A Lesson From the Potter's House

KJV Jeremiah 18:1-6
1. The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying,
2. Arise, and go down to the potter's house, and there I will cause thee to hear my words.
3. Then I went down to the potter's house, and, behold, he wrought a work on the wheels.
4. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.
5. Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
6. O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel.


In the story of the potter, the Lord is telling Jeremiah that it is He that controls his people, as the potter controls, or molds the clay. Just as the potter mars the clay so He molds us. And let’s face it. When we get mashed, twisted, or beaten into a vessel there are going to be aches and pains. Just try this. Let’s say you’re an average person. You’re not very active, other than being real good at using a remote control device. In addition to that, you may be a few pounds heavier than you want to be. Suddenly, you decide to become a professional athlete. There is just no way you can achieve your goal on your own, so you go out and hire a trainer to get you in shape. The first thing the trainer does is go over your body with a fine toothed comb. He takes your weight, measures your height , measures body fat, and checks your physical endurance. Once he has your full physical condition totaled, he takes an assessment of your mental capacity (this is to see if you have the mental toughness to succeed). Now comes the fun part.

The examination part of your makeover is now complete. The physical part has yet to start.


KJV Haggai 2:3-9
3. Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory? and how do ye see it now? is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing?
4. Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, saith the Lord; and be strong, O Joshua, son of Josedech, the high priest; and be strong, all ye people of the land, saith the Lord, and work: for I am with you, saith the Lord of hosts:
5. According to the word that I covenanted with you when ye came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth among you: fear ye not.
6. For thus saith the Lord of hosts; Yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land;
7. And I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of hosts.
8. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of hosts.
9. The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, saith the Lord of hosts: and in this place will I give peace, saith the Lord of hosts.

If this seems like a strange passage to prove a point, take a second look at it. Gods people are standing before the rubble that once was Solomon’s Temple. God said to Zerubbabel to be strong. This is the trainer giving you a pep talk to get your mind in the right frame of mind before the hard work and toil begins. How many times have we knelt down fervently in prayer and said something to the effect of: “OH, LORD, I OFFER MYSELF UP TO YOU . TO DO AS YOU WILL. HAVE YOUR WAY WITH ME, OH LORD!!!” Now, the prayers of a righteous man avails much and since we are a righteous people, we should rightfully say that the Lord has heard our prayers. Now the LORD has heard your prayer; to do with you as He will. You have just designated God as your personal trainer. Oh, by the way, he had already given you a physical and you flunked it miserably.

Sin, self-righteousness, boastfulness, a haughty spirit and a judgmental attitude along with a serious lack of spiritual exercise has made you seriously out of condition. Remember what the doctors say: “Recognizing that you have a problem is the first step in getting cured.”

ROMANS 3: 23
For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;
Now you have taken an assessment of yourself and decided that you’re a mess. All of that extra baggage your carrying around has slowed you down to a crawl, spiritually speaking. You have gotten to the end of your rope and decide to go out and find a trainer to get you back into shape.

Now that you have found him, you get down on your knees and beg him to take you as a client. You promise; NO MORE TWINKIES, NO MORE SWEETS, ONLY FOOD THAT’S GOOD FOR ME TO EAT. Some of us have been here before, for some, this is the first time. The trainer doesn’t care. He is not worried about your past failures, he just wants you to have the best possible future you can. You are now ready for your inspirational talk, the Vince Lombardi speech to the Green Bay Packers that led them to the first of many Super Bowl wins. Listen close. Hear it? You are saying I’m nuts, you can’t hear anything. Listen again, this time remember, God is not going to put a Megaphone to your ear and yell at you, or come out of nowhere with a big booming voice telling you what to do and the rewards at the end. That is nothing more than Hollywood hype and drama. God has that still small voice that speaks expressly to your soul.
I KINGS 19: 11-12
11. And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the Lord. And, behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the Lord; but the Lord was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the Lord was not in the earthquake:
12. And after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.

You are now ready to begin your workout. Keep in mind that the first few times are not going to be fun. If you have ever been on a life cycle and can remember that first time you got on, you will understand. It starts off relatively easy, but by the time your done your legs feel like rubber bands and the rest of you is a big ball of smelly, stinky sweat from all of that bad stuff you have been putting into your body over the years. You want to crawl off to a corner of the room and pass out, but your trainer grabs you and has you doing stomach crunches then weights until your ready to drop. If this sounds about right, just nod your head or say amen. you may not realize it but your trainer knows exactly what he or she is doing. They know that in order to rebuild your body, they must first break it down and get it into a condition they can work with.

It’s much the same way with God. He can’t work a stubborn, stiff necked, soul that wants to do things his way. It just won’t work. If you want the Lord to take control of your life, then you need to be prepared to do what He says and not what you want. Sound a little familiar? “Nevertheless, not my will but thine be done.” This means you must give God something that few have given, your commitment to do his will, regardless of what He says. Wow, that sounds tough, you say? Not really. God won’t give you more than you can handle. There are certain steps to take, however, that God needs to do, in order to make a vessel to His liking.

Let us return to the Potters’ house. There is the potter, sitting at the wheel. In front of him is a mound of clay, waiting to be molded and shaped into a vessel. Now he could just mold out a bowl or vessel in a few minutes and say he is done, but the potter knows that the second he puts that vessel in the fire to be cured it will crack and fall to pieces. There are steps that have to be taken:
1. Removing the impurities.
2. Constant cleansing and washing.
3. Resting the vessel.
4. Putting the vessel through fire.
5. Adorning the finished product.

