“Don’t be conformed to this world, but be transformed!”
Romans 12:1
Whittle. Such a weird sounding word, isn’t it? To be honest, I had to look up how to even spell it! But over the last week, that’s what has been on my mind…this concept of “whittling”.
You see, over the last few years, a few of my friends and I have been writing music together. My role in our partnership is primarily writing lyrics. Sometimes I start out with what I think is a great concept. To the naked eye, the words on paper look like a masterfully crafted lyric, with great rhymes and imagery. Then we start to examine it, line by line. We start whittling away at the song. Sometimes when the song is done, it looks nothing like what it originally started out as. To be honest, sometimes it kind of hurts, too...to delete some of the words that I chose originally because I loved them. But the truth is, if I settled with my original first draft "masterpiece", the song would never be transformed into the final beautiful song it is today. (Yes, I might be slightly biased with that term "beautiful" but in my humble opinion, that's what the end result is!) You see, I had to be willing to chop it up, take out the "unecessary" and "useless" words in order to make it better. No, not "better", I had to do it in order to make it the BEST it can be. It was necessary pain. Kind of like waxing your eyebrows.
I grew up in Northeast Ohio, and on a few occasions, my dad would take us over to Dover, Ohio, to visit the Warther Museum. Unless you’re from the area, you’ve probably never heard of it. No big deal - no reason to put this on your bucket list, right? Wrong. As a kid, I remember going under duress several times because not only did my dad want to go, but I had already been there a few times on field trips. (When you're a child, once is enough for a museum!) But my dad loved that place, and although we didn't go often, I remember how enamored he was with it. As an adult, now I understand why he loved it and wanted to expose us to its offerings.
What I remember most about the museum (now in its 4th generation of knife makers and wood carvers) is that there’s one specific display that you cannot miss. It is an exact scale model, inside and out, with working pieces, of a Great Northern locomotive – all originally carved out of one block of wood by Mr. “Mooney” Warther. This man who had a 2nd grade education could envision something and create it, to scale, exactly how it should be. He started with nothing special – just a block of wood. Then he began carving. Whittling. Until little by little, whittle by whittle, that block of wood began to be transformed into what the master craftsman, Mr. Warther, envisioned in his mind for that block of wood.
How much more able is my omniscient Master Carver able to whittle me into his beautiful creation? The Bible says in Jeremiah He has plans for me. He’s thinking about ME, and as the Creator, He knows what He wants me to ultimately look like. He knows HIS PLAN for my end result. The difference in the two, of course, is that a piece of wood is an inanimate object. It couldn’t jump out of the way when the knife was headed toward it to carve away a blemish or cut off an unnecessary part that wasn’t necessary. But me? Well, sometimes that’s exactly what I do. Sometimes it’s easier to jump out of the way than see the long-term benefit of obedience. God created us as free-will beings. He doesn’t force Himself on us. Just like it's up to me to be willing to whittle away the lyrics of a song, it’s also up to ME to allow God to whittle me into His beautiful creation. It’s my choice to allow Him to carve away the blemishes of sin and transform me into His master creation – one whittle at a time.
Sometimes we talk about our lives as if it’s God painting us into His masterpiece. I’ve probably blogged about that myself over the years. But this morning, I’m thinking that for a Christian who is yielding to the Holy Spirit and allowing Him to make changes, perhaps “whittling” is a much more accurate term compared to “painting”. Either way, the bottom line for me this morning is to ask myself the tough questions. Do I look different now compared to last year, last month, or even last week? Unlike that train made from one block of wood at the Warther Museum, on display for all to see, I have never arrived. My life should always be changing as the Master Whittler carves away the blemishes and transforms me into His image, whittle by whittle, one whittle at a time.
---Beth Banfill
www.GodandMe2theMax.com