Spiritual formation in Christian preaching emphasizes the gradual shaping of character and soul through divine grace and human nurture, reflecting transformation into Christlikeness (Romans 12:2). Illustrations often use natural growth, education, and influence metaphors—such as trees changing color or raw diamonds being cut—to depict how early habits, associations, and teaching impact the believer's spiritual maturity and identity.
People are influenced by those they associate with, like a tree-frog changes color to its surroundings.
The tree-frog acquires the color of whatever it adheres to for a short time. If it be found on the oak, it is a brown color; on the sycamore or cedar it is of a whitish-brown color; but, when found on the growing corn, it is sure to be green. So a man is sure to be influenced by those with whom he associates.
Associating with bad companions can cause both to adopt sinful habits.
A story is told of two parrots who lived near to each other. The one was accustomed to sing hymns, while the other was addicted to swearing. The owner of the latter obtained permission for it to associate with the former in the hope that its bad habit would be corrected; but the opposite result followed, for both learned to swear alike.
People tend to take on the character of those they associate with, like a tree-frog changes color.
It is said to be a property of the tree-frog, that it acquires the color of whatever it adheres to for a short time. Thus, when found on growing corn, it is commonly of a dark green: if found on the white-oak, it has the color peculiar to the tree. Just so it is with men: they generally resemble those with whom they associate.
— Bib. Treasury
Ancient education focused on physical and intellectual training but neglected spiritual formation.
The ancient Spartans educated their youth in a stern and severe drill, beginning with the earliest infancy, and tending to make the body elastic, vigorous, and firm to the last degree. For the mind and heart, it cared nothing. A young man who could neither read nor write might yet be the flower of Spartan youth if he could hurl the discus farther than his fellows, or wield the javelin with more vigor and grace; or if he could endure, without a groan, the savage discipline of the lash, inflicted, not in punishment, but as a test of honor, and with all the sanctions of religion, before the altars of the gods. Nor was the Athenian culture, with all its boasted superiority of refinement, intrinsically better. It was an intellectual discipline, to be sure, and, as such, in many respects superior to our own; but it took little heed to the spiritual nature, and left the culture of the heart to accidental agencies to a great extent. The Persians, perhaps more than any other nation of antiquity, took pains to implant moral principles in the minds of children; yet even their morality was of the earth earthy. It sought the advantages of virtue rather than its beauty. Dr. McClintock.
Early life experiences shape character foundations that later instruction cannot change.
Education begins with life. The touch first ministers to it afterwards the sight, and then the hearing. This is our guide in seeking to assist the progress of nature. We must begin with present and tangible things; we must then give absent things a visible form by picture; and the picture which meets the eye may lead to the description which finds its way to the mind only by the ear. Before we are aware, the foundations of the character are laid; and no subsequent instruction can remove or alter them. Linnaeus was the son of a poor Swedish clergyman. His father had a little flower-garden, in which he cultivated all the flowers which his means or his taste could select. Into this flower-garden he introduced his little son from his infancy; and this little garden undoubtedly created that taste in the child which afterwards made him the first botanist and naturalist of his age, if not of his race.
— Dr. J. Todd
Mothers should nurture children's hearts with lasting spiritual values, not empty forms.
Don't cram your children with unreal forms, like blown bladders, which occupy all the room, and collapse on the first rude rub on real life. In pity to your children, put something into them that will last and wear. Don't expend all your energies in tying ornaments on them to attract the gaze of the curious in the street; get into them, if you can, some of that ornament which is, in the sight of God, of great price. Mothers, if your hearts have been quickened by the Spirit, take your fashions from the word of God. Occupy yourselves mainly in moulding the heart and life of your children after the pattern which Jesus showed and taught. This will give you most enjoyment at the time, and most honor afterwards. Arnot.
True education reveals and develops hidden potential, like sculpting an angel from stone.
It is related of Michael Angelo, that, while walking with some friends through an obscure street in the city of Florence, he discovered a fine block of marble lying neglected in a yard, and half buried in dirt and rubbish. Regardless of his holiday attire, he at once fell to work upon it, clearing away its filth, and striving to lift it from the slime and mire in which it lay. His companions asked him, in astonishment, what he was doing, and what he wanted with that worthless piece of rock. "Oh! there's an angel in the stone," was the answer; "and I must get it out." He had it removed to his studio, and with patient toil, with mallet and chisel, he let the angel out. What to others was but a rude, unsightly mass of stone, to his educated eye was the buried glory of art; and he discovered at a glance what might be made of it. A mason would have put it into a stone wall; a cartman would have used it for filling in, or to grade the streets: but he transformed it into a creation of genius, and gave it a value for ages to come.
A sanctified imagination helps us understand and connect with heavenly realities.
We should make our fancy serviceable to us in spiritual things. And, seeing God has condescended to represent heavenly things to us under earthly terms, we should follow God's dealing herein. A sanctified fancy will make every creature a ladder to heaven. Sibbes.
Early habits deeply shape identity and are difficult to overcome even after conversion.
