Amazingly, George Lucas, who created one of the most famous villains of all time in Darth Vader, could not resist the storyline that even with the Darth Vader there is always "A New Hope." There is always the hope that anyone who has gone over to the dark side, no matter how far or how deep, can once again reemerge to the light side and the right side.
Thousands of years ago God told the Prophet Jeremiah of a land that we could call "The Land of New Hope". To illustrate that land, He told Jeremiah to go down to a potter's house to see how a potter works with clay.
Jeremiah did what he was told and went south of the City of Jerusalem, through the Valley of Hinnom, past the place where the city dumped all of their garbage and burned it, to the headquarters of the pottery industry. Amazingly, the art of pottery has basically remained unchanged for thousands of years. Even today, the finest pottery you can buy is not mass produced - it is handmade.
Today, the potter works with clay just about the same way as the ancient potter did thousands of years ago, because clay is simply water and dust mixed together. The potter takes this soft putty-like clay and begins to beat it and shape it and mold it. Then he throws it on what is called a revolving wheel. While that wheel is being turned, he caresses it, holds it, pulls it, and shapes it until finally that soft mass of putty-like material begins to come together and take shape and form to become a beautiful finished work of exquisite pottery.
God used this real life simple example in the life of Jeremiah to teach him a lesson on how He deals with us. The potter is going to illustrate to us how God shapes us and molds us until we become a beautiful vessel fit not just for earthly use, but also for eternal use.
There are actually three parts to this story: the potter, the clay and the wheel. Listen to the story.
"The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD saying, 'Arise and go down to the potter's house, and there I will announce My words to you.' Then I went down to the potter's house, and there he was, making something on the wheel. But the vessel that he was making of clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter; so he remade it into another vessel, as it pleased the potter to make. Then the word of the LORD came to me saying, 'Can I not, O house of Israel, deal with you as this potter does?' declares the LORD. 'Behold, like the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel. At one moment I might speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom to uproot, to pull down, or to destroy it; if that nation against which I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent concerning the calamity I planned to bring on it. Or at another moment I might speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom to build up or to plant it; if it does evil in My sight by not obeying My voice, then I will think better of the good with which I had promised to bless it. '" (Jeremiah 18:1-10, NASB)
You will not understand this story until you realize that the focus of the story is not on the clay and it is not on the wheel. The focus of the story is on the potter. It is the potter who makes the clay useful and makes the clay beautiful. It is the potter that gives the clay both its form and its function. When you realize that we are the clay, God is the potter and life is the wheel, you can learn why with God there is always the possibility of new hope for anyone no matter how far they may have crossed over to the dark side. This little parable tells us three things about how God deals with all of us.
I. God Is Always Working On Me
"The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD saying, 'Arise and go down to the potter's house, and there I will announce My words to you.' Then I went down to the potter's house, and there he was, making something on the wheel." (Jeremiah 18:1-3, NASB)
Though this was an actual event that took place in Jeremiah's life it really was symbolic. Although there was an actual potter it is very obvious when you read the story that God is represented by the potter.
This is made plain in verse 6. "Can I not, O house of Israel, deal with you as this potter does?" declares the LORD. 'Behold, like the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel.'" (Jeremiah 18:6, NASB)
Incidentally, Isaiah the Prophet said basically the same thing in Isaiah 64: 8. "But now, O LORD, You are our Father, we are the clay, and You our potter; and all of us are the work of Your hand." (Isaiah 64:8, NASB)
God is the potter of our lives. Every day just like the clay is in the hand of the potter God has His hands on your life and my life. Invisible hands of a Heavenly Potter are on the clay of your life molding you, shaping you, forming you and making you into the beautiful vessel that He wants you to be.
Dr. Bill Bright, who was the head for so many years of Campus Crusade for Christ, wrote a very famous Gospel tract called, "The Four Spiritual Laws." The first spiritual law he said was this - God has a wonderful plan for your life.
That is absolutely true. I don't care who you are, what your background may be, where you have come from or where you are going, God has a glorious, beautiful, wonderful plan and purpose, not only for your life, but for every life.
