pastorjohnb

Thoughts and musings on faith and our mighty God!

Tag Archives: reshape


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Can You Feel It?

Reading: Jeremiah 18:1-11

Jeremiah 18:11 – “I am a potter preparing disaster for you… So each one of you, turn from your evil ways; reform your ways and actions.”

In Jeremiah 18 God sends the prophet to the potter’s house. Using this mental image, this visual, it brings God’s word to life. In ancient times, pottery was used for many things: food and water storage, cooking and baking, cleansing. Jeremiah’s audience would be very familiar with a potter and the work they did. Like Jesus’ many examples drawn from his agricultural society, the potter imagery instantly connects the people to God’s message.

At the potter’s house Jeremiah observes the piece being made. It becomes flawed as it is being formed, so the potter starts over. That’s the thing about clay – until fired in the kiln, if kept properly, it can be reshaped again and again. Extending this idea, God says to God’s people, “Can’t I deal with you like this potter?” While these words can sound a bit threatening, these are really words of grace and mercy. Through Jeremiah and many other prophets, God has warned Judah (and Israel before them) again and again. Yet they continued to displease and disobey God. So God declares, “I am a potter preparing disaster for you… So each one of you, turn from your evil ways; reform your ways and actions.” God so desires for Judah to walk in right relationship with God. Can you feel it?

This potter metaphor applies to our lives as well. When God first created you, created me, God did so with an end product in mind. From the beginning, God has a plan and a purpose for our lives. But along the way we become flawed. We sin, we get distracted, we wander. And there is God, the potter, bringing us back to the wheel, reshaping us again and again. God so desires to walk in a close, personal relationship with us. Can you feel it?

Prayer: Lord God, thank you for your deep and unconditional love for us. Thank you for your mercy, grace, and forgiveness that always returns to the wheel of our life, steadily shaping us into who you created us to be. By the power of the Holy Spirit, may we feel and sense your guidance and direction, taking an active role in our relationship with you. Amen.


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Malleable

Reading: Jeremiah 18:1-4

Verse 4: “The pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.”

Photo credit: Robert Linder

In this week’s passage from Jeremiah, God sends him to the potter’s house. Here Jeremiah received new understanding and a sharper vision. He goes and finds the potter working at the wheel. The wheel turns, making it easier to shape and form the clay. Whatever appeared to be taking shape was not as the potter envisioned. So we read, “The pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.”

One advantage of clay is that it is malleable. Therefore it can be reshaped and reworked over and over again. Standing there watching, Jeremiah realized that the clay represented humanity – himself on a small scale and Israel on the larger scale. You and I are clay too. Unfortunately, we are not always malleable. We don’t always like to be reshapen and reworked.

Jeremiah understood that God was trying to reshape and rework Israel. Their worship of false gods and their pursuit of wealth and power had marred what God had envisioned for Israel. In the same way, when we turn selfish and allow the voices of the world to lead us away from God, we too become marred. Like the potter who is patient with the clay, working it, reshaping it, so too is God patient with us. Life is the spinning wheel that God uses to try and shape us, define us, rework us. But unlike the clay in the potter’s hands, we have the ability to decide, the power to choose whether or not we’ll allow God to touch us, to shape and form us into what God envisions for our lives. How malleable will you be?

Prayer: God, shape me and mold me. Work and gently form me into who and what you want me to be. Help me to surrender those parts of me that mar your plans for me. Amen.


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Look Upon Us

Reading: Isaiah 64: 5b-9

Verse 8: “Yet, O Lord, you are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter”.

As we continue in Isaiah 64 today, the second half of the passage begins in verse 5b with an admission: “When we continued to sin, you were angry”. Yes, God will come to the help of those who do right, but the sinners? Isaiah asks the correct question: “How then can we be saved”? As a people living in sin, the Israelites were taken into exile. God still loves them, but what can God do with his children who continue in their rebellion? The prophet laments that they have become “unclean” and that their faith has “shriveled up” like a dry leaf. In verse seven his words are honest: “No one calls on your name or strives to lay hold of you”. The situation, the condition of the people’s faith, is not good. Yet there is hope. There is always hope with God.

