HE is the potter
and we are the clay
There was a couple who
used to go to England to shop in a beautiful antique store.
This trip was to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary.
They both liked antiques and pottery, and especially tea-cups.
Spotting an exceptional cup, they asked "May we see that?
We've never seen a cup quite so beautiful."
As the lady handed it
to them, suddenly the tea-cup spoke, "You don't understand."
It said, "I have not always been a tea-cup. There was
a time when I was just a lump of red clay. My Master took
me and rolled me, pounded and patted me over and over and
I yelled out, DON'T DO THAT! I don't like it! Let me alone!",
but he only smiled and gently said; "Not yet!"
Then.....WHAM! I was placed
on a spinning wheel and suddenly I was spun around and around
and around. “Stop it! I'm getting so dizzy! I'm going
to be sick!” I screamed. But the master only nodded
and said, quietly; “Not yet.”
He spun me and poked me
and prodded and bent me out of shape to suit himself and then........then
he put me in the oven. I never felt such heat. I yelled and
knocked and pounded at the door. "Help! Get me out of
here!" I could see him through the opening and I could
read his lips as he shook his head from side to side, “Not
yet.”
"When I thought I
couldn't bear it another minute, the door opened. He carefully
took me out and put me on the shelf, and I began to cool.
Oh, that felt so good! "Ah, this is much better,"
I thought. But, after I cooled he picked me up and he brushed
and painted me all over. The fumes were horrible. I thought
I would gag “Oh, please; Stop it, Stop it!” I
cried. He only shook his head and said, “Not yet.”
Then suddenly he put me
back into the oven. Only it was not like the first one. This
was twice as hot and I just knew I would suffocate. I begged.
I pleaded. I screamed. I cried. I was convinced I would never
make it. I was ready to give up. Just then the door opened
and he took me out and again placed me on the shelf, where
I cooled and waited---and waited, wondering “what's
he going to do to me next?” An hour later he handed
me a mirror and said, “Look at yourself” and I
did. I said, “That's not me; that couldn't be me, It's
beautiful. I'm beautiful!”
Quietly he spoke: "I
want you to remember, then,” he said, “I know
it hurt to be rolled and pounded and patted, but had I just
left you alone, you'd have dried up. I know it made you dizzy
to spin around on the wheel, but if I had stopped you would
have crumbled. I know it hurt and it was hot and disagreeable
in the oven, but if I hadn't put you there, you would have
cracked. I know the fumes were bad when I brushed and painted
you all over, but if I hadn't done that, you never would have
hardened. You would not have had any color in your life. If
I hadn't put you back in that second oven, you wouldn't have
survived for long because the hardness would not have held.
Now you are a finished product. Now you are what I had in
mind when I first began with you.”
The moral of this story is this: God knows what He's doing
(for each of us). He is the potter and we are His clay. He
will mold us and make us, and expose us to just enough pressures
of just the right kinds that we may be made into flawless
piece of work to fulfill His good, pleasing and perfect will.
So when life seems
hard, and you are being pounded and patted and pushed almost
beyond endurance; when your world seems to be spinning out
of control; when you feel like you are in a fiery furnace
of trials; when life seems to "stink", try this...
Brew a cup of your favorite brew in your prettiest tea cup,
sit down and think on this story and then, have a little talk
with the Potter.