Sometimes we get the idea that God has a plan for people like me who are pastors or missionaries or someone who works full time in the church, but the truth is - God has a wonderful plan for everybody.
Just as the potter controls the clay God wants to control you. Just as the potter has a plan for the clay and a purpose for the clay God has a plan and a purpose for you. Psalm 138:8 says, "The Lord will fulfill His purpose for me." (Psalm 138: 8, HCSB) God has a purpose and a plan for your life and He wants to see to it that plan and purpose is fulfilled if you will let Him.
Just as God is the potter in this little story remember that we are the clay. Just as the clay is nothing without the potter we are nothing without God. Do you know what is true about clay? It is only useful in the hands of the potter. Likewise, we are only useful when we are in the hands of God.
Even though the clay is useless without the potter it is not worthless to the potter. To you clay may be unimportant. It may be unattractive, undesirable, or you may look at it as cheap, but to the potter, clay is more valuable than gold and more precious than diamonds. Don't let the fact that you are called clay in the Bible deflate your ego. If anything, it ought to inflate your self-esteem, because just as clay is valuable to the potter, that is how valuable you are to God.
Have you ever thought about the fact that God created the world with His hands, but He created us with His heart? When God created the world He said, "That's good", but when God created us, He said, "That is very good." God values His creatures far more than He values His creation. The psalmist put it this way in Psalm 8:3-6. "When I look at the night sky and see the work of your fingers the moon and the stars you have set in place what are mortals that you should think of us, mere humans that you should care for us? For you made us only a little lower than God, and you crowned us with glory and honor. You put us in charge of everything you made, giving us authority over all things-" (Psalm 8:3-6, NLT)
As the potter represents God and the clay represents us, the wheel represents life; it represents what happens to us in life. It represents, if you will, the daily turn of life. As the world turns, God is literally working on the world. Life in essence is God's pottery wheel on which you and I are being formed and shaped day by day. Have you ever felt like your life was just going in circles? Have you ever felt like you were just going round and round and round? I've got news for you - you are! In the daily rounds of life, God has placed you on the wheel of His providence. He is shaping you and molding you into His image. This is not the "Wheel of Fortune", nor is it the wheel of fate. It is the wheel of faithfulness; God's faithfulness to His purpose and plan for your life.
Benjamin Franklin was addressing the Constitutional Convention, June 28th, 1786 when he said this, "I have lived Sir, a long time and the longer I live the more convincing proofs I see of this truth - that God governs in the affairs of men."[1] Benjamin Franklin was right. God is in control of every circumstance of your life and He wants to take all of your circumstances whether they are good or whether they are bad and use them to shape you into what He wants you to be. So often, we get so frustrated when life takes a twisted turn or the wheel of life seems to turn unfairly. We get discouraged and disillusioned and sometimes even bitter toward God and here is the problem - we start focusing on the wheel and we forget the potter. The potter knows exactly what He is doing.
We will not always understand why certain things happen to us. We will not always understand why the wheel of life takes a certain turn, but if the clay of your life is in the hands of the potter called God, you can trust Him to mold you and to make you into what He wants you to be and do what is best for you. That is exactly what Romans 8:28 means, "God works all things out together for the good of those who love Him." (Romans 8:28, NKJV)
Life is really like baking a cake. If you were to take all of the individual ingredients of a cake and eat them by themselves it would taste terrible - raw eggs, baking powder, flour, salt. Who wants to eat that? If you put all of those things in the hands of a cook that knows what they are doing the result can be an absolutely fabulous cake. Keep in mind even in the most difficult times of life, if you are a child of God, God is always working on you.
II. God Is Always Wanting What Is Best For Me
Now the parable takes another turn (no pun intended!) "But the vessel that he was making of clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter. (Jeremiah 18:4, NASB)
Oftentimes, the potter will have a problem - the clay will be spoiled or marred; there will be an imperfection of some sort - a stone or a hard spot that has to be removed before the work can be completed. Usually one of two things happens to the clay in this incidence.
