The Potter and the Clay

Open service with Veteran’s Day video

Today and tomorrow, across this nation, we will be remembering our nation’s veterans and the great sacrifice that they have made on behalf of this nation! The love for a brother and a sister that prompts another to lay down their own life for the protection of the other, was modeled perfectly by our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, as He so stated in , “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” and then He went on to do so, that very next morning, without hesitation and without a fight to resist!

It is one thing to take a verbal stance on behalf of another person in defending them and their honor; it is something entirely and all together different to lay down one’s life for the good and protection of the other! Today, let us take a moment and do the very thing that the Apostle Paul tells us in , “Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.”

Let’s honor, at this time, the men and the women here today who have served, or who are currently serving in any branch of the our nation’s military services. And those here today who are representing a family member that has since deceased and who served our nation as a veteran. We want to honor each and every veteran who put their lives in harms way, by serving, as well as those who have fallen and laid down their lives on behalf of this great nation and who have selflessly given of themselves time and time again, to enable us the right to assemble on this day and every day so that we may worship our great God and Savior with freedom and without repercussion!

HAVE VETERANS STAND AND RECEIVE HONOR FROM CHURCH BODY!

Have Katie Scoville come forward with her parents and pray over her as she is heading out for training.

I was reading a passage Friday that became stuck in my head and that I could’t seem to shake and in reading and studying that passage of scripture, I ended up coming to yet another passage yesterday, which I read and pondered and prayed about. And as I read over this second passage, it gave me an image of our veterans who have served our country, as well as those who are currently serving, or of anyone who will ever serve our nation in the future in the capacity of a US soldier and of what must happen in order for them to be called a SOLDIER of the United States of America.

In order to explain what I am talking about, let’s turn right now in our Bibles to this passage that I was reading yesterday and read it together and then I will begin to elaborate on it.

The passage I am talking about is a very familiar one to many of us and it is, ,

Jeremiah 18:1–9 NLT

1 The Lord gave another message to Jeremiah. He said, 2 “Go down to the potter’s shop, and I will speak to you there.” 3 So I did as he told me and found the potter working at his wheel. 4 But the jar he was making did not turn out as he had hoped, so he crushed it into a lump of clay again and started over. 5 Then the Lord gave me this message: 6 “O Israel, can I not do to you as this potter has done to his clay? As the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand. 7 If I announce that a certain nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down, and destroyed, 8 but then that nation renounces its evil ways, I will not destroy it as I had planned. 9 And if I announce that I will plant and build up a certain nation or kingdom,

Jeremiah 18:1–10 NLT

1 The Lord gave another message to Jeremiah. He said, 2 “Go down to the potter’s shop, and I will speak to you there.” 3 So I did as he told me and found the potter working at his wheel. 4 But the jar he was making did not turn out as he had hoped, so he crushed it into a lump of clay again and started over. 5 Then the Lord gave me this message: 6 “O Israel, can I not do to you as this potter has done to his clay? As the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand. 7 If I announce that a certain nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down, and destroyed, 8 but then that nation renounces its evil ways, I will not destroy it as I had planned. 9 And if I announce that I will plant and build up a certain nation or kingdom, 10 but then that nation turns to evil and refuses to obey me, I will not bless it as I said I would.

Now, before I say anything about this passage and why it gave me the image of a soldier, let me ask you a question. If I were to walk into a recruiter’s office tomorrow and say that I want to become a soldier, would they simply say, “OK”, and just hand me a uniform and a gun and pat me on the rear end and usher me off into the wild blue yonder to go fight?

Absolutely not! Our nation would have been sacked decades ago, if that was its mode of operation and protection! In order for someone to be able to serve as a soldier in any branch of the military, their is a process that MUST take place first.

I taught a lesson several weeks ago dealing with this very process, entitled, “BASIC TRAINING”.

And in that message, I spoke about how you must have that initial training, that starting point in order to advance in the military, or, as far as that goes, pretty much anything else in life that is worthy of its calling.

So, if I want to join the military, I must go into it with the knowledge and the understanding that I will begin in BASIC TRAINING and grow and develop as I learn, RIGHT?!

Well, in this amazing passage in Jeremiah, we see something very similar that God is stressing to His people.

The same thing that must happen to a new recruit in the military is the same thing that must happen to a new believer in Jesus the Christ.

They must be trained, yes, but more importantly, they must also be molded and developed.

