block sits there for the woodcarver and allows itself to be cut, chiseled, and burned! We human beings are not blocks of wood; we are living, moving, confused creatures that want to create our own life, using our own tools and blueprints, and we mostly don’t even think about what God actually wants to do in our life! Unless we trust God and believe that his plan for our life is better than ours, we can continue to struggle and work out our feeble plans for life and never receive the gift of a new life that he freely offers us! The verse right before the one the one at the top is Ephesians 2:9, which says:

“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast”.

 God’s new life is a GIFT, and only can be received by trusting in Jesus and allowing HIM to do the work within you, changing you from the inside out over a lifetime! This change comes from God’s power and work, and gives us what we need to live as his followers. Peter gives us a glimpse of this refining and chiseling process as God’s creates our character to become his masterpiece in II Peter 1: 3-8:

³  His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. ⁴  Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. ⁵  For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; ⁶  and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; ⁷  and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. ⁸  For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

The lifelong tools God uses to carve us into his masterpieces include prayer, reading and meditating on his Word, learning to wait and listen for His voice, and then applying what we learn in everyday life, doing the good works we were created to do.   But the greatest gift God gives us is Himself, living within us through the Holy Spirit! If we allow him to, the Holy Spirit will teach us, guide us, and empower to become the unique masterpiece God intends to us to become. In CJ’s life, I recall her slowly growing and changing each year, as she humbled herself before God and listened for His Spirit to teach and guide her. Her desk is filled Bible studies, notebooks, and Bibles that are underlined and filled with notes, as well as prayer lists and journals that she compiled over decades. CJ was taking notes, making prayer lists, highlighting her Bible, and taking sermon notes on the Sunday messages up until 2 weeks before she died. That’s when her hands started shaking too much and confusion overcame her because of the liver failure. But I admire her willingness to continually be formed into the unique person God created her to be, and she never stopped learning and growing until the end.

God wants to craft each of into his unique, one of a kind, masterpiece! And he wants us to do unique, amazing things for him and his Kingdom.

God wants to fill each of us with his power, love, and hope for an amazing and eternal future with him.

Are you, and I, willing to wait on God, listen to His Spirit, and allow him to continually change us from the inside out, molding us into his sons and daughters of the Kingdom?

As I think again about my friends’ comments to “not try to find another Claudia”, I think the one quality of Claudia I would like to find in another Christian woman is the desire to allow God to form her into the unique masterpiece that he wants her to be. As for me, I would like to enjoy the privilege of sharing life with another daughter of God who has found her peace and fulfillment in God’s love! The bottom line is, God wants a better and more amazing life for us than we can ever create ourselves, and I pray that for you as well.

I will close with the wonderful prayer of Paul from Ephesians Ch. 3:

Ephesians 3:14-21 (NIV)
¹⁴  For this reason I kneel before the Father, ¹⁵  from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. ¹⁶  I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, ¹⁷  so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, ¹⁸  may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, ¹⁹  and to know this love that surpasses knowledge–that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. ²⁰  Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, ²¹  to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.