Isaiah 29:15-16 NLT
15 What sorrow awaits those who try to hide their plans from the Lord,
who do their evil deeds in the dark!
“The Lord can’t see us,” they say.
“He doesn’t know what’s going on!”
16 How foolish can you be?
He is the Potter, and he is certainly greater than you, the clay!
Should the created thing say of the one who made it,
“He didn’t make me”?
Does a jar ever say,
“The potter who made me is stupid”?
Are we pilgrims ever guilty of trying to hide what we are doing from the Lord? Perhaps our minds block out thoughts of the Lord when we make decisions or plan a course of action. Perhaps we find ourselves reaping the fruits of evil “seeds” we planted in the past, or living with the results of wrong decisions. There is many a man having to live with the consequences of a child born out of a permanent relationship, for example. But even in small things, are we consulting the Lord about what we should do, or are we going the way of our selfish desires? The decisions we make in life should be influenced by the godly lifestyles that we lead, and we should listen to the Holy Spirit’s prompting when we are at a life junction. Perhaps we can imagine a signpost saying “This way will lead to evil” in one direction, and “This way is God’s way” in the other. There is a Proverb that reads, “There is a path before each person that seems right, but it ends in death”(Proverbs 14:12). Human logic, desires, and cultural norms often make certain choices feel completely correct, safe, or justified, but relying solely on our own understanding can lead us down a destructive path. Human perspective is limited, but God is all-seeing and all-knowing. Proverbs 15:3, “The LORD is watching everywhere, keeping his eye on both the evil and the good”. The writer of the Hebrews epistle wrote, “Nothing in all creation is hidden from God. Everything is naked and exposed before his eyes, and he is the one to whom we are accountable” (Hebrews 4:13). Quite simply, when decisions have to be made, then we must look beyond immediate satisfaction and seek God and His perspective and wisdom rather than trusting only our own instincts.
In our verses today from Isaiah, it seems that there were people in Judah who tried to hide what they were doing from God, in the hope that He would be looking the other way, or would be ignoring what they were doing. How did they reach that mindset? Probably because God’s judgment is mostly delayed. He doesn’t “zap” us the minute we do something wrong, thankfully, but He instead gently leads us back onto the right path, perhaps through a Bible verse, or a word of encouragement or correction from the minister or pastor, or a trusted friend. But the people in Judah had become deaf to God’s corrections, probably because everyone else had become deaf as well, even the religious leaders. What hope is there for a child of God if their pastor and everyone else is walking in sin, following the path of evil, themselves? But it wasn’t all a hopeless situation because prophets such as Isaiah were crying out the ways of salvation, sharing God’s heart with a people “who do their evil deeds in the dark”. Did some listen? Probably, because we know that God always has a generational remnant who are faithful to Him.
Isaiah goes on to use a great analogy of a potter and a lump of clay. The potter sits at his wheel, picks up a lump of clay, and forms it into something useful. Before his creative work, the lump of clay is good for nothing, but with a skilled potter, he can turn it into a beautiful vessel, expressing his artistic gifts in his creation. But the vessel itself has been created and cannot turn round and criticise its creator. If necessary, the potter can look at what he has made, decide it isn’t what he wanted, and crush it back into a lump before trying again. The potter provides a great picture of our Creator God, who uniquely creates every person who has ever been born. The Psalmist, David, wrote, “You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvellous—how well I know it” (Psalm 139:13-14). The analogy ends when we compare the wondrous complexity of a human being with a vessel made from clay. Jeremiah wrote, “O Israel, can I not do to you as this potter has done to his clay? As the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand” (Jeremiah 18:6). It was stupid of the created beings, the people of Israel and Judah, to think they could turn around to the One who created them and say that He got it all wrong. And to even deny that God made them at all is surely the greatest sin. It is sad today that evolution is the dominant ideology, one that maintains that human beings have happened by chance. We pilgrims are in the midst of a people who deny that God created them, or anything else in the natural world around them. How will God deal with these people, the created vessels of “clay”, when they stand before Him? In the same way that the potter deals with a vessel that hasn’t become what he wanted it to be.
Thankfully, our Creator Potter has put a plan in place so imperfect “pots” can be transformed into the very vessels He created them to be in the first place. God has taken flawed human beings and, through Jesus, cleaned up their lives, refining them to be worthy to be called His children. John wrote, “But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. They are reborn—not with a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God” (John 1:12-13). God is in the recycling business, giving all who believe in Him the opportunity to be transformed into the beautiful people He designed from the start. Sin corrupted the vessels into useless pots unsuitable for any purpose in God’s Kingdom. And so they will end up on the rubbish heap with all the rest of the broken pots. It will be no good for them to say things like, “the potter who made me is stupid” because it will not be in their capability to change themselves into something beautiful. People cannot save themselves. In Paul’s letter to Titus, we read, ” … When God our Saviour revealed his kindness and love, he saved us, not because of the righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He washed away our sins, giving us a new birth and new life through the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:4-5). God takes the broken pot and makes it into something new and wonderful, a person suitable for being called one of His children.
So today, fellow pilgrim “pots”, what are we saying to the Master Potter, God Himself? Perhaps a thought to reflect on in the day ahead.
Dear Father God. We declare today that we want to be the vessel that You have designed us to be. With the words of the old hymn, we pray, “Spirit of the Living God / Fall afresh on me / Melt me mould me / Fill me use me / Spirit of the Living God / Fall afresh on me.” Amen.
