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Mark’s painting of his brother and sister and himself outside our home. |
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Mark left behind him many evidences of his skill as an artist. We will value these pictures even more now he has gone. The picture we brought to church today will stay in our living room as a constant reminder of our son’s special skill with brush and paints.
It is not a unique skill of course – many are able to sketch and paint – but for those of us fortunate enough to have an original Mark Green on our wall it will be a continuing remembrance of the man we love.
Mark did not often paint or draw an original or imagined picture – he preferred to start with a photograph or another illustration – and he transformed it. He took the ordinary two-dimensional image of a view or a person and worked at it with his brushes or pencils so that it became more than a familiar picture. It had his skill, his time, his energy woven into it. It was no longer a mechanical image – but evidence of a living skill.
We acknowledge today our love and respect for him – whose own life was often like a painting painted with dark colours and troubled strokes. God was at work with Mark and it is a miracle of His grace that He can take the two dimensional ordinary person and transform him or her into a work that demonstrates His handiwork. That work may not be exhibited in its completeness in this life – but it will be completed!
You may not think that Mark would have much in common with the Old Testament prophet Jeremiah, but I believe he would have understood the significance of this reading. Here it is – just six verses from chapter 18:
“This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: “Go down to the potter’s house, and there I will give you my message.” So I went down to the potter’s house, and I saw him working at the wheel. But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him. Then the word of the Lord came to me: “…, can I not do with you as this potter does?” declares the Lord.“Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, …”
Mark would have happily stood beside the prophet that day and watched another artist at work. He would have watched as the potter formed a pot – and it became spoiled in the potter’s hands. Then the potter re-shaped the clay again – patiently and skillfully until it pleased him. Mark would have recognized the skill required.
Mark understood that God can reshape PEOPLE and LIVES. That is the work of God in Jesus Christ. He takes a life otherwise spoiled or disappointing or failing – and He transforms it into that which is beautiful and eternal – that which pleases Him.
Oh if only we could do that in real life! If only we could make the changes we want to our lives, and sometimes the lives of others! There is no earthly artist who can do that. Putting things right is God’s work. Making things beautiful and making a beauty which lasts for ever is the work of God’s grace.
For years we have prayed, and many of you have prayed with us, that God would help Mark make the very best of his life. Sometimes we foolishly thought we knew what was best for him. Sometimes we even tried to reshape him ourselves to our own satisfaction.
Mark belonged to God. Early in his life he gave himself to Christ in faith. It is God who transforms, not us. We hoped that his life would even out, become more settled. We prayed to God to help Mark – and He did not fail. He did not answer our prayers as we expected. But now He has taken Mark to Himself – and the final verdict on this lovely man is God’s, as it will be on all of us too.
But in the doing of it God saw that Mark’s life would touch many other lives as well as ours. Perhaps he touched yours?
In his own humble but gifted way Mark could take up his pencil or his brush and render a likeness – often such that we wanted to keep it as something extraordinary and special. His gifts are a reminder to us that God was working with Mark’s life. He wanted that. But there is a difference that we need to notice. Sometimes we do indeed feel a bit like an unfinished masterpiece, or a spoiled, even hopeless case – but God does not take us into His hands automatically. He waits for us to respond to his invitation to reshape our lives, to give us purpose and direction in this life and beauty in the life to come.
He sent Jesus into the world to share our experience. And at pretty much the age that Mark died, Jesus died.
The death of Jesus is the supreme triumph over all that is wrong in the world. The Easter story that begins at the cross is God’s answer to human sin and human need. It is completed in His resurrection and ascension.
Yes – the cross is a frequent subject of art down through the ages. But sadly that is often all that it is. The reality is different. “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.” “The Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.” We stand today in the presence of mortality – it is a good time to be reminded that God has other plans for us – if we will come to Him in honest repentance and put our trust in Jesus Christ.
“Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, …”
Only Jesus can make us into that which pleases Him.
“Finish, then, Thy new creation;
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