Of Potters and Pots

 

We have this treasure, writes St. Paul, in earthen vessels . . .

It may seem to us sometimes that the biblical analogy of God being the Potter and we being the clay pots that he creates and shapes for His purposes, make Him and His Province to be such that we are mere, passive, almost inanimate objects. Following the insight and words of the prophet Isaiah (in chapter 64) again we may think that in the 'working with clay analogy' we are passive and God is totally in control/charge. Apparently one might think that, until one starts working with clay. (I've not done that: I'll take the word of others who have).

An initial steps involved when working with clay is called Wedging  (now, don't go there) – where you work hard 'to beat the life out of the clay.' Actually you are beating and kneading out air bubbles. If you don't, the bubbles will make the new creation crack when it hits the kiln. Or, it may blow up and, potentially everything around it. There are ‘bubbles’ that need to be removed from our lives if we are to be and achieve the purposes of our Creator.

Another step involved is something called Centering – a difficult process because (who would have known?) clay is naturally very resistant. One’s whole body weight has to be pushed into the play until you feel no anomaly as the clay is going around in your hands – until you know it’s ‘centred.’ If it isn’t centred, it will be wobbly or collapse entirely. God is always wanting us to centre our lives in and around Him. What in our lives need to be centred around the Lord?

In Jeremiah 13, we find that the pot that was created became marred in the potter’s hand so he crushed the clay and formed into another pot. Similarly, God moulds us into different shapes and purposes, painful as that often seems to us. It is His doing even though we often (usually?) resist the process.

Am I accepting of God’s God’s centred will and priorities for my present and future? How am I active in working with, rather than resisting what God is doing in shaping me (or other aspects of my life and ministry)? Can we discern and welcome the changes He is bringing? Do they perhaps indicate that there is a lack of alignment, a difference or out-of-step aspects to my life in general, or in some particular are

How do we listen, look, trust and acquiesce more without giving up our responsibility and part? Could even our brokenness, resistance and doubt be part of what is repaired strengthened for the good as we the clay sometimes wrestle with the Potter in what He is doing and in how He is doing it?