Formation
Summary
As the Movement series continues, Dominic Jackson turns to the theme of formation—the lifelong process of becoming like Jesus. Rooted in Matthew 28, this sermon looks at the Great Commission as an ongoing invitation to apprenticeship. To follow Jesus is to be continually shaped: receiving and responding to God’s love, embracing his teachings, embodying his rhythms, and walking in community with others.
Dominic challenges a shallow view of faith that stops at a moment and invites us into something deeper and slower. Formation is not about perfection or information—it’s about transformation over time. Like clay in the hands of a potter, or even something as ordinary as a bar of soap carved into something beautiful, our lives are being shaped every day. The question is not if we are being formed—but by what—and whether we are becoming more like Jesus.
Questions for reflection
When you think about your faith, do you tend to see it as a moment or a process? Why?
How has your understanding of the Great Commission been shaped in the past (conversion vs. discipleship)?
What does it look like in your actual, everyday life (work, home, stress, routines) to be “formed” in the way of Jesus?
Which part of the formation definition stands out most to you: receiving, responding, embracing, embodying, or community?
Where might you be settling for knowing about Jesus rather than living like Jesus?
What rhythms (prayer, rest, community, scripture, etc.) are currently shaping your life—for better or worse?
Who are the people most influencing your formation right now? Are they leading you toward Jesus?
How do you typically respond to failure or imperfection in your spiritual life?
What resonated with you about the idea that formation requires both addition and subtraction (things added and things cut away)?
What is one small, concrete step you can take this week to more intentionally participate in your formation?
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Now that I've been in the Midwest for a little while — we're coming up on our two-year anniversary in a couple of weeks — I've had an epiphany that probably won't surprise any of you, but that nobody warned me about when I moved here.
Apparently, in Iowa, we have two winters.
The first winter is brought to you by the Hallmark Channel: ice skating, playing in the snow, hot cocoa, Bing Crosby on the radio. It's wonderful. But then there's the second winter. The second winter is a yearly brief return to the ice age. Have you ever seen the movie The Grey with Liam Neeson — the one where his plane goes down in Alaska and he has to fight off wolves and try not to freeze to death? That's what second winter feels like, at least to the Californian in the room. And there are things about Iowa that sound made up but aren't — like exploding trees. Nobody told me about those. Or snow squalls. I still don't entirely know what that is. Or corn sweats, which come later. Anyway. That's my weekly Iowa report.
Wrapping Up the Series
We are wrapping up our series on Movement — looking at how God moves, how we move toward his invitation and become followers, and how we ultimately move out into our communities, living out the way of Jesus.
This series has been anchored in the Great Commission, Matthew 28, while also holding up our three core values as a church: presence, formation, and renewal. Three words you'll hear a lot around here. Last week we talked about renewal. This morning we're going to close by talking about formation.
Scot McKnight calls this Christoformity. Ruth Haley Barton describes it as the transforming self. I love that language — an ongoing transformation that happens in a person. Changing, growing, continual.
Spiritual formation is one of those terms that means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. To some it sounds entirely orthodox, ancient, with deep roots. To others it's new language. To some it sounds almost mystical. And to many it's just plain confusing.
So here is a definition we actually have on our website — and I want to be clear, I didn't write this. I'm not quoting myself. It was here before I got here, but I really like the language:
Formation is the lifelong process of receiving and responding to God's love. For this reason, we seek to embrace the teachings of Jesus, embody the rhythms of Jesus, and live within the community of Jesus — all through the power of the Spirit who makes us new.
You'll notice words like receive, respond, embrace. I love how this describes both what formation is and why it's one of our core values. But as you read it, you might be wondering: what does this actually look like in my life? I can understand it on a Sunday morning, during quiet time — but what does formation mean at 11:00 AM during a staff meeting on a Tuesday? What does it mean on the freeway? During tax season? What does formation look like the other 99% of the time? And what does any of it have to do with Matthew 28?
