Lent
Bishop Joseph Perry

 

“I am the Potter… you are the clay!” Jeremiah 18

The famous chapter 18 of the book of Jeremiah of the Old Testament recounts the allegory of the potter’s vessel. Jeremiah is instructed to rise and go down to the house of the potter and wait for the word of the Lord.

The potter’s wheel of that time was usually two circular stones joined by an axle and powered by a combination of hand and foot.

From watching the potter at his wheel making and shaping pots and bowls, pitchers and plates, Jeremiah got the message that God gets his hands dirty molding and forming the world and those who are in it.

God is alert for fatal flaws that may prevent us from fulfilling our destiny. The Lord asserts his right to shape and reshape us as the potter does the clay vessel, for we are the work of his hands, created to manifest his great goodness and glory.

We can trust God to shape our lives with loving hands… if we will let Him!

The image of the potter suggests an artisan, a craftsman, someone who cares deeply about the work he or she produces. This is not the work of a capricious child building a sand castle just to delight in destroying it again or the waves of the ocean melting it again. A potter reshapes the work in progress until it’s perfected.

Perhaps, there’s an air bubble in the clay that would weaken the vessel. Perhaps it’s a flaw in the shape the clay is taking on the wheel. Perhaps it’s an imbedded foreign particle that will cause the vessel to break apart in the intense heat of the kiln.

The potter knows from long experience the characteristics of the clay he works with. And he’s guided by an inner vision of the finished piece. Only the potter – not the clay, not someone watching the process – knows when a created piece is right.

So it is with God who created us from the clay of the earth. God has a vision of our finished form. God knows when we need to be reshaped. We are born with flaws that threaten our creation. Along life’s journey outside influences and influences from our genetics and cultural conditioning threaten our mature shaping. God is not yet finished with us.

Periodically we need reshaping. Lent allows this reshaping with God’s hands to take place. In instances we can do this self-correcting ourselves. Other instances we need the wise counsel of the Church’s wisdom and sacraments. Lent affords us this personal attention to what God is want to do with us.

Sometimes this reshaping process means a radical transformation. Often it seems painful at the time. We may feel that a crisis or a transition has reduced us to a formless blob; at such times it can be comforting to be aware of the Potter, whose loving hands will reshape us and build us up once again.

Our role is to remain open to change, to be pliable soft clay in the hands of the Potter. This isn’t easy for us, especially for those who are used to making their own way in life. Some of us are too stubborn for our own good… this is the trace of sin in us.

We like to think we shape our own lives through our own thoughts and determinations. We don’t like anyone telling us what to do. Unlike clay we are blessed or cursed with the ability to make choices.

When the Potter breathed life into the first human beings free will was part of the gift. But so was grace, the grace that enables us to trust God’s strong and loving care for all of creation. Sometimes we don’t use that grace or we ignore the grace and go our own way.

We sin!

We hate to admit that we are sinners. Some people can’t, not with any sincerity. We can’t stand to be wrong, we refuse to be guilty and we would rather die than admit failure. Why? Because the conviction is deep within us that it’s all about looks, achievement, merit and success.

Dr. George Cuttrick talks about how tired he gets of the typical American success story. It is so insipid and devoid of spirituality. What the world needs, he said, are a few more “noblefailures”. Who are they, the noble failures?

They are those who would rather have integrity than success, those who know there is more virtue in being true than in being right, those whose character is not for sale at any price. These kinds of people with these kinds of values get no where in this life... by worldly standard, that is.

Who are history’s noble failures: Jesus Christ, Archbishop Thomas Becket who was murdered at the altar, St. Peter Claver who ministered for forty years to African slaves arriving on ships to the Americas, the Jesuit martyrs of North America who were butchered by the Iroquois nation in the area of the Great Lakes, Archbishop Romero who was murdered at the altar in El Salvador. Mother Teresa of Calcutta who picked up the poor from the gutters of the world… and some of you can be added to this list of noble failures.

Christianity is the only religion where people win by losing. Jesus Christ lost his life so we might win life! Our life’s pattern must follow this same paradox. Unlock this riddle of our Scriptures and you have found the prize!

You might have seen the televised Special Olympics recently where in a race energetically undertaken by a group of young disadvantaged youths, one of them tripped and fell to the ground. Instead of ignoring him and racing each one to the finish line, the others stopped in their tracks looked behind and saw their fellow racer had fallen, went to him, picked him up. They locked arms and ran to the finish line together. Now, that’s a different definition of winning… and one that is very Christian.

Lent calls us back to simply love and fidelity. In addition to reminding us of our physical mortality, the ashes we received at the start of the season can represent the death of any sins that keep us from loving God and living for God.