You see “training”, in and of itself, in this account in Jeremiah, is not quite what God is stressing to His people.

This metaphor that God is giving Jeremiah through the visual of the potter and his work at the wheel, is stressing, not so much the process of being trained and equipped, but more so, it is stressing the malleableness and the willingness of the “clay” to be molded and conformed.

That is, God is stressing that He can form and shape His people into a vessel that it pleasing and useful to Him, IF they will yield to Him, just like the potter can shape and reshape the clay into a pleasing and usable vessel, because the clay is ALWAYS yielding to the hands of its master!

My ability to study and learn the Word of God, is very much critical and crucial for growth and development in my walk with the Lord, but my growth is not just about what I study and what I learn.

My growth and development is also, and more importantly, due to the inward working that God does within me, as I yield to Him and let Him change me!

My true growth and development into the vessel that He desires and that is pleasing to Him, is dependent upon His inward working inside of me, as His Holy Spirit transforms me and molds me into the creation that He planned for me to be!

The reason that I thought of a soldier, or a veteran, when I read the passage from Jeremiah, is that a soldier must yield, COMPLETELY to the military branch that they have joined. They must allow that military branch to mold them into whatever it is that they desire of them to become!

Have you ever heard of , or seen a soldier under the US government that was a rogue and did what they wanted and operated from their own agenda and on their own terms?

NO, these things only exist within the mind of Hollywood and some Rambo film!

A soldier of the United States of America government, is one that is trained, YES definitely, but even more importantly, they are molded and transformed into what the US military wants them to be!

You don’t see a US soldier, or for that matter, a soldier of any other country, doing their own thing and behaving on their own accord, right?!

If that were the manner in which our military operated, we would have fallen as a nation by now.

Without UNITY, the battle is lost!

Or, as Jesus Himself said, “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and every city or house divided against itself will not stand.”

And when you look at the battles that Israel entered into, like the battle of Jericho and the battle of Gideon with his 300 men and Abraham and his 318 men, you begin to see that there was a much greater force working on their behalf and going before them for their victory!

You see e people doing

These victories were wrought not from men and their own design and skills, but rather from the very thing as we see in ,

Deuteronomy 20:2–4 NLT

2 When you prepare for battle, the priest must come forward to speak to the troops. 3 He will say to them, ‘Listen to me, all you men of Israel! Do not be afraid as you go out to fight your enemies today! Do not lose heart or panic or tremble before them. 4 For the Lord your God is going with you! He will fight for you against your enemies, and he will give you victory!’

God was for Israel in the Old Testament and still is today, the source of our victory over the enemy!

When Moses and the children of Israel faced the more seasoned and war ready Amalekites in the wilderness and defeated them, Moses made a memorial and there named God, “Jehovah Nissi – The LORD is my banner.”

It is the Jehovah who goes before us and leads and directs and fights our battles!

And it is Jehovah who molds and forms and shapes His soldiers!

I called a very dear friend and brother in Christ in yesterday, one whom I knew had personally served in a branch of the US military service and I asked him if a new recruit going into the military and being placed into the hands of the officers who were in charge of training him, could be analogous to a lump of clay held in the Potter’s hands and molded and shaped into whatever the potter desired.

He said, “For sure......most definitely.” He told me that this was the premise behind basic training. It was their job to make sure before you left “boot camp”, that you were molded into and fashioned into a soldier of that specific branch of the military so that you could do whatever they wanted you to do in real time action!

And so with this understanding, we look at the account in , where God is showing the prophet Jeremiah this amazing analogy and then instructing him to tell Israel and ultimately, each one of us, that He is the Potter and we are the clay.

And this same analogy of God being the Master Potter who molds and shapes those who are His, is found throughout the Bible.

If you remember, from another message that I gave weeks ago, I stated that it was God who formed us from the dirt of the ground and that because of that we could legitimately call ourselves “dirt bags”, correct?

But the imagery of the divine Potter and His clay is clearly seen when we see what we are and how we were made, physically.

God took the dirt of the ground, (i.e. “clay”) and He molded it and fashioned it into the vessel that He desired, which was mankind.

And once He was done making us, the Bible states that God said, “It is VERY good” and then He was done with His divine creation of His children.

Well, once a potter is done with forming the vessel, he then takes that vessel and bakes it in a oven, or a kiln and the intense heat process, causes a chemical reaction that removes the moisture from the clay and it is forever set as whatever shape the potter designed it to be.

