REPURPOSED CLAY


Many things Yogi Berra said don't make sense, but in one of his famous sayings, he absolutely nails it. "It ain't over till it's over." It's true. No matter how things look today, it ain't over yet. And it won't be over until it's over. These are words to remember and to live by. A common mistake is to think that the way things are today is the way things will always be. The economy will always be this good, or it will always be this bad. Business will always be this good, or it will always be this bad. This relationship will always be this good, or it will always be this bad. Very few things in life will always be the way they are now. There is an ebb and flow to life. The tide comes in and the tide goes out. Things get better and things get worse. This truth is an encouragement and a warning. Things won't always be like they are now. We should live our lives with this in mind. Don't give up on the future. There's still time on the clock. Give 100% until the final buzzer. That’s the whole point of Jeremiah 18. It ain’t over till it’s over.

This passage is about the potter and the clay. The potter symbolizes God who is working at his wheel (v. 3). This means that God is in control. Sometimes it doesn't feel that way. Sometimes it seems that you're just a lump of clay sitting on a spinning machine, without anyone in control. It may look that way sometimes, but that's not how it is. There is a potter, and he is sitting at the wheel of your life. He is shaping you and molding you and making you into the person you are capable of becoming. And then in verse four these words were spoken, “But the jar he was making did not turn out as he had hoped…” There will be times when things turn out not only different from the way you want, but different from the way God wants. But remember this God can repurpose anything that happens in your life—“so he crushed it into a lump of clay again and started over” (v. 4b). Things happen outside the will of God, but nothing happens outside the control of God. There is no situation beyond his power to redeem. If you allow him, he can take the broken parts of your life and shape them into something beautiful.

If you will allow God to sit at the potter's table, then the words of Jeremiah will be yours, “Then the word of the Lord came to me” (v. 5). That's why it's too soon to give up on your future. There is a potter at the wheel. He can take a mistake and turn it into masterpiece, if you will only say: Have thine own way and let his word live in you.

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