The Potter and The Clay (Jeremiah/Isaiah)

Sermon Title: The Potter and The Clay (Jeremiah/Isaiah)
Text: Jeremiah 18:3-6, Isaiah 64:8
Copyright (c) Nathaniel Tan

We often hear words of song that go “You are the potter, I am the clay”. There are even song titles that read “The potter’s hand”. What can we learn about the potter, and the clay?

In the book of Jeremiah 18, we find God telling Jeremiah to go down to a potter’s house to receive His message. Jeremiah obediently goes there and he saw a potter working on a potters’ wheel.

In Jeremiah’s time, pottery was a major industry. People needed bowls, cups, jugs and they were all made of clay. If you were at the potter’s house, the first thing you would take notice of would be a large wooden wheel that’s about the size of a car tire that was rotated by the feet of the potter.

This was perhaps a common sight for Jeremiah and it was possible that Jeremiah probably wondered what could be taught from the potter and the clay that the potter used to form stuff into.

If you were there, you would probably see how the potter took the clay and form a pot. He would go through specific steps throughout the process. The potter would pick up a seemingly useless, shapeless lump of clay, putting it into a pot of water, washing it, and then letting it soak in the water for a while. After soaking it, he would take it out and start to slap the clay around a bit, after which he would knead the clay to remove the lumps in the clay.

After kneading the clay, the potter would take a thin piece of wire and cut through the lump of clay, right in the middle. The potter does this to see if there are any air bubbles or impurities inside. Air pockets and impurities will cause the clay to crack during drying or firing and the potter always wants to make sure that each piece of pottery that comes out from drying and firing comes out perfect. After making sure that the clay is good for molding, the potter’s feet go to work and the turn-table spins around, round and round. It takes a while, but in the potter’s skillful hands, the clay soon takes shape and slowly becomes a solid representation of what was seen in the potter’s mind. After it has been fired, the final pottery is glazed before it is set on a shelf for display in someone’s home, or for use.

Just understanding how the potter works on his clay, we can learn some valuable lessons about God and us. First, God takes you and I. We were nothing but a lump of clay; hopeless, useless and shapeless. As that clay was dug from a pit in the ground by the potter, so we have been drawn out of the pit of eternal destruction and sin by Jesus Christ. In Psalm 40:2, David writes that God “brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock”.

Secondly, the potter takes the clay and soaks it in water. We being the clay have to be soaked in the word of God. As the clay is saturated with the water, we have to be saturated and filled with God’s word. Dry clay is useless to a potter. Dry clay can’t be molded and shaped into forms; dry clay cracks. God needs softened hearts to work with, hearts that are willing to suck in all that God wants to teach us. God can’t work on people who aren’t willing to hear His word. When we become sensitive to His word, He begins to shape us for our ministry.

Next comes the slapping around and cutting of the clay. Now, God wouldn’t exactly take us, cut us, and slap us around literally, but I believe that we are ‘slapped around a bit’ when God allows trials and temptations to come around to try our faith. James 1:2-3 speaks of trials and temptations that come our way, only to build us up! God wants to make us into pure and holy vessels, and while He is in the process of molding our lives so that we become mature Christians, He has to work out all of our lumps, our weaknesses, imperfections, strongholds; things that are hindering us from become who God wants us to be. So allow God to work you around in His hands. Be patient as He roughs you up, He’s only trying to work out the rough spots in your life so that you can be the person He wishes for you to be.

After the slapping and cutting of the clay, the forming of the clay begins to take shape. The potter would place the clay on the turn table, using his feet to spin the table around. As with the clay as it spins around in circles, sometimes we too think that our lives are going nowhere, that we are accomplishing nothing, that we are not growing. We’ve got to stay on the turn-table and be patient as God slowly but surely molds us into who he wants us to be.

The final processes are the firing and glazing processes. Pottery is placed into a furnace of fire, where it spends a lot of time baking, till it becomes hard. The firing process comes after all the trials; the soaking, kneading, slapping, cutting and shaping. After this, the pottery is glazed. Not only does it make the piece of pottery beautiful with its shiny coat, it prepares the piece of pottery to be able to hold liquids without leaking. The piece of pottery has now matured and it can be used. When someone looks at that beautiful piece of pottery, it isn’t only the work that they praise, but also the potter who shaped it and made it with his hands. I think that I need no further explanations.

When God has finally molded us to who we were meant to be, people who look at us will praise Him, the one who made us. We will be shining lights for God who bring light to the world. You are the potter, I am the clay.