https://odb.org/MY/2021/09/15/the-ocarina
The Prophet Isaiah uses the metaphor of the Potter and the Clay in Isaiah 64:8 to describe the relationship between Israel and God and by extension through Christ, between us who are in the faith and God. However, if we read Isaiah 64 carefully, we will sense that there is a feeling that God had already left Israel to their sins because they had continued to sin against Him – they felt that the LORD had hidden His face from them and had thus given up on them. Isaiah was sort of pleading with God when he declared that the LORD is the Potter and we are the Clay that we are all the work of His hands. Isaiah then went on to exalt the LORD not to be angry beyond measure and not to remember their sins forever.
The question this morning is are we the Clay that God can work with as the Potter. In its natural form, the Clay is inanimate and thus is a picture of total submission. The Clay just yields as it is shaped by the Potter as He spins the wheel and His hands mould the Clay into the form that He wants. The Clay doesn’t do anything as it can’t – it is not a living thing.
Now imagine that the Clay is alive and can move since it is a metaphor of us as living believing beings. Will the living Clay be like the inanimate Clay, allowing God to shape us as He wished. Or will the living Clay now move against the hands of God, avoiding His touch, jump off the wheel and run away? Will the Clay now want to remain in its original form and thus refuses to be moulded? Will the Clay now resist and rebel against God shaping it?
As much as Isaiah exalted God that He is their Potter and they are His Clay, the reality is that they were a bunch of rebellious, disobedient Clay that had rejected the hand of God. That is probably why Isaiah felt God had given up on them. They were living Clay not behaving in its natural inanimate form.
Ask ourselves today – are we the Clay that God can work with? Although we are not inanimate but alive, can we be like the inanimate Clay when God works in our lives? Can we just let God shape and mould us as He pleases into an instrument that brings forth His glory like the ocarina in today’s ODB? Will we yield our will to Him or will we fight and resist Him? Will we go the way He directs and open new frontiers with Him or will we walk our own familiar path, our comfort zone? We all know that the Clay can only become pieces of beauty after it goes through the heat in the furnace. That’s a topic for another day. For today, we need to accept God’s hands working us into the shape and form He wants before we are ready to serve Him in a deeper way, to do great things for Him in the Kingdom of God!
Ronnie's Thoughts 