January 5: Becoming God's Children: Vision & Transformation
♫ Music:
Day 35 - Saturday, January 5
We Will Be Like Him
Scripture: I John 3:1-3
See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.
Poetry:
Blazon
by G. C. Waldrep
As far as darkness is from God
the world keeps dreaming. I dream with it,
with each breath I consent
to the torsion of these orchards, this fertile plain.
Ahead of me, in the track,
a crow pinches life from an angleworm--
thus answers aftermath with inclusion.
Indeed I covet the storm's violence.
For who among men has overtaken that ragged figure at field’s edge?
Consider the waltz, its irresponsible geometry,
replay of the drama
in which teeth strike crisp flesh
at the onset of winter.
This was the ambition of the bud's fluted glory.
This is the superscription of an immoderate regret.
I am that spark, with each return
I lift the image of my conscious flaw
past the pleasure of pure apprehension,
taste, sight, smell, touch,
the whole governing entablature.
Only the ear is vital, only the cochlea preserves its garland.
I walk among the trunks and their ash-collars.
A flame, thus kindled, draws straw
deep from the stone of finished brick, teasing out that thread--
as a stream divides each rush from his long brother
I sift, I harvest, I burn.
BECOMING GOD’S CHILDREN: VISION AND TRANSFORMATION
In Shannon Guo’s provocative Transformation Series, feather-like plumes, beads, crafted wood figurines and chains hover on the periphery of tangible representation. Contemporary, yet somehow timeless, Guo’s work bares the modernist influence of Brancusi, creating an atmosphere of afflatus that suggests change. While her creations abstractly evoke birds, angels, and perhaps even humans transformed into angelic beings, I read these works as two stages of the same titular event: transformation. Transformation is something people frequently seek; yet it is often beyond our own ability to accomplish. It is ethereal, comes from above. Today’s Scripture passage suggests that we are works of art crafted in God’s wise and loving hands, precious beings whose ultimate beauty will unfold in ways we can’t currently fully imagine. This is because we are told we will “be like him,” the Lord of all creation, and thus we will be able to fully see the ways God appears in the universe. Our belief serves as a catalyst for this supernatural change, this beatific vision, and our desire for purity distinguishes us as children of the living God.
In G. C. Waldrop’s “Blazon,” readers are invited to observe the stark contrast between the ideal world of God that we are invited to inhabit and the world in which we currently abide, a world in which God’s glory is manifest, yet is often buried beneath the quotidian. The seemingly random act of a crow eating a worm is part of a larger pattern designed by God that ultimately works for good. That is to say, nothing is truly random: rather than seeing earthly life as “nasty, brutish, and short,” there is always a purpose. The speaker of the poem “covet[s] the storm’s violence,” because it is only in a place of radical transformation that any kind of lasting change is possible. Our lives are often lived in the shadow of an “immoderate regret,” but more fiery embers burn below. Returning to 1 John 3, “what we will be has not yet been made known.” God has planted within us a spark that will never die out. Waldrop’s speaker “lifts the image of [his] conscious flaw” beyond “pure apprehension,” and urges us to transcend the “governing entablature” of the human senses. This divine spark will eventually become a “flame,” and in a remarkable image asking us to envision the straw within the “finished brick” that it helped to form, we too, the poem indicates, will be refined (“sift[ed]” and “burn[ed]”) into the elements that are most true to the new nature God has given us.
The music that accompanies today’s devotional, Gretchen Yanover’s “Suddenly I Felt a Joy,” plucks along with a steady, vibrant confidence. The melody evokes the carefree playfulness of children, of adults allowing themselves to enjoy life’s blessings in a childlike way. If we are indeed children of the living God, then what better way to approach life than as a gracious, obedient follower of Jesus Christ whose life long journey is to know God more completely.
Prayer:
Lord, help us to daily appreciate the blessing of allowing us to call ourselves your children. Please produce radical transformation in our lives that will help bring others into your kingdom. Encourage us to be pure in our motives, and purer still in our devotion to You.
