Any Formation Lately? > Marble Collegiate Church

Current Articles | Categories | Search | Syndication

Saturday, August 07, 2010

Any Formation Lately?
By webmaster @ 12:01 AM :: 997 Views :: 1 Comments :: Nina Frost

I write this at Chautauqua, the adult ed heaven in upstate NY (http://www.ciweb.org/) dedicated to things spiritual and artistic and thoughtful. It’s also a week I have been working on the adult ed classes for Marble starting in the fall. Both place and task pivot on what I would call “spiritual formation,” as in… what helps people grow spiritually? What literally forms them, stretches them, surprises them on the path of their lives?

Yes, formation comes from books, a good sermon, a compelling class. But I remember the quivering unformed blob I was when I stumbled into a church in my mid-30s, sad, vulnerable, basically clueless. Formation happened there in spades, thanks to fiercely caring and wise clergy, and a community of folk eager to journey together into what it means to live an awakened life in the Christian faith. The spark got lit there, and the flame still burns. Thanks be to God.

Sparks that form us come from many places, but I think there are also optimal conditions for them to land in. Vulnerability can help, as well as being in a place of transition. Embracing our identity as pilgrims, as seekers on the way also equips us. A lot of formation work is inner: prayer, psychological inquiry, genuine wrestling with our shadows—and our light.

And God’s shadow. A line the preacher, the current president of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, used last Sunday startled me: What do you do with “all the times God’s answer to our prayers is the very adversity you seek to discard?”

What do you do indeed? In difficult times, times of descent, even a loss of identity, spiritual formation takes on a whole different cast. And yet… and yet… it is during these times that we are being shaped for a new life, albeit often an initially strange and unwelcome one.

Church is the place we can talk about formation from the place of what is real: What confuses, what hurts, what astonishes, what heals. We are all “theologians,” literally engaged in “God talk” and Marble this fall will give you even more places and opportunities to engage faith questions.

In the meantime, think of your own “formation”: Who or what has been formational in your spiritual life? Share them in responses to this blog. And this summer: is something working on you, shaping you, pulling at you, adding (or subtracting) to you as a seeker of God? Share that, too.

Comments

By SniffNY @ Monday, August 09, 2010 8:54 AM

Thank you for your invitation to respond and your thought provoking questions. My most intense periods of growth came from tragedy and anger that by grace was redirected toward God. I had endless questions about a God that would create people that would damage each other and give us emotions that could hurt so deeply. That redirected anger probably saved me from even more tragedy.

Summer with its long colorful sunsets does pull at me for spiritual growth, not from tragedy but from wonder. I am grateful for those lazy afternoons, outside, preferably away from the city when I can appreciate the amazing gift of life.

You must be logged in to post a comment. You can login here