The first thing the potter does is to remove any impurities from the clay. In biblical times the potter got his clay from a field, not the stuff that comes neatly packaged in an airtight plastic bag. This means there is a lot of poking, prodding, mashing and kneading. He does this over and over until he is sure that no impurities or pockets of air remain in that mound of clay. Even a small air bubble left undetected inside the clay will cause the vessel to explode when put into the fire for its final cure.

Once the clay has been prepared, the potter will dunk the clay in a pot of water then put it on his wheel, so that he can start to form it into a useful vessel. As the wheel turns, the potter will use his skill to mold the clay over and over again. He will also keep putting his hands in the water to keep the clay wet and malleable. This constant wetting of the clay also washes off any small imperfections on the vessel, while it is being formed. The clay is hard to work, at first. But as the potter keeps his hands on the clay, it will start to move and take shape. The potter may change that shape several times, while he is working on it. This is not because he has changed his mind, but changing the shape of a vessel several times adds to the strength of the vessel.

Now that the vessel is formed to the potters liking, he moves it to a drying area. This lets the vessel rest while it dries. The potter knows that this newly formed vessel has been through a lot of work. It has been pounded, stretched, prodded, poked and had constant pressure put on it, all the while it was turning around in circles. Almost sounds like everyday life doesn’t it? Once the vessel has rested, it is ready to be tried. The potter takes his creation and examines it closely . If everything is right, he is ready to put the vessel in the fire, to be cured. If, however, he detects a defect, or flaw, and knows that the clay will never stand up to the heat, he will break up the clay and return it to the field for future use.

Once the vessel is ready, it is time to cure it by putting it through a fire. The fire was usually made in a pit, where the temperatures would reach several hundred degrees. The vessel was then placed in the heat and left for an extended period of time, so that the clay would harden and no longer be easily broken when used. When the potter was sure that the vessel was done and cooled, he would remove the finished product. Depending where the vessel was to be used, the potter would then add a coat of paint, called a glaze, to decorate the vessel according to it’s use. Regardless of where the vessel ended up, when it left the potters house, you were assured of a richly adorned vessel that was strong enough to serve it’s intended purpose and still have a look to it that showed everyone it was a vessel made by the potters hand.

Back to the gym

You see what the potter does to the clay. Now is the time to picture yourself as the clay: a big blob of whatever happened to be on the ground, in the potters back yard. You have determined for yourself to do whatever the Lord, your personal trainer, tells you to, no matter what it is. The first step is to build up your stamina. This also builds discipline at the same time. Some things sound simple at first, but the idea is to keep on doing the same thing over and over again. It may be something as mundane as turning off a light when you leave a room, or walking a few extra steps to put a shopping cart in the cart return slot at the grocery store when you finished loading your car. When the easy stuff is mastered, after many repetitions, more difficult things come up. For a lot of people, the hard things are like holding your temper, or even more, holding your tongue.

That last one is a toughie. But the Lord is keeping his hands on you. Keeping with his program means a lot of exercise and rest. The exercise is prayer and letting God have HIS way. The rest is just that.

Hebrews 4:1-11

1. Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.
2. For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it.
3. For we which have believed do enter into rest, as he said, As I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.
4. For he spake in a certain place of the seventh day on this wise, And God did rest the seventh day from all his works.
5. And in this place again, if they shall enter into my rest.
6. Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to whom it was first preached entered not in because of unbelief:
7. Again, he limiteth a certain day, saying in David, To day, after so long a time; as it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
8. For if Jesus had given them rest, then would he not afterward have spoken of another day.
9. There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God.
10. For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his.
11. Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief.

All of that exercise, must be balanced with rest. This gives the body time to regenerate and therefore make it stronger. Spiritual exercise is much the same way. Prayer, warring with the flesh, confronting temptation can exhaust, not only the spirit, but the body and mind as well. We must enter into the rest of the Lord. We must go to that quiet place, the place that we can go to commune with God. Sometimes, prayer gets turned into a bunch of repetitive mumbo jumbo. God doesn’t need to be reminded of our problems on a daily, sometimes more often than that, basis. There are times when we should just crawl up in his lap and take a nap. Anyone with a child knows what I mean. nothing feels better to a child or his parent than to have that child crawl up in your lap for nothing more than a comfortable , safe place to rest. It also builds the bond between the parent and child. The same thing is true of you and God. There are times He would like nothing more than for you to be with him and rest on His lap

Now that the trainer has reshaped you, and you have rested, it is time for you to be put through the fire. This is where things get really tough. The fire that will make the finished product will take the rest of your life to go through. That means the wear and tear of everyday life, all of it’s stresses, crises, and worst of all, all of it’s monotonies, will be with you until you go to be with the Lord. This isn’t to say that all of life is hard, when you are living for God. Actually, it’s quite the contrary. With God’s spirit dwelling in you as you go through life, you will always have that place of refuge, that place of safety, that place of rest, to run to when times get hard. But don’t seek him in the hardest of times, seek him in the joyous times as well. Seek him in the morning when you get up and in the evening when you go to bed. My favorite thing to tell people is that I get up in the morning, take a breath and say Thank you Lord. I do this everyday as practice for the day when I wake up and DON’T take a breath, for then I have to say How are you doing Lord. For it is on that day, when I meet the Lord, that the last and greatest step of the Potter is done. For on that day, we shall all be given a robe of white and a crown of glory, to be with our Lord for eternity in Heaven.

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