A brief overview for Sunday School teachers and Bible study leaders of Lifeway’s “Explore the Bible” lesson of Jeremiah 18:1-12, with the title, “Shapes,” for Sunday, July 2, 2023.

A video version of this overview is available on YouTube at:

INTRO:  This may be too far “out of the box” for some of you, but I’m going to suggest it: get some inexpensive modeling clay for each class member (I got a little pack on Amazon for less than $4 for 24 little pieces — or you can make some play dough very inexpensively) and start class Sunday by letting each member make something with it. You could vote for the best one, or the most creative, or the funniest, or whatever.

If you don’t choose to have your class use clay, you might bring a clay pot or a ceramic piece that you, or someone you know has made, and share the story behind it. 

But then transition to the lesson, and say, Today in Jeremiah 18 we are going to see how God showed Jeremiah that HE is the potter and we as His people are like the clay in His hands.  

CONTEXT

This is now our 5th lesson in our study of Jeremiah. God is speaking through him to His people in Judah, the Southern Kingdom. Last time we saw how Jeremiah was being persecuted for his preaching, and he wondered why God was letting the wicked prosper. Today the Lord gives Jeremiah another message for Judah in Jeremiah 18. Verse 11 says “Speak to the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem” so this is a message, again, to Judah, the Southern Kingdom and its capital Jerusalem.

OUTLINE

I. A Step of Faith  (:1-2)

II. The Picture of the Potter & the Clay (:3-6)

III. One Particular Application  (:7-12)

I. A STEP OF FAITH  (:1-2)

:1 THERE IT IS AGAIN: “The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD (YHWH) saying” — AGAIN: This is GOD’S word, not Jeremiah’s opinion, etc.

In :2 God tells Jeremiah to go to the potter’s house, and there he would be given the message He wants him to share.

??? WHY do you think God had Jeremiah go down to the potter’s house to get the message???

(If you don’t know, well Jeremiah didn’t know right off either! But it would turn out that God wanted him to see something there, in that particular scenario of the potter and the clay, that would be the “illustration” or analogy for God’s message to His people. Jeremiah couldn’t see that staying where he was. He had to get up and go where God told him, in order to get it.

Which is a good word for us, too. Sometimes God sends us in a particular direction, that we often don’t understand, for His purposes — but we discover His purposes later.  Why did Jeremiah have to go to the potter’s? He didn’t know at first — but later it became obvious, as he saw the message. 

— The same thing happened to Philip in Acts 8, when God told him to go to a desert road going south from Jerusalem to Gaza. WHY do that? Well, it turned out that he would meet the Ethiopian treasurer there, and lead him to Christ, and most likely many Ethiopians ended up being saved too. 

It happens that way for US sometimes too.

??? You could ask your group: “Can anyone share a time when God had you do something which you didn’t understand immediately, but you saw why later?”

(For example, after I had gotten sick and was out of the ministry and we were living in a condo Norman, one day I had the strongest impression to go and check the mailbox, which was about 50 yards away in the parking lot. I thought maybe I was going to have a letter from a church there or something. But when I got there, there was nothing in the box! I thought, that was odd; I had the strongest impression to go. But just then I heard a voice — and young lady had lost her keys, and my wife Cheryl & I were able to take her to get some help, and got to share with her on the way. THEN it was more clear why I went out there!) You can share that/or you/your group can share other examples.

But the point is, we don’t always know WHY God has us do something. The important thing is: obey God, and it will often become clear later, why He had us do something. It did for Jeremiah here.  

II. THE POTTER & THE CLAY (:3-6)

So :3 tells us what Jeremiah saw when he went to the potter’s house. “There he was, making something on the wheel.” So this is what God planned for him to see: the potter working with the clay. (You might show a picture from the internet like this one, of an ancient man with his pottery wheel.) This would be the basis of the message that God wanted Jeremiah to give to the people of Judah.

So the potter was making something on the wheel, but :4 says “the vessel that he was making of clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter; so he remade it into another vessel, as it pleased the potter to make.” 

IF you used the clay as an introduction you might ask: 

??? Did anybody start to make something this morning and crush it and start again???

THAT is what happened here: the potter was working with the clay, and “it was spoiled” so he remade it. 

THIS is the picture that God wanted Jeremiah to see. 

THEN :5 says God spoke to Jeremiah (“The word of the LORD came to me” — AGAIN!)

So God spoke to him through what he saw. And God gave him the message in :6: “Can I not, O house of Israel, deal with you as this potter does?,’ declares the LORD. ‘Behold, like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel.’”

So what’s the lesson here: from Jeremiah and the Potter (and from our own experience today with the clay, if you used that)?

— God is the Potter

— We are the clay

So what are some of the lessons can we glean from that?

— God is in charge of making us, +x Psalm 100:3 “It is HE who has made us, not we ourselves.” 

There’s a lot of implications there, aren’t there?
What about for the modern “gender confusion” issues? (It tells us that GOD made us the gender we are. “HE made us.” We don’t make ourselves; HE decided what we would be. He knit us together. Many people today are like the pot telling the Potter what to make them! 

— If God wants to do something with us, He can. He doesn’t have to “ask our permission.” He made us! 

+x :4b said “As it pleased the potter.” The potter is in charge! 

Did you have to ask the clay in your hand a while ago what it wanted to be? Did you have to ask its permission to crush it and make it all over again? NO! YOU are the potter. You can do with it just as you want to.  YOU picked the color; YOU made it what you wanted; YOU changed it if you wanted. YOU are in charge.