That's where we're going this morning.
Prayer
Lord, as we begin this conversation about being formed in the way of Jesus, I can't imagine starting without turning to you first. Help us to see formation — as difficult as it can be at times — as an act of love, as a desire you have for returning and reconciling us to you, as an opportunity to live the way we were designed to live all along. I pray for your eyes and your heart as we approach this text. Let it be more than just a story, but your story. Let it be more than just information, but an invitation for transformation. We pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen.
A Lifelong Process
I want to move through our definition line by line — the way we'd normally work through a passage. We'll look at the Bible too, but I want to really understand some practical examples and applications, and then close by asking God to do just this in our lives.
Let's start at the beginning: Formation is the lifelong process of receiving and responding to God's love.
A few things jump out immediately. First: lifelong process. This is not a singular moment. It's a life of following him.
Look at Matthew 28 again, and pay attention to the active versus passive language — it's even clearer in the original Greek, but you can catch it in English too:
Jesus says go — not arrive. He says all nations — a continual, ongoing reality, not a single location or one-time event. He says baptizing — not baptism. He says teaching — not teach. There is movement here, and that movement continues long after the first commission.
"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."
Notice: in order to be a disciple who makes disciples — which is the call here — it is an ongoing, continual process.
But here's the problem. I would say that 99% of the sermons I've heard on this text treat it as being entirely about evangelism. Tell as many people as you can about Jesus. Hop on a boat, go on a mission trip, whatever you need to do. Go and talk about Jesus. And the result of hearing it taught that way is that the Great Commission becomes about sharing knowledge and counting converts — not making disciples. Let me explain, because I used to feel exactly this way.
The Youth Camp Story
Many years ago, I was a youth camp speaker. Someone would hire me to go speak to hundreds of teenagers. We'd have chapel time — if you've ever been to church camp, you know what I'm talking about. Someone would play a David Crowder song, there'd be this moment, an altar call, and everyone would come up. I'd lead them in a prayer to accept Jesus. We'd sing and cry.
And then do you know what the follow-up and discipleship looked like the very next morning? From the guy who had just prayed with those teenagers the night before?
Paintball. Or go-karts. Or rock climbing. Or all the camp games that have been banned from youth groups since the '90s. Anything but actually talking with these kids about the commitment they had just made. No conversation. No study. No prayer about what it now meant that they had chosen to follow Jesus. Because they had made their decision, and it was on to the next kid.
The following night it would be a Chris Tomlin song or a Steven Curtis Chapman song, another convicting message, and another altar call. And I would actually say, out loud: "If you came up last night, stay in your seat — you had your moment. I'm talking to the kids who were too cool to come up yesterday."
If you had a time machine and went back twenty years to ask that version of me what I was doing, I would have said: "I'm just following the Great Commission. I'm just doing what Jesus told us to do — tell as many people as you can about Jesus."
The reason I would have said that is because I had reduced faith to a binary system. You were either a Christian or you were not. Those were the only two categories, and all I cared about was getting people across that line. Never mind what the rest of their lives would look like. Formation was a singular moment, not a lifelong process.
Now, I want to be clear: I'm all for telling the world about Jesus. And for many people — myself included — faith really does start with a single moment. There was an altar call. You walked into a room unconvinced and walked out believing. If that's your story, hallelujah. It's wonderful.
But for others — people who grew up always knowing Jesus, or who were raised in a more Orthodox or mainline tradition — there wasn't one defining moment. Some don't even remember their baptism; they were babies. And they wonder: Is something wrong with me? I never had a dramatic come-to-Jesus moment. If that's your experience, also hallelujah. That's also wonderful.
The point is this: what I was missing in those early years as a speaker and youth pastor was the entire rest of the Great Commission. Everything about discipleship and formation — the growing, the learning, the daily decision versus the singular event. That word disciple translates a lot more naturally as apprentice than it does convert, in my opinion.
