Your Life Is A Poem Of God

Did you know (realize) that as a Christian, born-again into the family of God, your life is a poem or a poetic expression from God to this needy world? You most likely would not realize this before your salvation experience (your conversion to Christ). Please read Ephesians 2:10 below and notice the word “workmanship” that I put in parenthesis with red and bold text.

Ephesians 2:10: For we are His “workmanship”, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

In the original Greek Text, it looks like this, with the word “workmanship” from above also highlighted in bold and red in the Greek text below.

αὐτοῦ γάρ ἐσμεν “ποίημα”, κτισθέντες ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ ἐπὶ ἔργοις ἀγαθοῖς, οἷς προητοίμασεν ὁ Θεὸς ἵνα ἐν αὐτοῖς περιπατήσωμεν.

“ποίημα” is the word “poiēma” (English pronunciation: poy'-ay-mah). Just by looking at it, you can easily see the English world “poem” in it. So, you as a Christian are God’s poema or poem. Now - who is God writing His poem for? He is writing it both for the world and for the church. Your life’s poem is a beautiful and creative expression of the person and character of Jesus Christ, that is designed to be a blessing to everyone in the world that sees it and a gift to the church…as in the universal body of Christ. Your spiritual gift would also be a part of this poem (poetic expression).

www.merriam-webster.com defines workmanship as:

1. Something effected, made, or produced
2. The art or skill of a workman
3. The quality imparted to a thing in the process of making it

Ephesians 2:10 states exactly that in saying you are His workmanship (poema) created in Christ Jesus for good works and all of this was prepared beforehand…before you were born and even before the creation of the universe. This will blow your mind. This will cause you to look at yourself in a completely new and unique way. God made you. God imparted the qualities in you and continues to refine those qualities. God owns all of the copyrights and the redemption rights to your life’s poem.

I found a good summary of what a poem is in a literary context at:

https://poemanalysis.com/poetry-explained/elements-of-poetry.

Poetry is an intricate literary form that incorporates rhyme, figurative language, sound devices, and meter in order to evoke a wide array of meanings. The language of poetry is not always straightforward. It guides readers to reach a conclusion but never gives out any details explicitly. Such is the beauty of a poetry text that demands readers’ attentive and creative participation. With the knowledge of the important poetry elements, we can understand a poem’s message and appreciate the text more effectively.

This source also lists the 10 basic elements of a poem and it is fascinating to think of these in relationship to the poem of your life penned by God Himself.

1. Structure & Form
2. Meter
3. Rhyme & Rhyme Scheme
4. Sound & Rhythm
5. Subject
6. Speaker
7. Figurative Language & Poetic Devices
8. Theme
9. Tone and Mood
10. Syntax

With a little imagination, you can visualize each of these elements, as elements of your life, your personality, your emotional make-up, your intellectual assets, your ability to speak, your spiritual gift, your faith, your hopes and dreams, how God’s providence has worked in and around your life, and on and on! These elements go all the way down to your DNA. Scripture makes a point to say that you are fearfully and wonderfully made.

Psalm 139:14: I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.

Have you ever praised God that you are “fearfully and wonderfully made”? Have you ever told God that His creative work in making you is “wonderful”? A great paraphrase of this verse by Jennifer Heeren says that “God made all the delicate, inner parts of my body. He knit me together within my mother’s womb. I was made wonderfully complex. God knew me as He was painstakingly designing me with much loving care”.

If you think back to a few of the most famous poems in history (listed below), these poems are shallow and temporal and boring compared to the poem of your life and I am not discounting the beauty or value or inspiration of poems like these.

• ‘Sonnet 18’ By William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
• ‘Holy Sonnet 10: Death, Be Not Proud’ By John Donne (1572–1631)
• ‘Daffodils’ By Williams Wordsworth (1170–1850)
• ‘A Psalm of Life’ By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882)
• ‘On His Blindness’ By John Milton (1608–1674)
• ‘The Tiger’ By William Blake (1757–1827)
• ‘The Road Not Taken’ By Robert Frost (1874–1963)

People have found great meaning and inspiration in good poems, but poems are just lines written down on a piece of paper, compared to your life’s “living poem” lived out in real time. The poetic expressions in these poems don’t compare to your eternal story…you are a walking, talking, 3 dimensional divine poem created in the image of Almighty God!

When did the Lord start writing the poem of your life? David answered this question in Psalm 139:16, which says…Your eyes saw my unformed body and all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of those days ever came to be. Psalm 139:16 adds this to your story in explaining…”For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb. Jeremiah 1:5 clearly states…“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you”.

Everyday the Holy Spirit adds another line (ordained in eternity past) to the poem of your life to continue expressing His love and His goodness and His mercy to the world through you and through Christ in you. Remember Colossians 3:3-4 from last week that Christ is your life. Paul added in Philippians 1:6 that he was sure of this…”That he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at (by) the day of Jesus Christ”.

On any given day, one of us could look into a mirror (or the mirror of your life) and say…”I sure don’t see anything poetic about what I am seeing in the mirror or in my life”. And it may not look like God is doing creative/poetic work in our life at that moment, but we just cannot see all that God is doing – but He is and He never stops His creative work in you…”For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. (Romans 11:29).

This is why Jesus said in John 13:7…”You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand”. Paul also explained how sometimes it is just hard to see things clearly (what God is doing). Consider these two verses.

1 Corinthians 13:12: Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.
2 Corinthians 3:18: But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.

So - we don’t give up or give up hope, because we know we walk by faith and not be sight (2 Corinthians 5:7).

Michelangelo was once asked what he was doing as he chipped away at a shapeless rock. He replied, “I’m liberating an angel from this stone”.

Let me leave you with this prayer to consider praying now.

Dear Lord, Thank You for fearfully and wonderfully creating each of us. Thank You for giving us worth in Your eyes. Help us live as the one You uniquely intended us to be. Help us abide instead of strive, living peacefully and joyfully as heirs to Your Kingdom and co-heirs with Christ. In Jesus’ Name, Amen. (by Julie Sunne)