A few months ago, I invited my friend to join me for a pottery class at a new local studio for her birthday present. We both love to try new things and were intrigued by the experience of using a potter’s wheel to create something out of clay.
When we arrived at the class, the teacher gave us step-by-step instructions. We each sat down behind a wheel while she passed out a ball of clay to each student. Our first task was to slam the clay down in the center of the wheel to get it to stick. Then we were to wet a small sponge and soak the clay.
Our teacher encouraged us to gently nudge the pedal to get the wheel spinning. With wet hands, we learned to center and cone the clay. Coning helps to mix the clay and work out inconsistencies or air bubbles before shaping it. We used our fingers to lift the clay into the cone shape and then our palms to push it down again.
Once the cone was centered well, the teacher showed us how to smooth and shape the clay into a flat disk. She said to make it look like a mini flan. (She had me at flan. Hello, one of my favorite desserts!)
The process of forming clay on the wheel was longer and harder than it looks.
The trick was to keep adding water to keep the clay supple and moldable. We pressed, pulled, and pinched until that ball of clay eventually became a bowl or vase.
Metaphors for life abound in the pottery studio.
A few times, the teacher came over, stuck her hands in front of me, and started to work with my clay. At first, I wanted to take control of the clay myself. I wanted to learn by doing it myself. But soon I realized the value in surrendering to her expertise. In fact, I learned a lot from watching my teacher and her techniques.
The first surprising lesson was that it requires lots of water to make a clay pot on a wheel. Clay is naturally hard and heavy, but water makes it workable.
Our souls are much the same. We need consistent hydration. We need the living water that only Jesus offers. On our own we are heavy, brittle; we are dust. With Jesus’s living water, we are malleable clay. The very same water that He offered the Samaritan woman at the well has the power to transform us from the inside out (John 4:13-14 NLT). He is our Thirst-Quencher when we are parched, our Teacher when we lack technique, our Shepherd when we need a gentle guide.
In the pottery studio, I also learned that pushing on the pedal to speed up the wheel does not actually make the work go faster. I had to be slow, deliberate, and intentional if I wanted to make a beautiful bowl.
It turns out in pottery-making, as in life, you have to trust the process. It’s rare that someone would sit down at a pottery wheel and make something perfect on the first try. Oftentimes the clay needs to be reworked, reshaped, and reimagined.
This brings to mind the story where God sends the prophet Jeremiah to the potter’s house to show him something important He wants to relay to the people:
Go down to the potter’s shop, and I will speak to you there. So I did as he told me and found the potter working at his wheel. But the jar he was making did not turn out as he had hoped, so he crushed it into a lump of clay again and started over. Then the Lord gave me this message: “O Israel, can I not do to you as this potter has done to his clay? As the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand.”
Jeremiah 18: 2-6 (NLT)
God uses this visual to remind the people that He is the Master-Potter, molding them like clay. He calls them back to repentance and rest in Him.
The prophet Isaiah uses a similar metaphor of clay and Creator:
“What sorrow awaits those who argue with their Creator.
Does a clay pot argue with its maker?
Does the clay dispute with the one who shapes it, saying,
‘Stop, you’re doing it wrong!’
Isaiah 45:9 (NLT)
These verses remind us that the Potter can do whatever He wants with the clay. He can push out our inconsistencies, transform our too-jagged edges, and smooth us to symmetry. It might feel uncomfortable or too-long in the waiting, but we are not to resist His design work. We are to submit to His molding and making, and behold His creative process embodied in us.
After the class, our teacher fired our creations in the kiln — a hotter-than-hot oven — to set them. When it was done, I traced my finger along the smooth edges of my bluish-teal bowl. I held it with a quiet sense of pride because it wasn’t fancy, but it was my creation.
That little bowl sits on my bathroom counter now, holding some of my favorite jewelry pieces. It’s a sweet reminder that God is the Potter, and we are but dust mixed with water in His heart-shaped hands.