Embracing the Teachings of Jesus
One of the ways we move from just praying a prayer to a lifetime of devotion and obedience — as an apprentice of Jesus, someone constantly watching and learning from him — is the rest of our definition. It continues:
For this reason, we seek to embrace the teachings of Jesus — not just as knowledge, but as a way of life.
That word embrace means to accept something, to allow it to happen to you rather than pushing it away, to let it impact and influence your entire being. It's more than study. Embracing means to be changed by the teachings of Jesus.
I heard a pastor once talk about the difference between the Great Suggestion and the Great Commission — one being head knowledge, the other actual movement. He told a story about commissioning his daughter to go clean her room. And then, when he came back and the room was still a mess, his daughter said: "I was going to do it. But instead of actually cleaning the room, I got some friends together and we formed a circle and we talked about what it would look like if we had clean rooms. And I memorized your command. I could even say it in Greek."
And the father said: "That is not what I asked for. When I left you with that teaching, it wasn't for you to study it — it was for you to do it."
And so often I read Jesus' instructions about loving my enemies, or choosing not to feed the destructive parts of myself — my ego, my selfishness — or all the verses about thinking of others, the marginalized, the orphans, the misfits. I read about dying to self. And I think: Very interesting, Jesus. I'm going to commit to a 40-day Bible study on the topic. Read some books about it. Maybe get some friends together over coffee to talk about what that would look like.
And I imagine Jesus saying: formation is actually doing it.
Embodying the Rhythms of Jesus
Our definition continues: embody the rhythms of Jesus.
If you want to experience the life of Jesus, you have to adopt the lifestyle of Jesus. That's the most direct path. The idea of the rhythms of Jesus comes from his teaching in Matthew 11:
"Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, take my yoke upon you, and I will give you rest."
One commentator pointed out something I had never considered: the idea of taking on a yoke seems like an oxymoron when it comes to rest. A yoke is a burden. It is work. A farmer hearing this would scratch his head — it's a bit like saying a relaxing tractor. But the point is that this burden, his burden, takes away all the other burdens. We lay those at the feet of Jesus.
The rhythms of Jesus are meant to both add and remove elements from our lives. Simply put, they change everything. We don't just study Jesus or even follow Jesus — we live like Jesus. We embody his prayer life, his community, his boldness, his priorities. All of it. That's what an apprentice does.
Living Within the Community of Jesus
The next piece of our definition: live within the community of Jesus.
I love that this is here. Dallas Willard has basically become the unofficial associate pastor of Gateway — I quote him so much. He writes:
"Spiritual formation cannot, in the nature of the case, be a private thing, because it is a matter of whole-life transformation."
You need to seek out others in your community who are pursuing the renovation of the heart, because the truth is we are all being formed. Every single one of us. It's only a matter of what is forming us — what is influencing and shaping us — whether we are in community or isolated, religious or not. Everyone is being formed. Spiritual formation is not a Christian thing. It is a human thing.
Willard again: "Everyone gets a spiritual formation. It's like education. Everyone gets an education. It's just a matter of which one you get."
And John Ortberg: "Spiritual formation is for everyone. Just as there is an outer you that is being formed and shaped all the time — like it or not, by accident or on purpose — so there is an inner you. You have a spirit, and it is constantly being shaped and tugged at by what you hear and watch and say and read and think and experience."
You've probably heard the quote attributed to Jim Rohn: you are the average of the five people closest to you. Think about the five people you spend the most time with — you're somewhere in the middle, a combination of them. It's not complicated. The more time you spend with someone, the more they influence you, and the more like them you become. The people we surround ourselves with have that power.
Which is a good time to mention: community groups are starting up again in a couple of weeks. It's a great opportunity to gather with others who are pursuing Jesus — not people who have all the answers. I definitely don't. There's no expectation to be anyone other than who you are and where you're at. It's a place to be authentically yourself, but to do so in community. At least in my life, this is one of the areas where I've seen the most transformation — coming together, pursuing Jesus alongside others, learning from how they're walking with him. Not doing it alone.
