"And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it." (Jeremiah chp 18 verse 4)
If we had made a trip to the house of the potter in Jeremiah 18 we would have found 2 piles of faulty goods:
A pile of damaged goods (18:4)
The damaged goods were "marred in the hand of the potter", defective perhaps through no fault of their own: "Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:" (Rom5:12) but these damaged goods were still soft and mailable and waiting ready to be placed again onto the potters wheel. He was able to restore the beauty which had been lost, and to bring both profit and purpose from the problem of the broken pot.
A pile of dammed goods (18:15-17)
Another pile of goods lay in the potters house. A pile not awaiting a return to the potters wheel but which were piled together ready for destruction. Like the unprofitable tares of Matthew 13 the instruction had been given: "Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn. " If there was no profit in them and no purpose to them there was no place for them in the potters house!What made the difference between the damaged goods and the dammed goods? Both had started off faulty. Was it purely due to the arbitrary mind and will of the potter? He is indeed sovereign over His creation. The distinction that is made in Jeremiah 18 over these 2 groups lies in this: their attitude to the potter. The damaged pile of goods remains soft and mailable and ready to return to the potters wheel to be refashioned into a vessel of glory. The dammed goods have set their mind to refuse the fashioning hand of the potter: "And they said, There is no hope: but we will walk after our own devices, and we will every one do the imagination of his evil heart." (Jer 18:12).
Which pile are we in?
Damaged goods?
Dammed goods?
The distinction lies in our yieldedness to the hand of the potter.
Yours in Christ
Stewart
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