I love this! Y’all r going to get tired of me saying this, yet as I woke up totally blind last May & God has molded,shaped & restored some of my sight & He has molded & shaped my life into something very different. Perhaps I was an elegant vase to hold bouquets of flowers & I’ve been reshaped into a shallow soap dish with a spout for draining the overflow of waste as the Master washer of souls cleanses me & those I listen to & pray for from our sins & hurts. Who wouldn’t rather hold beautiful bouquets yet soap dishes r needed too! In HIS HEART-SHAPEDhands I will be changed & serve Him as He needs me most! Blessings (((0)))
Aah … but a beautiful soap dish.
I love this too.
This was wonderful. Such a positive way of looking at things. I am not the most creative type and shy away from any type of artsy projects. But I was at a women’s weekend at a camp run by my church conference and every year there is a book to focus on that includes an activity at some point. This particular year it was making a bowl out of clay. I dreaded doing it. The instructor had us all close our eyes and used guided imagery to help us mold the bowl. By allowing the spirit to guide us rather than using critical eyes, I was actually able to create something that looked like a bowl! It reminds me that I need to listen to God, the Spirit, for guidance instead of focusing on what I see and want.
I’ve always wanted to experience working with clay on a wheel. Now I’m even more intrigued. And I love how God shows up, even in our curiosity.
The story about the clay, the wheel and the water was very interesting and I loved the reminder that God takes care of us and molds us in His plan for us. We just need to be patient during the wait time. Thank you that unique story which we really need to think about………..Betsy Basile
Dorina what you said true. We need to trust God in everything through out all we go through in life. Sometimes that can be very hard as we can be bunch of inpatient women who expect it done now. Like me with my Husband and job needs done around the house. He say I look at shorty or later or do something about it next week. You know he will not look at it in the time I’d like. So I done this to took it on myself to do try and fix it myself or get tge job done myself as I get inpatient in waiting for my Husband to look at it and fix it if he can. Bet some of you women are the same get impatient you try do it yourself or fix it. But the pieces that are broken or you need someone who know what they are doing to fix it. You try and try it no good especially if something with pieces that are broken. You get more and more frustrated trying to fix it yourself to tell you Husband I did myself as I couldn’t wait on you any longer. That is our impatience coming out in us. We most women if we admit we can’t wait we expect it fix now or the problem fix now. I was like that in my life when I wanted things fixed now or problems fix now. I hadn’t the patients to wait. God said Dawn he will do for you meaning my Husband but you’ll have to wait and if he can’t do he get someone to do it for you. That is true with our lives we have to trust God to fix the pieces in his own time not ours that are broken. Plus the way God wants to not our way as God knows best. Sometimes God makes us wait to make us trust him it will get fixed what wrong in our lives in his timing as God knows best. It hard for us especially as women to wait as we want it done now. Sometimes God doesn’t fix it he help us through it and come out the other end knowing God was helping us through it. We can see it in the end and say yes God was there with us all along. We have to put our lives in God’s hand like the Potter does with clay and with the clay he moulds it and shapes it into the beautiful pot he wants it to be. God does the same with our lives. To make us as women the beautiful pots he wants us to be chipping of all the bad and wrong in our lives as we are nice and smooth with no chips of bad or wrong there that don’t fit. If they stayed the pot of our lives would still look horrible and not beautiful with no pieces that are rough the bad and wrong in our lives. So we have to let the master who is God shape us through out our lives into the beautiful pots he wants us to be for the world to see with no rough edges of bad or wrong. I had to do that in my own life yes it was hard. Dawn Ferguson-Little Enniskillen Co.Fermanagh N.Ireland xx
Dorina,
This reminds me of the song “Change My Heart”. “you are the potter. I am the clay. Mold me & make me, This is what I pray”. God wants to mold & make us more Christlike. I pray He does this for me!
Blessings 🙂