Recently, I was involved in two events that both had a "tea party" theme. As I reflected on the teapot, my mind went to several verses in the Bible that refers to us as vessels. Just like the teapot is filled and used to serve others, God desires for each of us to be filled with his Spirit so we can serve others; so he can use us to pour out His love into others.
The Potter is fashioning each of His vessels for an exact purpose. He is forming us and molding us and refining us in the fire of trials. He knows just how much pressure to apply and how many times we have to go around His wheel, before we are ready to be a vessel of honor and beauty. Sometimes, we feel like we will break or burn up in the fire...sometimes we scream out for Him to stop, but He continues His loving work. Sometimes, we look at the progress and we think He's made a mistake or it seems like the pain has lasted too long and He's forgotten about us. But, Isaiah 29:16 says, "Surely you have things turned around; shall the potter be esteemed like the clay; for shall the work say of him that made it, He made me not? or shall the thing formed say of him that formed it, He had no understanding?" The Potter knows the clay!
Sometimes, the Potter has to break the vessel in order to remake it to fit His plan. Sometimes our vessels get damaged when someone abuses it or mistreats it, and sometimes we make mistakes that cause our vessel to become weak and cracked. The psalmist wrote, "I am forgotten as a dead man out of mind: I am like a broken vessel." Psalm 31:12.
Have you felt the pain spoken in that verse? I certainly have...I sat on the shelf, broken and filthy and unusable for several years. But...and this is the good part... II Timothy 2:21 says, "If a man therefore purge (cleanse) himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified (set apart), and meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work." It doesn't say, "unless you are too filthy or too broken". The Potter specializes in changing worthless into precious, guilty to forgiven, hungry into satisfied, empty into full...He specializes in changing broken into beautiful.
Friend, I don't know where you are at. I don't know if you are going through the fire of financial troubles, or health problems, or the loss of a loved one, or an unexpected tragedy. But I do know that the Potter has planned a beautiful design. You may not be able to see it right now because of the flames and the pain, but you will. You may be empty right now, but He is going to fill you and use you for something beautiful. Trust the Potter...because He knows the clay!
Isaiah 64:8 But now, O Lord, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of they hand.
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