If it was a bowl, then it remains a bowl. If it was a cup, then it remains a cup. If it is a vase, then it stays a vase and so on and so on.

Do you get the picture? Once the potter has created the vessel and then finalized it through the intense heat of fire, it is forever what He designed it to be.

You can take that cup that the potter made and try to call it bowl or a plate, but no matter how much you say that it is something else, at the end of the day, it is still the cup that the master potter fashioned it to be!

Does this makes sense to everyone here?

The vessel and the use of that vessel, once it is created by the potter, is irreversible. It is and always will be what the potter created it to be, regardless of what you or I try to rename it and reassign its use as! AMEN!

And we live in a day and age now, where mankind is trying to assume and play the role of the potter and change the vessel that He has made.

And as men gravitate more towards that reprobate mindset that they are godlike and they can alter and change the creation of the CREATOR, it has horrible end results.

, reminds us about this, where it says,

Isaiah 45:9–12 NLT

9 “What sorrow awaits those who argue with their Creator. Does a clay pot argue with its maker? Does the clay dispute with the one who shapes it, saying, ‘Stop, you’re doing it wrong!’ Does the pot exclaim, ‘How clumsy can you be?’ 10 How terrible it would be if a newborn baby said to its father, ‘Why was I born?’ or if it said to its mother, ‘Why did you make me this way?’ ” 11 This is what the Lord says— the Holy One of Israel and your Creator: “Do you question what I do for my children? Do you give me orders about the work of my hands? 12 I am the one who made the earth and created people to live on it. With my hands I stretched out the heavens. All the stars are at my command.

Isaiah 45:9 NLT

9 “What sorrow awaits those who argue with their Creator. Does a clay pot argue with its maker? Does the clay dispute with the one who shapes it, saying, ‘Stop, you’re doing it wrong!’ Does the pot exclaim, ‘How clumsy can you be?’

So, a cup is a cup and a saucer is a saucer, right? The Potter formed and fashioned these vessels that go together and work together and compliment one another.

And not only that, but the Master Potter also said that once these vessels are brought together in union, (A TEAM), as He designed them to be, they are never to be separated again.

,

Matthew 19:6 NLT

6 Since they are no longer two but one, let no one split apart what God has joined together.”

So, as a vessel that is formed and molded into what the Potter desires it to be and then sealed with the intense heat of the fire is forever set to be that vessel, so to are we forever set to be the vessels that God created us to be.

And with this understanding that God formed and fashioned us into the earthen vessels that we are we also need to understand that we were and are spiritually formed and fashioned in the image that He desired.

We are spiritually formed in the very image and likeness of the master Potter, Himself!

And so, whenever you or I come to the potter, in faith and belief of who He is and what He can and will do, we are basically saying to Him, “Here I am, take me and mold me into whatever you want me to be!”

And whenever the clay has a defect, or it does not hold its designed shape, as the potter is forming it, or it needs more re-enforcement to make it stronger, the Potter will sometimes take that defective, or weakened vessel of clay and crush it back into His hands and re-form and shape it into the stronger vessel that is needed and desired by the Potter!

This the very thing that God wanted Jeremiah to see and focus on. He didn’t take Jeremiah to the house of the potter and show him a perfectly formed and finished vessel.

No, rather, Jeremiah witnessed what God wanted him to focus on. The Bible says in ,

Jeremiah 18:4 AMP

4 And the vessel that he was making from clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter; so he made it over, reworking it into another vessel as it seemed good to the potter to make it.

And as Jeremiah witnessed this process and this transformation at the hand of the potter, on his wheel, God said this Jeremiah, (),

Jeremiah 18:6 The Message

6 “Can’t I do just as this potter does, people of Israel?” God’s Decree! “Watch this potter. In the same way that this potter works his clay, I work on you, people of Israel.

Jeremiah 18:5–6 NLT

5 Then the Lord gave me this message: 6 “O Israel, can I not do to you as this potter has done to his clay? As the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand.

Do you see what God is saying to Jeremiah and the nation of Israel and ultimately to each and every one of us who are His children?

“I can and will mold and shape you into a more perfect vessel for My use and for My glory, if you will yield to me and allow me to do so!”

And in saying this, God warns the nation of Israel that if they continue to rebel against Him, He would bring swift and certain punishment, not punishment for payback, but rather, punishment so as to draw God’s bride back to Him again!

Much in the same way as a father brings punishment to his child, to teach them right from wrong and to stop them from making a more grave and fatal mistake later in their life!