In verse eight Isaiah speaks of that hope: “Yet, O Lord, you are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter”. Our God never gives up on us. Yes, we may choose to distance ourselves from God and from our relationships with one another. Our sin leads to separation. Even in the midst of our sin, even then we can cry out to God. Like a petulant child, we cry out only half-heartedly because we remain unclean. We want our way and we want God to do our will too. At that point God hears but does not respond. This is where almost all of Isaiah’s audience is at spiritually. Yet the one who speaks for God has hope. Isaiah knows that God can and will reshape the people. Through the process of defeat and exile, God will fashion Israel back into obedient children once again. Our passage ends with a humble plea: “Oh, look upon us, we pray, for we are all your people”.

In this season, especially in this time of division and discord, in this time of online worship and personal distancing, in this time of illness and loss, Lord, look upon us. We pray for all of your people. Great potter, shape us into something new.

Prayer: Lord God, show us the way. Help me to work through this discord in my soul, through this time of unease. Bring healing to our land, O God. Not just physical healing but also spiritual and emotional and relational healing. Unite us, O Lord, in your love and grace and mercy. Amen.


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Refined and Reshaped

Reading: Exodus 16: 2-8

Verse 3: “You have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death”.

As the nation of Israel travels in the desert it is a time of testing and refining and reshaping. The journey began with a great freeing miracle in the Passover. The possibility of new life lay ahead as they exited Egypt. They were no longer slaves living in a foreign land. Shortly after leaving God again intervened on their behalf, providing a way through the sea. They were spared a return to slavery. But the experience of these powerful miracles soon gave way to the reality of their situation. The first grumbling for water was satisfied but it came with the first warning to “listen carefully to the voice of the Lord”.

About 45 days after leaving Egypt, the nation has now run low on food. Water and food are essential to life. The people begin to once again grumble against Moses and Aaron. Remembering the good old days – the days when they sat around pots of food as SLAVES – they say to them, “If only we had died at the hand of the Lord in Egypt”. Continuing on, the Israelites say, “You have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death”. They are once again testing God. When they feared dying when trapped against the sea, they complained and God provided the way. When they complained about the bitter water, again God provided the way. God will respond. God’s intent was not to bring his nation out of slavery just to die in the desert. But there are provisions this time. It will be necessary to begin listening to that voice of the Lord. As Moses speaks God’s commands, they must begin to listen. God is beginning to refine and shape their obedience. They are being readied for what lies ahead.

Our journeys with God include similar elements. There are times in our lives when needs are not being met. After one too many nights of Ramen noodles, it can be easy to slip into grumbling or complaining or having a “woe is me” attitude. We also have experiences where God provides a way – literally sending food our way or opening a door at other times. Like the parting of the sea and like water from the rock, as God reigns down food from heaven, it will reassure the people, it will refine their faith, it will begin to shape them into obedient people. Even so, the Israelites will again doubt, will again turn to fear instead of trust. We too are a work in progress. Our faith journey has its share of times when we need refined and reshaped too. We all need reminded from time to time that God is faithful and that God loves us dearly. Each time we are drawn a little closer, we are more assured of his love, and we emerge walking a bit closer, more obediently. May our loving and faithful God continue the good work that he has begun in each of us.

Prayer: Dear God, thank you for your continual work in my life. There was that time in the hospital when you were tangibly present. And there was that time when you opened a door when I couldn’t see a way. And, and, and… Through my doubt and worry, through my questioning and even anger, you provided the way. Thank you, God. Amen.


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Back to the Wheel

Reading: Jeremiah 18: 1-6

Verse 4: “So the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him”.

As a potter sits at the wheel with a piece of clay, in their mind is an idea of what the clay will become. It may be a bowl or a cup or a plate or a pitcher in the idea that the potter envisions. As the wheel turns, the potter’s hands gently but firmly shape the clay into something. Sometimes the thing that begins to evolve is not what the potter had envisioned. The potter then reforms the lump and begins to sculpt again, creating that which was planned.

God and the relationship with humanity is much like the metaphor of the potter and the clay. God formed Adam then Eve in his image. Since then God has knit each of us together in the womb, as we read about the last two days in Psalm 139. Ever since the creation of the world, God has had a plan. At times the people of God have wandered from that plan, becoming a thing that God had not intended. And like the potter, God worked to reshape the people, bringing them back to what was planned. As is the case today, God sends a prophet to try and guide the people back to God and back into a right relationship with God.

