Working with clay

Jason Nelson

God is using us, and we may not even know it. “Yet you, Lord, are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand” (Isaiah 64:8). We’re the work of God’s hand and do his work whether we realize it or not. Our good work is God’s work. That fact is easy to overlook. But our lives are richer when we acknowledge it every day. Let’s get started with a few questions. I know you will add more of your own. Just ask yourself, “Who would suffer if I didn’t take care of them? What would die if I didn’t water it? Who would feel lonely if I didn’t greet them? Who wouldn’t have a job if they didn’t need to take care of me? What shape does God want me in today?”

We are clay with malleable properties. Sometimes we determine our own contours because that’s how delicately the potter is holding us. We stretch to meet new opportunities and resist crushing pressures coming down on us. Sometimes we accept the shape we are in because that’s how firmly the potter is holding us. There isn’t much wiggle room. But every piece of clay, born or yet to be born, breathes in and breathes out the purposes of the potter. Someday, the potter will change well-used clay to dust and ashes and reshape it into what he always wanted it to be in the first place.

Devotion used by permission of Time of Grace®. For more information, visit timeofgrace.org