Crafted Together

Posted on June 25, 2026 by Jacqueline Coleman

My 6-year-old granddaughter is quite inquisitive. Every day we can expect to receive questions from her like, “How do erasers actually erase the pencil marks?” and “Why is a ladybug red?” A few weeks ago, she asked, “How are toilets made?” We found a YouTube video to watch and learned together. Part of the process of making toilet bowls and tanks is to pour each of them into a mold so that all of them are identical. Makes sense, right? And being identical (or nearly so) is quite necessary in that arena, but it doesn’t make sense for us, who are lovingly and carefully created in the imago Dei—the image of God.

Think about that for a minute. We are each made in the image of God, the same image of God, but none of us are identical! We are intimately and intentionally crafted by the exact same Creator, yet none of us look the same, act the same, or are the same. How boring would that be if we were the same? Each of us have had different experiences in life, good and bad, that God, when we give those experiences over to Him, can and does use to craft us into what He intends for us to be, what He intends for our good and the good of others, and for the expansion of His Kingdom.

The crafting of each of us differently, not into an identical mold, allows us to fit together like pieces in a puzzle, or pieces in a larger piece of pottery, to serve alongside one another to share His love with all those we meet. While we are each created in the imago Dei, we better and more fully display the imago Dei as we fill our roles using our God-given talents, abilities, and spiritual gifts together as the family of God. Those experiences that we have gone through? God wants us to allow Him to work through us to love others with what we have learned. He wants us to love others who are already believers and to love others who are not yet believers so that each of them can, in turn, use their experiences to love whomever God puts in their path.

In Matthew 28:18–20, Jesus commissioned every believer with the task of making disciples, baptizing them and teaching them. Teaching them what? Teaching them to make disciples. This process is cyclical. We are to make disciples who make disciples who make disciples.

Take special note of the order of the commissioning that Jesus gave. First, we make disciples; second, we baptize them; and only third do we teach them. Outside of having made a decision to follow Christ and understanding what baptism means, there is no requirement for disciples to have it all together to be baptized and to join in spreading the good news. Baptism itself is a proclamation of what God has done, what God is doing, and what God will do. Baptism is a symbol of choosing to identify with and take into oneself the death and Resurrection of Christ (see Rom. 6:3–4).

None of us are perfect and none of us will ever learn everything there is for us to learn about what it means to be a follower of Christ. What is important for us to remember is that God has always been there with us, in every experience, in every situation. He is patiently waiting for us to hand it all over to Him—the good and the bad, the parts that we are secretly holding onto, the parts that we do not wish to admit, the parts that we are proud to name, and the parts of which we are ashamed, so that He can mold and craft all those parts into what is best in only the way that He can. Part of the beauty in this molding and crafting is that He has called us into a community where we can help to bear the burden of others and others can help to bear our burdens as we allow God to craft and mold us together (see Rom. 12:4–5, Gal. 6:2). Who is God calling you to step beside even as you allow someone to step beside you? Step out into that calling, into those spaces, and embrace new growth.