This general pattern has continued since the creation of the world. The cycle of sin is ever repeated. God, in abundant patience and love, continues to shape and reform us into what we were created to be.

When I think about my life and the cummulative journey of my 53+ years, I am amazed. I cannot even begin to fathom how many times God has said, “Back to the wheel”! More than the “stars in the sky” comes to mind. What amazes me is that God always remains faithful. When I take option “John” instead of option God, God just revises. God goes to plan B or C or Z to get me heading back to point Q. Like the potter, God continues to shape my life, to work me back around to his plan, to help me be what I was created to be. How grateful I am.

As you look back on your years, how has God shaped and formed and reshaped you? How is God doing so today?

Prayer: Creating God, continue to work within me, ever shaping me to be who you created me to be. Form my will to yours, O God. Work in me to shape me more and more into your son’s image. Carry me through the valleys and hard days. Amen.


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There

Reading: John 2: 1-11

Verse 3: “They gave no more wine”.

Today’s interaction is sometimes played out in our own families. I have said to my sons or daughter some version of “your room is a disaster”. There is an implication in my statement. I have said things to my wife like,”Boy am I hungry” – again, there is an implication in my statement.

In today’s passage Mary says to Jesus, “They have no more wine”. It too was probably accompanied by a slightly long-lasting look. There is the same “do something” about this situation implied. Jesus, like most kids so, offers up a protest to the parent. But Mary knows that Jesus knows that she expects something to be done about the situation. Jesus obliges, turning the water to wine.

Sometimes God is expected to be like this. We throw a similar complaint God’s way and expect Him to remove the thorn or the stress in our life. And sometimes God does. But other times there is a purpose to our trial or testing – it is something to refine us or to reshape us or to help us grow in our faith.

And every once in a while we find ourselves so deep in grief or pain or distress when we cannot even mumble a prayer to God. We do not even know where to begin. Yet God is there. God responds when we do not or cannot ask. Exodus 14:14 says, “The Lord will fight for you, you only need to be still”. Rest in God. Trust in God. God is there.

Prayer: God, be with those who are hurting, who are broken, who need your presence. Amen.


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Invitation

Reading: Matthew 22: 1-14

Verse Nine: Go to the streets and invite to the banquet anyone you find.

Today’s parable is symbolic of God’s continuing invitation to all of humanity to come into the kingdom of God.  The original invitation began with God’s chosen people, but most rejected the invite – they did not see Jesus as the Messiah.  Still God invited them.  They abused and killed many who God sent to invite them – even killing the Son.  So God sent others out, saying, “Go to the streets and invite to the banquet anyone you find”.  In the Good News translation the Great Commission from Matthew 28 reads, “Go, then, to all peoples everywhere”, mirroring the invitation to all.  In God’s great patience, He will continue and continue to invite all into the kingdom.  Today, tomorrow, and on into the future God will continue to send out invitations to all who are lost.

The parable goes on to say that the good and the bad respond to the invitation, filling the banquet hall.  There are some who hear the invitation and come to see what it is all about.  Some come because a friend or family member received the invitation and they are going.  They come and they sit in the pew.  But they do not take the next step.  They do not become a part of the kingdom.  In the parable, the king comes to look over the guests.  He notices a man not wearing the right clothes.  The man did not fully accept the invitation.  He came to the banquet, but on his terms.  He remains stubbornly silent.  He is cast out into darkness.

This same idea occurs elsewhere in scripture.  In the parable of the sheep and the goats, for example, the goats are left wondering why they are cast out.  They knew who Jesus was and even did a few things He asked, but they did not choose to enter a saving personal relationship that changed their lives.  Today, many know who Jesus is, but they cling to their old self.  They appear to be at the banquet, but inside they are the ones in control, not Jesus.

To be a follower requires that we put off the old self and take on the new robe of righteousness.  We must not only accept the invitation, but we must allow it to reshaped us into the image of Christ.  We must die to self so that Christ can rule on the throne of our hearts.  Yet even then God continues to send us invitations.  He invites us to go out and live our lives as the salt and light the world so desperately needs.  He invites us to go out to the street corners and to invite everyone we see, helping them into the kingdom.  How will we do this today?