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This word came to Jeremiah from the LORD:
Rise up, be off to the potter’s house; there I will give you my message. I went down to the potter’s house and there he was, working at the wheel. Whenever the object of clay which he was making turned out badly in his hand, he tried again, making of the clay another object of whatever sort he pleased.
Then the word of the LORD came to me:
Can I not do to you, house of Israel, as this potter has done? says the LORD. Indeed, like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, house of Israel. - Jeremiah 18:1-6
Although it can be said that the “potter” has destroyed that which turned out badly it can also be said that he forms it into something else entirely. It is taken from the same material but reformed. Can we not also be reformed? Cannot God also make us into something new? Just because it may look as though something is being destroyed perhaps it is really being made better. Even when we by our own designs turn out “badly” God can, with our cooperation, make us pleasing to him. This is why we must not rush to judgment. We don’t know what God can do with a person who may seem to us to be lost. Saint Paul hated Christians and persecuted them. But we read his letters nearly every Sunday. Saint Peter was a coward – in the end he was also courageous. The apostles were kind of dumb. But in the end they brought the knowledge of salvation to the world. This is why we must try to be patient with one another. God isn’t finished with us yet.