If you ever get a chance to go to Williamsburg, Virginia they show you how life was back in Colonial Days and you can see a potter working with clay. I've watched a potter sitting at the wheel molding a piece of clay and it looks like everything is going fine; the clay appears to be beautifully shaped, the rhythm of the wheel is perfect and it seems as if the product is almost finished. Then all of a sudden the potter stops the wheel, takes off the clay, begins to beat it, push it, mold it, maybe pick at it, pull something away from it, discard it, throw it away and start over. Why does he do that?
The potter spotted something that I couldn't see. There was some kind of impurity in that clay that might be invisible to the naked eye, but by the keenly trained eye of a skillful potter he sees it. Maybe it was just a small stone or a wrinkle in the pattern or a discoloration of part of the clay, but the potter spots it and removes it.
That is exactly what "The Dark Side" can do to us. It is what sin can do to us. Sin is a very strange thing. We all know that we have it, but we can't always see it. We all know that we have faults, but nobody knows all their faults. I am convinced the average person may be more marred than they realize they are.
Have you ever heard someone say something like this, "If I know my heart, such and such is true." Can I let you in on a little secret? You don't know your heart. I don't know my heart. Nobody knows their own heart. Jeremiah 17:9 says, "The heart is more deceitful than all else...who can understand it?" (Jeremiah 17:9, NASB)
Only God knows your heart and you can have sin and imperfection in your life and you don't even realize it. King David said something very interesting in the 19th Psalm. He said in verse 12, "How can I know all the sins lurking in my heart? Cleanse me from these hidden faults." (Psalm 19:12, NLT)
That is what the dark side does - it mars the clay and scars the clay and then limits its use in the hands of the potter.
If you are sitting here today and you are thinking to yourself, "It doesn't seem like God is working on me", "It doesn't seem like God is involved in my life" or "He is not working in my life like I wish He were" have you ever considered the reason God is not doing more in your life is because He can't? God will not work for you until He works in you. The first work that God will always do in you is taking out any impurities that are in your life.
For a vessel to be used by God three things have to be true of that vessel:
- Available
- Empty
- Clean
If the vessel is not available God can't use it. If the vessel is full of itself God can't use it and if the vessel is dirty God can't use it. God has to clean the vessel and empty the vessel before He can ever get to it.
The other problem with the clay is this - it can become hardened, set and refuse to yield to the potter - that was the problem of the Nation of Israel. "So now then, speak to the men of Judah and against the inhabitants of Jerusalem saying, 'Thus says the LORD, "Behold, I am fashioning calamity against you and devising a plan against you Oh turn back, each of you from his evil way, and reform your ways and your deeds.' But they will say, 'It's hopeless! For we are going to follow our own plans, and each of us will act according to the stubbornness of his evil heart.'" (Jeremiah 18:11-12, NASB)
The reason why God could not do a work with the Nation of Israel is because their hearts were hardened and they refused to let God work.
That is the reason why God isn't doing more in some of you, because you won't let Him. Don't misunderstand what I am saying. God is omnipotent and God can do anything. There is nothing impossible with God. Listen carefully. Listen to this. "Even though you cannot limit what God can do in your life, you can limit what God will do in your life."
When the clay refuses to yield to the hands of the potter, when it becomes hardened and set in its ways, the potter is left with no choice sometimes, but to just set that clay aside. He has to melt it down until it is in its liquid form again so he can reuse it. This is exactly why sometimes God lets the fire of difficult times come into our life, because we have gotten so hardened against Him that He has to melt us down so we can be shapeable and formable in His hands again.
I read a story about a little boy whose hand got stuck in a very expensive vase that his mother owned. It was a family heirloom that had been passed down for generations. The mother tried in vain to pull his hand out, but she couldn't do it. Even though she hated to break that vase because it was so valuable, she realized it was the only way she could get her son's hand out, so she broke it, only to find out that her son had his fist all balled up and that is why she couldn't get his hand out.
