POTTER’S HOUSE TRANSFORMATION

Arise, and go down to the POTTER’S HOUSE, and there I will cause you to hear My words – Jeremiah 18:2

Everyone that’s destined for Glory will experience the POTTER”S HOUSE TRANSFORMATION: “Arise, and go down to the POTTER”S HOUSE, and there I will cause you to hear My words” (Jer.18:2). These verses are a comforting and reassuring reminder that no matter how badly we have messed up in life, no matter how many errors we have committed, no matter how miserably we have failed, God doesn’t throw away His people! Instead, He takes us, “broken pieces and all” and transforms – remoulds and reshapes – us into a new creation. The Prophet Jeremiah needed desperately to be reminded of this wonderful truth, just as we who live in these perilous times also do.

Jeremiah prophesied in a time when Israel had become a divided nation. His prophetic ministry was to the people of Judah, the southern Kingdom, at a time when the nation was sadly saddled with a series of terrible Kings who led the people down a path of idolatry and wickedness. Despite his pleas for repentance, Judah continued to drift from God and closer to her destruction. This sinful rebellion absolutely broke Jeremiah's heart, fore-shadowing how Christ would weep over the city of Jerusalem because of her rejection of God's salvation (Lk. 19: 41-44). Knowing that Jeremiah needed some reassurance that his prophetic ministry had not been in vain, God took him on an excursion to the Potter’s House.

Jeremiah quietly watched the Potter at work: he took the lump of clay, twisted, kneaded, and pounded it until all the bubbles and impurities were gone and it was soft and pliable. Then, he threw it on the wheel, turned the wheel with the treadle, while caressing the clay with his talented fingers, smoothening it out and shaping the clay into something useful and beautiful. Suddenly, the clay became “marred,” perhaps as it picked up some grainy sand or grit; or maybe it began to dry out and harden and became less pliable. Alas, instead of throwing the “marred” clay away, the Potter began to remould and reshape it into a new vessel that would be pleasing to him. Then, God broke His silence: “O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter?” says the Lord. “Look, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel!” (vv.5-6).

God's message was crystal clear: He is the “Potter” and Israel – His chosen people – was the lump of clay, which He had hewn out of the earth through the “seed of Abraham.” He worked, kneaded, and shaped Israel for over 400 years in Egypt’s captivity, and brought them up out to begin their journey to the Promised Land; but along the way, the clay was marred (v.4). The people began to whine, complain, and rebel against the Lord. Rather than throw “the clay” away, the Potter broke the clay down and reshaped it for 40 years in the wilderness, removing the “impurities” and giving Moses the Laws that would govern His people as they entered into the Promised Land. There, Israel became God's “Vessel of honour”! Just like a piece of pottery that had been fired in the kiln and covered in a brilliant glaze, Israel glistened as God's peculiar masterpiece.

Again, God’s Vessel of Honour had become “marred”; His brilliant masterpiece became a vessel of dishonour. But God gave Jeremiah the hope that He would never throw “the clay” away. Instead, He would, in her brokenness, reshape her into a new vessel. This is an analogy of the Believer’s relationship with our heavenly Father, the Perfect Potter, whose eternal plan is to divinely process our destinies, and reshape the “marred clay” of our lives into brilliant, useful and profitable masterpieces.

The Potter has absolute control over the destiny of the clay. In His hands, He makes of it what He ordained and pleases. By His Grace, God takes and transforms old worthless clay into Vessels of Honour and Glory. The chief duty of the clay is to yield to the Perfect Potter’s Hand and His Wheel – His Will!