THAT IS A PICTURE OF GOD AND US. He is the Potter, and we are the clay! 

Romans 9 references this same idea of the potter and the clay, and makes a specific application: 

:20 says: “Who are you, O man who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, ‘Why did you make me like this,’ will it?” (:21) Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use?

There in Romans 9 God uses this same argument from Jeremiah 18: God is the potter, we are the clay. We can’t say, “Why did You make me like this?” He can do whatever He wants to with us. He is the maker; we are His creation. 

That’s not a popular outlook today. What many people want to do today is to make GOD in OUR image, as if WE were the “potters”: “Well, I don’t think God should do this or that;” or “I don’t think Jesus would say this or that”, or “I don’t want to be or do what He’s telling me to do.”  But we aren’t the potter, making God in our image. HE is the Potter, making us in HIS image. 

— ??? Does anyone know into what image God is “shaping” us as His “clay”? Romans 8:28-29 says He is causing all things to work together to “conform us to the image of His Son” — God is “sculpting” us to make us more like Jesus with everything that happens in our life. Maybe this clay can help us picture that: that is what God is doing in US! 

??? What other insights/applications can you make from the fact that GOD is the Potter, and we are the clay???

Then either in this section, or maybe at the end of the lesson, you might quote the classic hymn, which really goes with this lesson:

“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.”

III. ONE PARTICULAR APPLICATION

Then after He talks about the Potter and the clay, God makes a specific application of this principle:

— He says in :7-8 “At one moment I might speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom to uproot, to pull down, or to destroy it. If that nation against which I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent concerning the calamity I planned to bring on it.” 

— Then He says the REVERSE in :9-10: “OR at another moment, I might speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom to build up or to plant it; if it does evil in My sight by not obeying My voice, then I will think better of the good with which I had promised to bless it.

What do we see in this verses? How “set” or how “flexible” is our future; what determines it? 

(The answer is: our ACTIONS: If we are headed for destruction and repent, God will “repent” of the calamity He was going to bring on us. OR if we were headed for blessing, but do evil and don’t obey Him, He will “repent” of the good which He promised us. 

So in a very real way, our future, God says here in Jeremiah, is not “set.” They are still “on the wheel” and can change.

EX: when they are making real pottery (not our little play figures) they bake it in a kiln at about 2000 degrees! And when it is baked like that, it is SET. You can manipulate it and form it up until then, but after it has been fired, it is set.

I think a lot of people believe their future is “set,” and there is nothing they can do about it. They may feel “trapped” by their situation or circumstances and think they have no choice, that their future is “set.” 

Some may think it’s their “fate” do one thing or another

Some think they are “predestined” by God to be saved or lost.

But God says here in :11, “I am fashioning calamity against you” — but then He says “Oh turn back …”.

??? What does this imply??? It means they have a CHOICE! They can listen to this; they can respond to this. So their future is not “set” in stone yet; their “clay hasn’t been fired” yet. God says you can still turn back and come back to Him!

THAT’S GOOD NEWS! 

I have a blog, shawnethomas.com that I post these teacher overviews on; I also post my weekly sermons and other blogs. Sometimes people comment on them. Every once in a while I will get one like this:

“I abused Gods grace. I’m 54 it’s too late for me my decisions to not obey Gods calling caused Jesus to cut me off from Him. He turned me over to Satan. I know it’s a done deal. I’m cut off from God because of my disobedience.”

If you feel led to, you could read this comment to your class and then ask them: ??? In light of what God says here in Jeremiah 18, What would YOUR response to this person be???

(Like God says here: your future is not “set in stone” yet; turn back to Him, and He will relent of the calamity you had in store.

Never think you are “too far gone” and can’t come back to God. You can! 

:12 says they’ll say, ‘It’s hopeless! For we are going to follow our own plans and each of us will act according to the stubbornness of his evil heart.”  In a sense, they are like the person on that blog, just kind of “giving themselves up to fate.”

But God says; TURN BACK! It’s not too late. You’re still “on the wheel.” The “clay hasn’t been baked” yet. As long as you are still alive, you can still change your future. And of course, the way you do that is by trusting Jesus as your Lord & Savior. Or if you are already a Christian, turn back from any known sin, right now.

I would SHARE THE GOSPEL at this point, and make sure everyone can understand it.

One good presentation of the Gospel is: 

— God’s Purpose: is that we spend eternity with Him in glory

— Man’s Need: is that we have all sinned against Him

— God’s Provision for our need, is that Jesus died on the cross to pay for our sins (I Peter 2:24 “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross.”)

— Man’s Reponse: turn to God in repentance and faith. Be willing to turn from your sins, and put your faith in Jesus who died on the cross for you. 

And emphasize: if you will do that today, from your heart, you will be SAVED! The “kiln hasn’t fired” yet! The clay hasn’t hardened! The decision is yours.

And you might emphasize to your class that the same thing is true for their friends & loved ones. DON’T think it’s too late; keep praying; keep sharing; I have heard several amazing stories recently of people who have come to the Lord after years of rebellion against Him. DON’T say like :12, “It’s hopeless!” Don’t give up. As long as they’re still alive, they’re still “on the wheel;” They can still come back to Him.

SO you might close your class with a time of prayer, both for yourselves, and for loved ones. You might pray for different loved ones who need to come to the Lord/back to Him. And pray for yourselves too, that you would be the “clay” in the Master Potter’s hand. You might use “Have Thine Own Way” in that closing prayer too: “Thou art the Potter, I am the clay; mold me and make me after Thy will, while I am waiting, yielded and still.”

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