Always Being Re-Formed

By Rev. Gusti Linnea Newquist  


Genesis 2:4-14, 18-22



Genesis 2:4b-14, 18-22
On the day when the God of Breath

made earth and heaven,

when every shrub of the field

was not yet in the earth

and every seed of the field

had not yet sprung up—

because the God of Breath

had not caused it to rain upon the earth,

and there was not humanity to work the humus,

but a mist ascended from the earth

and would irrigate all the face of the humus—

then the God of Breath

formed the human dust

from the humus

and breathed in its nostrils

a breath of life,

and it became a human—

a living breathing body.



And the God of Breath

planted a garden in Eden in the East,

and there God put the human

which God had formed.

And the God of Breath

caused every beautiful

and fruitful tree that exists

to sprout from the soil,

as well as a tree of

the knowledge of good and evil.



Now a river flows out from Eden

for irrigating the garden

and from there it is divided,

there it becomes the head of four rivers.

The name of the first is Pishon;

It is the one circling about all the earth of the Havilah,

in which there is gold.

And this gold of the earth is good;

bdellium and onyx are there.



And the name of the second river is the Gihon;

That one is winding through all the earth of Cush.

And the name of the third river is Tigris,

which flows east of Assyria.

And the fourth river,

that is the Euphrates.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Now the God of Breath said,

“It is not good to be the only human, all alone.

I will make for the human a corresponding helper.”



And the God of Breath formed from the earth

every beast of the field and all the birds of the heavens,

and God brought them to the human

in order to see what the human would call each creature.

And every name that the human called

each living, breathing creature . . .

that was the creature’s name.



The human called forth names

for all the animals and for birds of the heavens

and for all the life of the field,

but for the human,

a corresponding help was not found.



So the God of Breath

caused deep sleep to fall on the human

and the human slept

and God took the human’s primary rib,

and then its flesh closed in.



And the God of Breath built the rib taken

from the original human

to form a new human—a woman

and God brought her to the re-formed first human—

now a man.

And the re-formed first human said,

“At last, this is the occurrence of substance from my substance and flesh from my flesh;

this one is called woman—

and I am called man—

because woman and man were re-formed—

by God—

from and for each other.”





Can you believe it has been a year? A full year this week since I came to you from Tucson to serve as your second interim pastor. Or your third, depending on how you count.



When I met with your Interim Pastor Search Committee one year ago I told them that if they hired me, I would hope to lead the session and the congregation toward a posture of embracing transition as a way of life and not just a moment in time. That every part of life is a journey of trusting the Providence of God as we travel from one place to the next. That an “interim” period is a time to practice that trust. That our own Presbyterian tradition even has built within it an explicit expectation that we are always in need of the re-forming Spirit of God. That any time we think we have arrived at the perfect church or the perfect theology or the perfect mission or even the perfect pastor, the Spirit of the Living God will emphatically knock us off our self-righteous perch and demand we start all over again! And that this can even be a good thing. Even if it is hard. Especially if it is hard.



It is one of the great slogans of the 16th Century Protestant Reformation, which is the religious heritage of our own Presbyterian denomination. That the Church is Reformed and Always Being Reformed. Or as Bill Walker’s Latin expertise argues “always in need of being reformed.”



We have learned a little something about the need of being re-formed in this long-term interim season, have we not? We have hired new staff and then turned around to realize we needed to hire different new staff. We have fixed our financial procedures and then turned around to realize we needed to re-fix our financial procedures. We have gotten serious about faithful stewardship education and rallied around the mission of the Child Development Center. And we have just plain gotten on with our lives after the enormous loss of Ilene and Kenny and Linda and Rene.



It has certainly been a year of re-formation for Madison Square. Healing and fixing, yes. But also joyful, as I hoped it could be. Gathering in focus groups and prayer groups and conversation groups and mission groups to share what we love most about this church. Re-forming our identity in the compassionate heart of the steadfast love of God that will not ever let us go. Singing and clapping and celebrating and communing. And may I dare suggest it has actually been fun!?



Yes, we are a church in need of being re-formed, as our tradition has said all along. It can be hard, it can be fun, it can be everything in between. We can resist it or we can embrace it. But I have learned as much as I have tried to teach that re-formation really is a way of life, as I told that interview team, and not just a moment in time. Just ask my car, which is definitely in the middle of a “Great Re-Formation”!



The good news for all of us, as far as I can tell from the Scriptures this morning, is that God has been up to the work of forming and re-forming, and re-forming Creation from our very origins. If you read closely in Genesis you can see that our re-formation as a new creation occurs almost immediately after our original formation! In fact, God's work of forming and re-forming and re-forming God's good creation—including humanity and the faith traditions that nurture and guide us as the people of God—is woven into the very fabric of creation.

