HAVE THINE OWN WAY, LORD – Part 7: Arrayed in Grace - May 10, 2008

The kiln has cooled and the Potter eagerly opens the door on his long awaited vessel of clay. One by one he removes the pots from the kiln, handling them gingerly. His hands recognize his precious pot even before his eyes do. Eagerly he holds it up to the light, turning it every which way, exploring his final product. He runs his hands lovingly over the cool, hard surface, admiring its shape and hues.

Now the Potter adds his final touches to his creation. He may paint designs on the surface of the vessel—pictures that tell a story, a geometric design, or flowers, perhaps—or garnish it with touches of gold or precious gems. And then—THEN—he turns his vessel over, and with great flourish and tears of joy, the proud Potter adds his signature to his work of art.

As a work of God’s hands, I am so much more than clay and glaze and paint and gilding. There are secret ingredients at work in this earthly yet spiritual vessel. First of all, I have been created in the image of my Maker. A touch of the divine enlivens my clay. Secondly, I am a living, breathing being (more like a fragrant, life-giving loaf of bread than a lifeless jar of clay), growing and developing spiritually, due to the yeasting of the Holy Spirit.

I give praise to my maker, joining Isaiah who proclaimed, “I delight greatly in the Lord; my soul rejoices in my God. For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.” (Isaiah 61:10) The paint, gilding, and jewels that array my earthly shell are endowed with mysterious properties: salvation and righteousness.

In our society, we are so focused on our outward appearance and beauty that we tend to discount our personal assets—our intelligence, talents, skills, personal qualities, values, etc. If we are often blind to our own goodness, how are we to recognize and appreciate the mysteries of the Potter that pulse within our spiritual being?

In a famous Old Testament passage, the great prophet Isaiah prophesied about the Messiah, saying “He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.” (Isaiah 53:2) By human standards, Jesus was not handsome. In fact, there was nothing special about him that made him appealing and attractive, such that people were drawn to him by his looks— just a thirty-something, average Joe.

Jesus knew that, “the Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” (1 Samuel 16:7) Jesus became an earthly vessel, just like you and me; a vessel from whom our Heavenly Father’s love and grace flows.

So, my fellow vessels of clay, the next time you get down on yourself, remember whose you are and who you are in Christ:

• You were carefully chosen and created by the Divine Potter
  
• There are secret spiritual ingredients at work within you.


• You are created in the very image of God. The fact that you are prone to sin does not negate this amazing truth.


• You are a one of a kind creation. Gratefully, joyfully—and yes, proudly—bear the signature of your Maker.


• You are adorned with salvation and righteousness, thanks to your loving Creator and the sacrifice of his son, Jesus.


• And on those days when you just can’t look beyond your physical appearance and see your worth, remember that you are every bit as good lookin’ as Jesus!

We’ve spent seven weeks talking about being God’s vessel; now it’s time to let the Potter have his way with us. Let the spinning begin!

Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine own way!
Thou art the Potter, I am the clay.
Mold me and make me after Thy will.
While I am waiting, yielded and still.
Adalaide Pollard, 1907

HAVE THINE OWN WAY, LORD – Part 6: Godly Suffering - May 3, 2008

“ …So if you are suffering in a manner that pleases God,
keep on doing what is right,
and trust your lives to the God who created you,
for he will never fail you.”
1 Peter 4:19

Last week, I left you roasting in the Creator’s kiln. You kicked and screamed all the way to the kiln, questioning God’s judgment, but at some point, you yielded to God’s will.

Yielding is more than difficult. Yield is “a general term referring to any sort of giving in before force, domination, argument, entreaty, appeal.” Synonyms for yield expand the pallet with shades of surrendering (submit and capitulate), yielding through weakness (succumb), and yielding out of respect (defer). We might also say that we buckle, cave, or knuckle under. If you want me to yield, dispense with force, domination, or argument. I respond more willingly to entreaty or appeal. To surrender or capitulate shouts “LOSER.” Deferring out of respect is somewhat palatable, but I’d really rather be in charge. Are you identifying with my distaste for yielding? So why subject ourselves to the fiery furnace of God’s formation?

The apostle Peter offers us these disconcerting words of encouragement: “Dear friends, don’t be surprised at the fiery trials you are going through, as if something strange were happening to you. Instead, be very glad—for these trials make you partners with Christ in his suffering, so that you will have the wonderful joy of seeing his glory when it is revealed to all the world. So be happy when you are insulted for being a Christian, for then the glorious Spirit of God rests upon you. ... it is no shame to suffer for being a Christian. Praise God for the privilege of being called by his name! (1 Peter: 4:12-16)

Our trials make us partners with Christ—in his suffering. Peter is referring to a unique suffering—suffering for being a Christian. As an American, I worship whom and how I please. I’m familiar with the pain of physical and emotional suffering and the angst of spiritual upheaval, but I’ve not been persecuted for “being” a Christian.