She said, "Son was your fist balled up like that all the time we were trying to get it out of that vase?" He said very sheepishly, "Yes Ma'am." She said, "Why didn't you let your hand open so it would have come out easily?" He said, "Mother, if I had opened my hand, I would have dropped my penny." Too many people are just like that - holding on to the dark side; holding on to that impurity and that sin in their life when God is simply trying to make out of them a beautiful, valuable vase. He can't do it, because they refuse to yield to His will. That is why you always need to remember that when God is working on you He is wanting what is best for you.
III. God Is Always Willing To Start Over With Me
The greatest message in this whole story is in the last half of verse 4. "So he remade it into another vessel, as it pleased the potter to make." (Jeremiah 18:4, NASB)
As Jeremiah watched this potter he noticed the clay was marred and he realized it wasn't the fault of the potter. It was the fault of the clay. The clay would not yield.
Now the potter had a choice. When the clay refused to yield to the will of the potter he could throw the clay away and start on a whole new lump and just forget about that piece of clay, but that is not what he did. He kept the wheel turning and patiently worked with that clay. Listen again to those six powerful words, "He remade it into another vessel."
You may be sitting there thinking at this very moment that the clay of your life is too marred up, too messed up, nothing good could ever come out of it, but I want you to read that verse one more time and listen to every word of it.
"So he remade it into another vessel, as it pleased the potter to make." (Jeremiah 18:4, NASB) Do you see that little word "so"? That word is so full of patience and so full of love it is as if the potter has looked at this clay and said, "Well, the clay is marred, but what I do best is take marred clay and remake it into something beautiful and that is what I am going to do now." That tells me that no clay is so marred that the hands of God cannot detect it, affect it, correct it and direct it to become something absolutely beautiful.
What I am saying is with God there is always "A New Hope" just around the corner. I don't care how dark your life has become. It is never too late to begin again. It is never too late to start over. You can always start over with God as long as you are willing to for God is always willing to start over with you.
You may be thinking, "I've really messed up my life", but it doesn't have to stay messed up.
You may be thinking, "I've married the wrong person." God can make that person the right person by making you the right person.
You may be saying, "I've gone too far." No matter how far you have gone, God can bring you back.
Thomas Edison was a great, great man. When he was 67 years of age, he had a horrendous fire that burned up everything he owned in New Jersey. Every asset he had which at that time in 1914 was worth about $2 million dollars was totally uninsured. All of his experiments, all of his records, all of his equipment, all of his work, and all of his labor had gone up in smoke.
He had a 24 year old son that came out to where the fire was roaring and burning up his entire life's work. The two of them tried to stop the fire, but they couldn't do it. The son said, "i hated even looking at my dad. I just knew he would say that his life and his work were going up in flames."
He said, "My dad was out there. The wind was blowing in his hair. His face was all red from the flames. He was pouring sweat and I didn't know what he was going to say to me."
I couldn't believe what I heard. He said, "Son, go get your mother quick. She has never seen anything like this!" He went to get his mother just so she could see the fire. Later on this son said, "My dad was out there the next morning kicking through the embers and he said to me, 'Son, there is something wonderful about a fire like this.'" The son looked at him in amazement and said, "Dad, what in the world could be so wonderful about a fire like this?" He said, "Son, it just kind of seems to burn up all of your mistakes and failures and give you a brand new fresh start."
Three months later that company presented to the world the first phonograph, because here was a man who didn't see his problems as the end, but simply a new start and a fresh beginning.
This potter has nailed scarred hands, who can turn your scars into stars, your tears into triumph, your midnights into mornings and your darkness into daybreak if you will just let Him.
There are some of you here today that have never trusted the God of "A New Hope." You have never received His son, Jesus Christ, into your life, who died for you, who paid for your sins, and who was raised from the dead to give you a new hope. I am here to tell you that if you would like to start over with God today - you can.
Perhaps you are a follower of God already, but you've gotten off on the wrong track. You have slipped over into the dark side and your life has become marred and scarred because of it. God can take you right where you are, remake you, remold you, reshape you into what He wants you to be and take you to where you need to be, because He is the God always of "A New Hope."
[1] www.Fire-of-God.com/church