According to this second chapter in Genesis, God made heaven and earth and a mist to irrigate the humus. And it was very good, something to be celebrated! But it was not good for God to be alone. So God re-formed creation by forming a human being, breathing God's own breath into dust from the original humus that God created. And God placed the human in a beautiful garden with trees and fruit, including the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And the human being and the beautiful garden were very good, something to be celebrated! But it was not good for the earth to exist without running water. So God re-formed creation again by forming a river to flow out from the garden (may I call it the font of our identity?) and divided it into four prominent rivers and cultivated gold and other precious metals alongside each river. And it was good, something to be celebrated!



But it was not good for the human to be alone. So God re-formed creation again by forming more creatures from the earth to live in the fields and to fly in the air. And they were very good, something to be celebrated! But it was not good for the human to be without a corresponding helper. So God re-formed the original human in order to form a corresponding helper, the male and the female both re-formed from the original human in order to provide companionship for one another. And it was very good, something to be celebrated! Finally, we had a human community for support and encouragement. Finally the re-formation seemed to be complete!



But then along came the serpent and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the need for yet another re-formation. And another. And another. This time because of our own self-inflicted-nonsense. The first re-formation of humanity because God needs a second chance. The ones that follow because we do.



But here is the promise of the ongoing re-formation, whether it is because God needs it or we do. Through every moment of formation and re-formation the God who is nearer to us than our breath, the God whose Spirit is, in fact, our breath itself, is present, is personal, is breathing life and energy and wholeness and hope throughout every part of this beautiful and good and glorious creation. And God isn’t done with us yet! Whatever re-formation you need or I need or that my 2009 Pontiac Vibe needs—the ones we know we need and the ones we pretend we don’t need—God isn’t done with us yet! And God is doing everything God can to make this very good creation just a little bit “good-er.”



Because being formed and re-formed and always being re-formed in this primal story of our creation is not about change for the sake of change. Or chaos for the sake of chaos. Or theological inquiry for the sake of theological inquiry. Being formed and re-formed and always being re-formed is about companionship, community, finding and receiving help. It is about learning to live in joyous relationship with one another over and over and over again. And it is fun!



Being formed and re-formed and always being re-formed in this primal story of our creation never forgets that we are all creatures of the earth, substance from one another's substance, flesh from one another's flesh. And that we really have no choice but to treat one another with reverence and awe and respect in every moment of re-formation, tending to the pain as well as to the joy. Because the reality is that in our moments of re-formation, we very often have wounds in our side where our ribs have been removed, just like the re-formed first human must have had. And the reality is that in our moments of re-formation, we very often lament what we have lost by being separated from our origins, just like the re-formed second human must have done. And the reality is that we are often being re-formed by our anesthetizing God deep in our sleep, completely unaware that our lives have radically changed until we finally wake up and see a whole new life in front of us.



And being formed and re-formed and always being re-formed in this primal story of our creation means that every act of re-formation returns us to the God of Breath who has been with us all along. To the breath of God, which is nearer to us than our own breath. To the breath of God, which makes us a living, breathing body of miraculous creation. To the breath of God that reminds us to breathe through the chaos and the anxiety and the pain and the exhilaration. Which is why everyone from your therapist to your pastor to your yoga instructor will remind you to breathe when the chaos of re-formation brings you to your breaking point. Because that is how the Spirit of God can re-form us the best.



The bottom line of our formation and our re-formation and our ongoing re-formation as a congregation, as a denomination, and as individuals and families with our own lives beyond these walls is that we are indeed a miracle and we should not ever forget it! We are earth and water and the lifelong breath of God, formed into glorious creatures of the earth. Not only created in the image of God but also in our very living, breathing bodies a treasure of irrigated earth formed into human dust and filled with the very breath of God. God's Spirit-filled creature of the earth—a human from the humus—an adam from the adamah, as the Hebrew says, a living breathing body of earth and water and God's divine spirit flowing through us. The very breath of God flowing through us no matter how we are being re-formed! That is always and forever who we really are!



And so we celebrate God's playful and joyous work of re-formation among us with our own attitude of play and joy. With a deep love for the beautiful gift of God's glorious creation that each one of us is in our living, breathing bodies. With a heartfelt gratitude for the companionship we provide one another and for the “corresponding help” we can be to one another in the midst of the challenges that come with change and in celebration of the many opportunities that lie before us.



Because we are still about the business of being re-formed here at Madison Square. And it can continue to be an amazing Alleluia!



I pray it may be so. Amen.