The Power of the Spirit Who Makes Us New
Here's the last part of our definition, and it's my favorite:
...all through the power of the Spirit who makes us new.
Take all of the previous pieces — receiving, responding, embracing the teachings of Jesus, embodying his rhythms, living in community — and here is what they result in: a new creation. We don't do these things in order to earn the renewal of the Spirit. Rather, in the renewal of the Spirit, as we actively pursue Jesus, we are daily molded into his likeness.
The Bible returns again and again to the image of a potter and clay. Isaiah 64:8: "But now, O Lord, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand." Ephesians 2:10: "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." The artist and the creation. The potter and the clay. The Spirit and the formed.
When I think about formation, I think about soap carving. Bear with me.
Years ago, the college I attended held an art department contest: take a bar of soap and turn it into something else. That was it. Everyone started from the same place, but the results were extraordinary. Students carved birds, flowers, faces, hearts — intricate things from an ordinary bar. Something beautiful was revealed by cutting away what didn't belong, and by the careful use of a tool to shape what remained.
What strikes me most about those carvings isn't the skill — it's the recognition. When you look at them, you know immediately what they are. They aren't blobs. They are images of something real.
That's what formation is. It's forming us to look like Jesus. The reason a bar of soap carved into a bird is remarkable is because we know what a bird looks like. And the reason formation is so powerful and so necessary is because it reveals — to us, to our community, and to the world — what Jesus looks like. What hope looks like. What justice looks like. What love looks like.
Formation Is Hard Work
Before I put the analogy down, there's one thing we haven't talked about: formation is hard work. It is not easy. Carving that bar of soap is not easy. Which is why it takes what Eugene Peterson calls a long obedience in the same direction. It is a lifetime of that.
And one warning: formation is not sin management, and it's not behavior modification — to borrow from Dallas Willard. It is soul transformation, which transforms all of us. And in many ways, it involves a dying to the parts of us that are not pointing toward Jesus. In order for the beautiful creation to emerge, things need to be cut away. He must increase; I must decrease.
Let me close with one last story. A ceramics professor decided to conduct an experiment with her class. Half of the students would be graded on quality — they would receive a single grade based on one piece of art, as perfect as they could make it, with as much time as they needed. The other half would be graded on quantity — it didn't matter how good the pieces were, only how many they produced.
One group got to work immediately and made as many pieces as possible. The other group attempted to create one perfect piece.
At the end of the quarter, the quality group had almost nothing to show. Just clumps of clay and unrealized dreams. Because their whole grade rested on one piece, it had to be perfect — and perfection paralyzed them.
But the quantity group? Once the possibility of failure was removed, the professor said they produced some of the most remarkable work she had ever seen in her teaching career. Why? Because it took experience. It took time. It took making mistakes. It took collaboration and experimentation. And the more they worked at it, the better they got.
Formation, for me, often looks like that second group. It looks like being in community and sharing what I'm wrestling with. It looks like sometimes saying something flat-out wrong and being lovingly corrected by a brother or a sister. It's messing up. It's making mistakes. This is part of the process — not striving for perfection, but walking in obedience. Spiritual formation is a daily decision, not a singular moment. Both individually and in community.
Closing Prayer
Lord, help us to see formation as a lifelong process of receiving and responding to your love. Help us to stay humble and to always be learning — never arriving at a place this side of heaven where we think we've figured it out or have nothing left to learn.
Help us to embrace the teachings of Jesus not just as moral lessons or bits of information, but as life-changing, as invitations for transformation. Help us not just to study the scriptures, but to live them out — not head knowledge only, but heart change.
Help us to embody the rhythms of Jesus: to orient our lives around him and to follow him. Help us to live within community as a family — even when it's difficult or awkward or new. Help us to see you through and alongside our brothers and sisters.
And we pray all of this through the power of the Spirit who makes us new, every day. Amen.