Miss Martineau tells of a white infant who was captured by the Indians, and grew up among them, trained to their habits, and to think that to take the greatest number of scalps was the highest glory. While yet a youth, he was rescued, was educated, and subsequently became a minister. During the Revolutionary War, he held a pastorate near the scene of conflict. He went into the field of battle in his ministerial dress, but returned changed. A gentleman saw blood on his shirt, and said, "You are wounded." The clergyman put up his hands as if to conceal the wound. The gentleman, thinking it ought to be looked to, pulled open his shirt, and from beneath it took out a bloody scalp! "I could not help it," said the victim of early habits. He ran to the Indians, and never again appeared among the whites.
True excellence comes from studying nature and truth, not inferior examples.
IMITATION, Mistake of Titian, whom Sir Joshua Reynolds valued so highly, that he used to say he would be content to ruin himself to possess one genuine production of his pencil, devoted no less than eighty years of his patriarchal term of life to the prosecution of the art. He was but ten years of age when he became a scholar of Bellini, of whose style he was soon able to present imitations, which excited universal astonishment. Happening afterwards to see the works of Bellini's pupil, Giorgione, he found that he had been excelling in the imitation of a very inferior model; and for some time made it a rule to copy after the elegant but gaudy style of Giorgione. At length, abandoning the trammels of example altogether, he gave himself up to the study of Nature alone, and thus arrived at that pitch of perfection which has procured him so enviable an immortality. Percy.
True immortality comes from impressing the soul's character, not outward works.
Raphael did well, and Phidias did well: but it is not painter or sculptor who is making himself most nobly immortal; it is he who is making true impressions upon the mind of man,—frescoes for eternity, that will not shine out till the light of heaven reveals them; sculptures, not wrought in outward things, but in the inward nature and character of the soul. Beecher.
Unrefined minds are like uncut diamonds, valuable but needing shaping to shine.
On a voyage homeward from India, a child was found playing in the cabin with what appeared to be pebbles. On being asked where she got them, she replied, "From father's little box." A closer examination proved that the supposed pebbles were uncut diamonds of great value. Diamonds in the rough do not make a very attractive appearance: they do not sparkle; and yet they have great value. These uncut diamonds are lying all around us, waiting for the mental lapidary, in whose crown they may shine.
Religion in the soul is fragile and must be renewed daily by God's grace.
Religion in the soul of man is like some precious thing in a vessel of ill-seasoned timber. Not only does the rough wear of this rude world sore batter it; but the burning sun of secularity, the glow of daily business, is enough to fill it full of flaws and fissures: and it is only by putting it to steep overnight in the Pool of Siloah, that the chinks will close, and the cracked and leaky firkin be rendered fit for another morning's use. Dr. J. Hamilton.
Sunday schools turn children's hearts toward heaven, fulfilling a deep spiritual yearning.
Among the old Romans, there prevailed the touching custom of holding the face of every new-born infant towards the heavens, signifying, by thus presenting its forehead to the stars, that it was to look above the world into celestial glories. It was a vain superstition; but Christianity dispels the fable, and gives us a clear realization of that pagan yearning, in the deep solicitude which all its disciples cherish for the spiritual welfare of the young. The great design of the Sunday-school organization is to turn the faces of the little children towards heaven, and prepare their spirits for immortal glory. Biblical Treasury.
Early learning and spiritual discipline prepare us for future needs and opportunities.
Daniel Webster once told a good story in a speech, and was asked where he got it. "I have had it laid up in my head for fourteen years, and never had a chance to use it till to-day," said he. My little friend wants to know what good it will do to learn the "rule of three," or to commit a verse of the Bible or the Catechism. The answer is this: Some time you will need that very thing. Perhaps it may be twenty years before you can make it fit in just the right place; but it will be just in place some time; and then, if you don't have it, you will be like the hunter who had no ball in his rifle when a bear met him. "Twenty-five years ago, my teacher made me study surveying," said a man who had lately lost his property; "and now I am glad of it. It is just in place. I can get a good situation and high salary." The Bible and Catechism are better than that. They will be in place as long as we live.
Youth is a critical time for spiritual formation and establishing vital habits.
The human soul in youth is not a machine, of which you can polish the cogs with any kelp or brick-dust near at hand, and, having got it into working-order, and good, empty, and oiled serviceableness, start your immortal locomotive at twenty-five years old, or thirty, express for the Strait Gate on the Narrow Road. The whole period of youth is one essentially of formation, edification, instruction. I use the words with their weight in them, in taking of stores, establishment in vital habits, hopes, and faiths. There is not an hour of it but is trembling with destinies; not a moment of which, once passed, the appointed work can ever be done again, or the neglected blow struck on the cold iron. Take your vase of Venice glass out of the furnace, and strew chaff over it in its transparent heat, and recover that to its clearness and envied glory when the north wind has blown upon it; but do not think to strew chaff over the child fresh from God's presence, and to bring heavenly colors back to him, at least in this world. Ruskin.
Early religious education deeply influences a woman’s final spiritual allegiance.
A respectable lady died in 1845, near Madison, Wisconsin. She was a native of Kentucky, and educated a Protestant. All her family were Protestants. For seven years previous to her death she had no intercourse with Roman Catholics. But when death was approaching she sent a hundred miles for a Catholic bishop, that she might be received into communion and die in the Romish Church. And wherefore? Her feelings were the result of early impressions received while attending a Catholic school at Nazanath, Kentucky! Yet how little many parents think of the depth and permanency of the impressions made on their infant offspring by the school-teacher's instructions or their own! Of all impressions those are most enduring which are the earliest.
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