Recently I viewed “The Reckoning,” a documentary film about the Dutch Resistance during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands during WWII. The film tells the true stories of ordinary citizens who came to the aid of the Jews, risking their own safety and very lives.

I try to imagine myself in the shoes of Diet Emmon, a young woman who transported counterfeit identity and ration documents under the noses of the Nazi soldiers. How would I feel, sitting on a train when German soldiers board and begin to search the train? How would I feel hearing that my fiancé, also a member of the resistance, was captured and exterminated in a prison camp? How would I react when arrested and imprisoned for three months, not knowing what my fate would be? And on release, would I be able to return to resistance work, as Diet did?

I pray I never have to experience such suffering, but Christians and non-Christians alike, worldwide, suffer religious persecution as a way of life. But I will offer what suffering I experience to my Savior. My suffering is fraught with resistance and complaining, but I offer my suffering, such as it is, to come alongside Christ in the suffering he endured for me.

Centuries ago, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednigo were thrown into a fiery furnace because they refused to bow down to the golden idol of King Nebuchadnezzar. Yet they testified that “if we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up." God joined them in the furnace and saved them from the fire. (Daniel 3)

This fire was not the kiln of God, but the inferno of Satan. Whether we are being shaped by our Master Potter, or suffering in the hands of evil, God is with us.

“…lo, I am with you always,
even unto the end of the world.”
Matthew 28:20

HAVE THINE OWN WAY, LORD – Part 5: The Hot Seat - April 26, 2008

Well, the red letter day is finally here. We lumps of clay have been kneaded, pounded, wedged, sliced, and slammed and are now soft and supple. We have been skillfully shaped on our Heavenly Potter’s wheel, air dried, glazed, and are now ready to take a lickin’ in the fiery furnace. Just bake for 24 hours at 2000 degrees.

"Excuse me? You’re going to put me in a kiln, heat me up to 2000 degrees—and leave me there for how long? I DON’T think so! When I sing, ‘Have thine own way, Lord,’ inviting you to mold me, I agree to wait and yield and be still. I see no fine print indicating that I’ll be sauna-tized at 2000 degrees. You surely read the recipe wrong, Lord.”

My unyielding attitude and my questioning God is nothing new. According to Isaiah, God’s people are often prone to argue with their Maker:

“You turn things upside down, as if the potter were thought to be like the clay! Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘He did not make me’? Can the pot say of the potter, ‘He knows nothing’? (Isaiah 29:26)

"Woe to him who quarrels with his Maker, to him who is but a potsherd (a pottery fragment) among the potsherds on the ground. (Isaiah 45:9)

When I’m in an adolescent, pottery-fragment sort of mood I often speak back to God. I’m resistant throughout this process of becoming a clay vessel, but now—NOW—I’ve reached my limit. I kick and scream all the way to the kiln. “Woe to him who quarrels with his Maker”? I’m WAY beyond quarreling. I’m out of here!

There are times in life when the pressure is so great, the heat so hot that we can’t imagine being able to endure and survive. The Bible encourages us to“…yield your hearts to the Lord,” (Joshua 24:2), but this yielding can feel more like succumbing, losing, or dying. “Yielding” conjures an image of a flexible tree branch that yields to the wind or bends low when pelted by rain or burdened with snow or ice. I think of yielding to cross-traffic or moving aside to let someone go ahead of me in line. I hear a senator saying, “I yield to the good senator from the state of Indiana.”

Perhaps “yielding” is an apt term for clay as it is being shaped on the wheel, but I think there needs to be a different word to describe what is expected of me when trapped in a kiln-like experience; a word that blends courage, determination, guts, grit—a word one might use to describe a Navy SEAL, perhaps.

The prophet Ezekiel reveals to us a God who yields:

"This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Once again I will yield to the plea of the house of Israel…” (Ezekiel 36:37)

The God of Israel put up with the repeated unfaithfulness of his people, yielding to them with a grace beyond measure. As I enter the kiln, I need to remember that even in my unfaithfulness, God continually forgives me, loves me, and never gives up on me. Can I bring myself to yield to my Heavenly Potter who has modeled for me a holy yielding?

Sometimes I feel as if I am thrown head first into the kiln of crisis, like when I entered the hospital to give birth to my husband’s and my first child, only to be devastated a few hours later when our baby died. Sometimes I voluntarily step into the chamber, as when I chose to conceive again and entered the fiery furnace of fear. I personally fanned the flames—until the moment when our second child, Matt, announced his arrival with a lusty cry.

I hope that my yielding will “yield [a] harvest and God, [my] God, will bless [me].” (Psalm 67:6) I want to be like “a tree planted by streams of water which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither.” (Psalm 1: 3) Maybe I can endure the blistering heat if I know good will come of it. And I take heart that “my leaf does not wither.”