Amen
Marc Malandra
Associate Professor of English
Biola University
About the Artwork:
Transformation Series, 2017 (two views)
Xin (Shannon) Guo
Silver filigree with fimo clay and pearls
These evocative little works are part of an extensive series of fine art jewelry pieces the artist began in 2013 on the theme transformation. Like a chrysalis that provides for the seemingly miraculous transformation of a caterpillar, ugly, slow, and slug-like, into a glorious butterfly that takes flight, the delicate elegance of the silver filigree wings against the weighty black body signals a transformation so complete as to become a different creature—pure and free. These delicate works were inspired by sources as diverse as the fantastic and elaborate traditional horned silver headdresses of the Miao people of South China (one of the 55 official ethnic minorities in China), the seraphim described in the Bible, and images of Moses and the brazen serpent which the Israelites were instructed to touch in order to be protected from the plague of serpents God sent as punishment for their impiety. As the artist explains, “Nature has always been the source and inspiration for my work. Created by the image of the Creator, I create works that reflect my faith and record my life experiences. The definition of contemporary jewelry has been broadened and now a jewelry piece serves as a stage—emotions to be expressed, stories to be told, memories to be shared, statements to be presented.”
About the Artist:
Xin (Shannon) Guo is one of the most well known pioneering jewelry artists and educators in China. Her expertise has won her multiple recognitions and awards. Her works has developed a unique style, which often draws inspiration from nature and her understanding of life, her Christian faith, social issues, and environmental protection. She received her BFA in graphic design in 1989 in China, and both her MA and MFA degrees in metals and jewelry, and a minor in ceramics from Indiana University of Pennsylvania in 1999. On her return to China, she built the jewelry and metals studio for the College of Fine Arts of Shanghai University where she directs the master’s program. Guo founded twocities gallery in Shanghai, the first gallery in China devoted to contemporary craft media. She has curated numerous exhibitions in the fields of contemporary glass, ceramic, lacquer, jewelry and metals in China and around the world. She is a leading force in her field, serving on the boards of many national organizations and arts committees that are shaping the future of these arts in China.
About the Music:
“Suddenly I Felt Joy” from the album Bow and Cello
About the Composer and Performer:
Seattle cellist Gretchen Yanover has been attached to her instrument since she began playing at the age of ten in her public school music program. She was immersed in the world of classical music until her college years, when she expanded her range to include playing in contemporary bands. Once she was introduced to a loop sampler, Gretchen found a new voice for her instrument. She began to improvise and compose in this context, creating her own instrumental atmospheres and melodies. She has three solo albums to date.
About the Poet:
G. C. Waldrep (b. 1968) is an American poet and historian. He earned undergraduate and doctoral degrees in history at Harvard University and Duke University, before receiving an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Iowa. His collections of poetry include: Goldbeater’s Skin (2003); Disclamor (2007); Archicembalo (2009); Your Father on the Train of Ghosts (2011), and the long poem Testament (2015). Waldrep’s work is known for its lush musicality. In an interview, he once noted, “I trained as a singer and the idea that poetry should be performative on some basis—that it should live in the tongue—is important to me.” His honors and awards include prizes from the Poetry Society of America and the Academy of American Poets, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the North Carolina Arts Council. He currently teaches at Bucknell University, edits the journal West Branch, and serves as Editor-at-Large for The Kenyon Review. His work has appeared in Poetry, Ploughshares, Boston Review, Colorado Review, Gettysburg Review, New American Writing, American Letters & Commentary, Seneca Review, Harper's, and elsewhere.
About the Devotional Writer:
Marc Malandra
Associate Professor of English
Biola University
Marc Malandra is an Associate Professor of English at Biola University. Malandra teaches courses in American literature, composition and creative writing at Biola University. His poetry and scholarship have appeared in over three-dozen publications. He attends EV Free Fullerton, and lives in Brea, California, with his wife Junko, college-aged children Noah and Sasha, and their cat Tora.