I didn’t realize it’s been THIS long since I’ve posted anything.  There’s been lots going on and no time to talk about that.  Other things have been consuming my thoughts as of late.  I have found myself in a very comfortable place that I cannot seem to move from right now.  I like to call it, the hand of the potter.  Over the last month or so, I’ve been taking a very hard and revealing look at Jeremiah 18:1-4.  The biggest theme that continues to come up for me right now, is unity within the body of believers, and how we need the kind of unity so desperatly that Jesus prayed about in John 17.  We need each other beyond the point of support and helping out; we need each other to the point that our spiritual health is dependant upon our unity.  So for your consideration, let me share how I came to this idea. 

It is needless to say who represents the potter and who represents the clay in the object lesson that Jeremiah is seeing in this passage.  What is important about this visual, is the relationship between the potter and the clay.  The crafting of the vessel by the potter becomes a continual working and reworking in order to achieve the desired product.  It’s a constant breaking and remolding due to the problems within the clay.  Here, it must be pointed out that the problem is not due to the error of the potter, but with the clay’s failure to submit to the workmanship of the potter (the clay doesn’t have the right give to it).  Throughout the process, the clay is marred.  The proper vessel cannot be formed.  At this point the question that I’ve entertained has been, “what is a vessel made for?”  The simple and obvious answer is that it may be filled.  Filled with what?  I think this answer is obvious too, when we consider the cross.  God wants to fill us with His love, mercy, grace,…  and ultimately Himself.  He wants to do so in order to cause us to overflow, or spill Him over into the lives of the people around us so that others experience God through us.  But God has not been able to do so because we are marred in His hands.  We have become leaky vessels.  Instead of God spilling over to others, God runs right though us.  But here is where our unity is so vital.  We all have different strong points and weaknesses.  In other words our holes, our leaks are in different places.  So here is another object lesson.  Take a few cups.  Now put holes in the cups so that they are in different places.  Then try to pour water in the cups individually.  The cups will not hold the water at all.  But, if you take the cups and stack them inside each other and then try to pour the water into them, the water will hold, and the only way it can spill is over the top.

We need each other in such a way as to prevent leaky vessels from failing to accomplish the purpose of God in the world here.  We need to learn dependence upon each other, but first we must learn dependence on God and trust that he is going to make us into the perfect vessel for His purpose so long as we let Him do it.