HAVE THINE OWN WAY, LORD – Part 4: A Lull in the Process - April 19, 2008

“Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him.”
Psalm 37:7

I’ve been exercising my “waiting” muscle quite a bit lately. On a recent mission trip to Guatemala, I waited in a long line at the ticketing counter at Indianapolis International Airport while members of our People Helping People mission group were methodically checked in – at 4:15 a.m., no less. I waited to go through security; I waited for the plane and waited to board the plane—and then waited some more. In Guatemala City, there was customs and immigration and waiting on luggage, my mind spinning with the conveyor, as I hoped and prayed my suitcase arrived safely. I waited for the bus to arrive and load up passengers and luggage for the six hour trip to San Marcos, and then waited to check in at the hotel. And that was just the first day of the trip.

The waiting wasn’t all that difficult at first. I was excited to see old friends and meet new people, to hear mission stories, to experience a new country and culture. But as the day wore on, and I wore out, my tolerance for waiting waned. “Just feed me and put me to bed, please,” I wanted to whine, “enough with all this waiting.”

Most journeys entail periods of idleness; some we enjoy and others we detest. However, not all waiting is wasted time or useless inactivity. Waiting can be purposeful and necessary. As we visit the pottery studio this week, we’ll notice that the pots have been removed from the wheel and lined up on shelves. They’ve been set aside to air dry prior to firing.

We’re eager to move along, get glazed and gorgeous so we can be admired and appreciated for the beautiful vessels that we are. But why rush? There’s a trial by fire coming up soon, so let’s dawdle awhile, shall we? Just as all the previous steps in the process have proven essential to a positive outcome, this waiting game has its merit as well. If you’ve ever made a loaf of bread, you know that the dough must be set aside to rise. Rushing the process and baking the loaf before the yeast has done its job results in an inferior loaf of bread (I can personally vouch for this). Similarly, if a woman has “a bun in the oven,” it’s not advisable to rush the process. (Go ahead and groan—I deserve it.)

So here we sit, waiting. We’re bored. We’re anxious. We’re frustrated and feeling useless. Finally, the conveyor belt cranks into service and we’re on the move. If you’ve ever witnessed a makeover on the popular show, “What Not to Wear,” the application of makeup is the final step in a total makeover overseen by fashion gurus Stacy and Clinton. The objective is to transform a clueless-about-her-looks woman into a sophisticated, eye catching “gee, I wish I looked like her,” model of potential for all other women who have let themselves go.

Likewise, it’s time for the blah clay vessels to get their crowning touches of glaze. The process is a lot like getting one’s hair tinted. When the dye is applied to the hair, the recipient is going to look worse than ever. The dull, colorless appearance of both dye and glaze bear no resemblance to the hues and luster of the final products.

But be patient. For once the dye is rinsed out and the hair shampooed, gelled, curled, teased, scrunched, carefully arranged to look natural, and finally sprayed to preserve the work of art, then the stylist will swing the chair around and let you gaze upon your more youthful image.

My analogy fails at this point, for while the person enduring the tinting process may spend a few minutes under a warm hair dryer, a clay pot is about to serve a lengthy stint in a hot kiln.

I’ll join you next Saturday on the hot seat. In the meantime, ponder these words of John Milton:

“They also serve who only stand and wait."

How might you be a servant in waiting this week?

HAVE THINE OWN WAY, LORD – Part 3: On the Potter's Wheel - April 12, 2008

“For we are God's workmanship,
created in Christ Jesus to do good works,
which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
Ephesians 2:10

Okay, folks, it’s time to get in shape! As a tyke, my daughter, Beth, begged us to wake her up early so she could watch “Mousercize” on the Disney channel. She was so in to exercise, that for Christmas, she requested “Get in Shape, Girl” products—pint-sized, pink exercise paraphernalia like a mat, sweat band, tiny bar bells, etc. But her idea of getting in shape was to get comfy on the sofa and “watch” Minnie and Mickey and their cheerful, colorfully clad, energetic friends sing and sweat. That’s my girl, all right: just like her mama.

However, this is not the kind of getting in shape that I want to talk about today. No exercise videos or leotards required. No running shoes, no sweating. Did I hear a collective sigh of relief? You’re not going to be required to do anything in this step of the process of becoming a clay jar. You can just lay back and let the Master Potter do his thing.

Once the impurities and air bubbles have been pounded out of us (Part 2, March 29) the potter places the purified clay on the wheel. It’s essential that the potter center the clay on the wheel, for if it is even slightly off center, the pot is likely to collapse at some point during the shaping process. Twila Beahm, my artist friend, likens this to real life. If we aren’t centered in God, life spins out of control and splat!

