Reshaped by God

 Jeremiah 18: 1-11, Psalms 139: 1-6, 13-18

 In our Jeremiah passage, God uses common things to explain a profound message from God. Jeremiah is told to go down to the potter’s house. So, he does so and observes the potter working with the clay. He notices then when the clay becomes spoiled, the potter reshapes it into another vessel. God then describes this metaphor as God being the potter and Israel being the clay. God has great intentions for Israel – for the vessel they can become. But if Israel is spoiled by the evil and being unfaithful, God’s mind may be changed about the good God had intended to do and will reshape it devising a plan against it. It is as if Israel is now on God’s potter’s wheel and God is giving them a chance to amend their ways and their deeds so that God can shape them into what God has intended.

Psalms 139 tells how wonderfully made we are by the Creator. It tells how God knit us together in our mother’s womb. All the days that were formed for us were written in God’s book. God has formed us all for a purpose to glorify God by reflecting the image of God in our words and our deeds.

We begin as perfect clay God has a purpose for. Many times, we turn from God. We try to take charge and the clay of our lives becomes spoiled and we become reshaped away from the purpose God has for us. But the good news is God can reshape us again if we turn back to God – we can be remolded into the instrument God has originally planned for us. We need to give back control to God the potter by living faithful to God’s ways and producing honorable deeds that reflect the fruits of the spirit, loving our neighbor as ourselves, and living with mercy and justice for all.

May we allow God the potter to continually shape us into the vessel – the purpose God has for us.  Amen

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