And so God made it clear that He forms and fashions and refashions these “lumps of clay” into the vessel that He wills and desires us to be, IF WE ALLOW HIM TO DO SO!

Everyone turn to someone else and say to them, “YOU ARE A LUMP OF CLAY”.

Now say, “I AM A LUMP OF CLAY!”

Have you ever noticed that you cannot make a personal declaration about yourself, like we just did, without acknowledging GOD first?

When we just said, “I AM A LUMP OF CLAY”, we said God first and then made our personal declaration!

This why even atheists can’t get away from God and this is why the most staunch narcissist in the world always has to give GOD the glory first.

Because ANYTIME that we begin to say something about ourselves, we must start off by acknowledging our divine creator, our POTTER, first, by saying, “I AM”!

So, we are physically the vessel that God desired at creation, BUT, we are to continually allow the POTTER to form and fashion us and re-form and re-fashion us, more and more, until the time that we are perfect and without flaw!

And how many of you know that this perfect state will not happen until either the Potter calls us home to the great POTTERY BARN in the sky, or until the real PERFECTION comes and claims us?!

And with this understanding that we are formed, spiritually, the way that He wants us to be and for the purpose that He desires for us, as His willing clay vessels, we must keep PRIDE (which is the single greatest defect in our clay vessels), out of our spirit!

Pride is the very thing that produces a weak and worthless vessel, if it is not dealt with.

When you or I see another brother or sister in Christ and they are wealthier, or prettier, or smarter, or excelling in church ministry and we are not even close to the appearance of their vessel, then PRIDE creeps in and mars and flaws our vessel.

And if this not dealt with, then the vessel becomes lesser and lesser in value and purpose.

Do not worry about the way that God has formed and fashioned another person and for the use that He has for them. The Bible clearly says that, regardless of its appearance, there is NO PART OF THE BODY OF CHRIST, more important than another!

In fact Paul said in ,

Romans 9:20–21 NLT

20 No, don’t say that. Who are you, a mere human being, to argue with God? Should the thing that was created say to the one who created it, “Why have you made me like this?” 21 When a potter makes jars out of clay, doesn’t he have a right to use the same lump of clay to make one jar for decoration and another to throw garbage into?

And in we read,

Isaiah 29:16 NLT

16 How foolish can you be? He is the Potter, and he is certainly greater than you, the clay! Should the created thing say of the one who made it, “He didn’t make me”? Does a jar ever say, “The potter who made me is stupid”?

We must always remember that it is the Potter who shapes and forms and fashions the vessel and not the other way around!

As long as we ALLOW the Potter to mold and shape our lives, then we will be useful vessels in His Kingdom!

God has created each and every one of you as a beautiful and pleasing vessel for His service and filled that vessel with the most valuable treasures in the world...........HIS HOLY SPIRIT and the GOSPEL MESSAGE!

And this clay vessel that contains this great and precious treasure, is TOP QUALITY and is not able to destroyed by the enemy, as long as we stay within the Potter’s reach and always sitting on His wheel so as to re-enforce us.

tells us,

2 Corinthians 4:7–9 AMP

7 However, we possess this precious treasure [the divine Light of the Gospel] in [frail, human] vessels of earth, that the grandeur and exceeding greatness of the power may be shown to be from God and not from ourselves. 8 We are hedged in (pressed) on every side [troubled and oppressed in every way], but not cramped or crushed; we suffer embarrassments and are perplexed and unable to find a way out, but not driven to despair; 9 We are pursued (persecuted and hard driven), but not deserted [to stand alone]; we are struck down to the ground, but never struck out and destroyed;

As long as you and I remain in His hands, the Potter’s hands, humble and willing to allow Him to mold and shape our lives, we will be His masterpieces that define and shape the course of this nation and this world!

I am going to end with two short videos to demonstrate and illustrate what i am talking about this morning.

PLAY OOBLECK VIDEO and explain to the people.

Play THE POTTER video.

The Greek cleric and theologian, Irenaeus, said this of us, "It is not you who shape God; it is God that shapes you. If then you are the work of God, await the hand of the Artist who does all things in due season. Offer the Potter your heart, soft and tractable, and keep the form in which the Artist has fashioned you. Let your clay be moist, lest you grow hard and lose the imprint of the Potter’s fingers."

READ THE DIVINE POTTER’S PLANS (on iPad)

He is not what we try to make Him to e