When the clay is centered, the wheel is set in motion, and the potter uses his very skilled hands to force the clay to rise up into a cylinder, and then presses on top of the clay with his thumbs or palms. The potter repeats this process three or four times to increase the clay’s flexibility and strength.

From time to time, the potter will dampen his hands with water to soften the clay and make the texture more smooth and supple. Water symbolizes the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit moisturizes and softens our hearts. We are supple—responsive to the Potter’s touch, and in his hands, we grow more flexible and open to new situations.

Now pressing his thumbs into the center, the potter “opens up” the clay, gradually hollowing out the vessel. A little pressure with the finger tips evens out the thickness of the cylinder walls. Finally—drum roll, please—the potter shapes the clay into a vessel.

That wasn’t so bad, now was it? All that pressing feels like a massage. Well, maybe not a massage, but a good work out, at least in compared to the beating we took in the preparation session last week. I guess we could say that this phase is our “work out” or “exercise routine.” We do stretches to enhance our flexibility and weight training to build our muscle strength. “No pain, no gain,” as the saying goes.

But wait, what’s this about spinning? I’m getting dizzy just thinking about it. Pastor Howard Chang makes this spiritual application: “Often we want to run from or change our circumstances. We may even become embittered toward God because of the situations we find ourselves in. If we do, we will only find that we will face the same circumstances elsewhere. Why? Because we are still the same clay, spinning on the wheel of life’s circumstances.”

As the wheel of life spins, we have a choice: to fight our Master’s shaping, or relax under his touch. If you’re like me, you do some of both. When we want to climb off the potter’s wheel and run away from the trying circumstances in our lives, it helps to remember this:

“We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” (Romans 8:28)

I enjoy needlework, and as I stitch, a picture slowly emerges. With mere thread, fabric, and a pattern, I create what will be seen out of what is unseen. God can do likewise. Clay or cloth, it matters not. His touch transforms.

HAVE THINE OWN WAY, LORD - Part 1 - March 29, 2008

Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine own way!
Thou art the Potter, I am the clay.
Mold me and make me after Thy will.
While I am waiting, yielded and still.
Adalaide Pollard, 1907

I am not an artist skilled in working with clay, but I do love to play with it once in a while. Clay can be expensive, so when my kids were tikes, I made my own play-doh with a recipe passed around my group of friends. It involves salt, flour, food coloring, and a few other secret ingredients. To my relief, it was much easier to clean out of the carpet than the real Play-Doh. Whether it be clay or homemade play-doh, it’s just pure fun to squish it between my fingers, make my handprint, with all the lines and creases, and shape and reshape it into balls and ropes. Artistically, that’s about as far as I ever got with this medium.

In high school, however, I did have one brief encounter with clay in art class. I made an unusual looking pot. My art teacher, Mr. Graboski, took interest in my pot (I think he must have felt sorry for me) and enthusiastically directed me to do different things to make it more interesting. Under his tutelage, my pot had numerous uniquely shaped openings. Personally, I thought it was ugly, but Mr. G couldn’t wait to get it fired and see the final masterpiece. Unfortunately, the kiln malfunctioned and every pot in the batch melted into oblivion. I was crushed.

So it is with a wee bit of hesitancy that I again pick up clay, if only metaphorically, and fashion it into a series for your reading enjoyment.

To begin, let’s get to know the Potter. Our Heavenly Potter has been working in clay ever since he created Adam, “of the dust of the ground (actually, one part dust, two parts water) and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.” (Genesis 2:7) During a prototype planning session, God proposed, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness.” And so it was that, “God created man in his image, in the image of God he created him; man and woman he created them.” (Genesis 1:26-27)

One of the first questions pondered after a baby is born is, “who does he or she look like?” Our curiosity must be inherent in our very nature, since it seems that family resemblance was important to God as well. Think about your spiritual family resemblance—you look like God! Well, the gene pool has been tainted over the eons, but in some sense, we still retain a smidgeon of God’s DNA.

It is a loving God who fashions us on his wheel. Recently I had lunch with Twila Beahm, a local artist who has found her niche in clay. As she talked about working in clay, her face shone with joy and her eyes glittered with emotion laden tears. She tells me that the clay speaks to her, that it has a mind of its own. When she remembers to listen, allowing the clay to express its longing for existence, she is always awed by the results. Twila takes no credit for this, stating firmly that it is God who is at work. Creating in clay is very much a spiritual experience for her.

In several places in the Bible, human beings are referred as “jars of clay.” Being fashioned into a pot is a strenuous, painful process. This shaping and firing, waiting and yielding is—the PITS! But it’s comforting to know that God wants the best for us—to be like Him; to have the very character of Christ. Just as the potter carefully chooses the clay, so God has carefully chosen us (“You did not choose me, but I chose you.” John 15:16). I am not a mistake, nor are you. We’re handmade by a “hands on” God who loves us and wants the best for us.