The Potter and the Clay

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I'd like to speak to you this morning, we're taking a small break from the Gospel of John.
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When we return to it, Lord willing, in a few weeks, we will be entering in chapter 6.
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But this is a message I've been thinking about for quite some time, and actually,
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I saw a little outline that was on a church sign that I'm going to use for my application today, but this is not original with me,
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I don't know who came up with it, but I thought, wow, that is so good, and it's so biblical. God formed us, sin deformed us, and Jesus Christ transformed us.
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I thought, now that will preach. I'm going to use that as an application, actually, today's message, but I'd like to speak today on the lesson of the potter's clay, speaking about the potter and the clay.
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So please turn with me in your Bibles this morning, in the Old Testament, as we look at this wonderful lesson that God has for us, each and every one of us today, and to the book of Jeremiah, to the book of Jeremiah, chapter 18, chapter 18, just going to read verse 1 to 11.
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There are other lessons here that's given to us, 18, 19, and 20, but we're just going to look at one that God showed the prophet
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Jeremiah. Beginning with verse 1 to verse 11, hear the word of the living
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God. The word which came to Jeremiah from the
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Lord, saying, Arise, go down to the potter's house, and there
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I will cause you to hear my words. Then I went down to the potter's house, and there he was, making something at the wheel.
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And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter.
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So he made it again, and to another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to make.
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And then the word of the Lord came to me, saying, O house of Israel, can
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I not do with you as this potter? Says the
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Lord, Look, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so will you in my hand,
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O house of Israel. The instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, to pull down, and to destroy it, if that nation against whom
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I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it.
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And the instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it, if it does evil in my sight, so that it does not obey my voice, then
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I will relent concerning the good with which I said I would benefit it.
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Verse 11, Now therefore, speak to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying,
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Thus says the Lord, Behold, I am fashioning a disaster and devising a plan against you.
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Return now every one from his evil way, and make your ways and your doings good.
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May God richly bless the reading of his word from the hearing of our ears to our hearts this morning.
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Please bow with me in prayer as we seek the Lord's face and blessing upon this hour of worship as we hear his word.
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O Lord, our God, as you spoke to Samuel, speak,
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Lord, for your servant hears as he calls out. And now,
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Lord, as David prayed, let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight,
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O Lord, O Lord, my strength and my Redeemer.
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And we ask this in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, your one and beloved
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Son, and we ask it for your honor and glory. Amen.
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Now, I'd like to start this service by showing you a piece of pottery.
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This pottery is a vessel that was made by someone, by a potter, unnamed, which we don't know, this piece of pottery.
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And it began its existence by first a lump of just clay.
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I wish I had the lump of clay. I could not come up with that, but it's almost like just a handful of a mud pack.
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As all of us were kids, if you grew up, you know, playing in mud sometimes as boys did, just grab some dirt and put it in water and the next thing you got, you got a pack of mud.
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But that's actually what we're made and formed from, is the mud, the dirt of the earth, clay.
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And it's hard to believe that this nice piece of pottery that belongs to my wife, by the way, she gave me permission to use this as an illustration this morning, is a good visual demonstration of a piece of pottery that was made by a potter on a wheel that he formed.
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The designer made it. And the piece of pottery here is beautiful, isn't it?
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It's painted, it's been through a lot. It's been through fire, it's been cooked.
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It is what it is today because of all the processes that it's been through. Nice piece of pottery.
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The making of it has been around, by the way, for thousands of years. Thousands of years.
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I'll pick that up in a minute with more to say about the vessel in a few.
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But thousands of years in the Middle East, pottery has been made.
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So in today's story, we're going to learn about a prophet by the name of Jeremiah.
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He was known as the weeping prophet. Had such affection and heart as a prophet for Israel.
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You know, so many times we get this picture of these prophets as wild men that's somewhat distant.
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And they are distant because they're separated from God, but in a sense, distant from their people. But they were really affectionate, especially
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Jeremiah, toward Israel. They were God's mouthpiece.
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They said, thus says the Lord. And whatever God spoke to them to say, they said it. As reverse of that, a priest would go before God for the people.
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A prophet would go before the people for God and speak, thus says the
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Lord. And thus, Jeremiah was that prophet. And, as Jeremiah approached, we're going to look at what happened when he visited a potter in the potter's house.
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God will teach this prophet, this weeping prophet, a very important lesson, and us as well, as he visits this house of the potter.
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The lesson is really about the potter and the clay.
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That's the focal point. In this story, the potter is actually symbolic of God, Yahweh, the
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Lord of hosts. The clay is symbolic of the house of Israel, a nation.
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We see that from verse 6 to 10, but as we see the application, it was to also an individual, and which it is to us as well, in verse 11 to 17, calling for a response from the people of Judah and Jerusalem, and it also calls for a personal response from us today.
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This lesson is a very important lesson because it is so relevant to today, not only in the nation of Israel in that time period, but also it's relevant to us today in America and to the church.
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Really, the focal point of this lesson of the story, as we will see, is focused upon repentance.
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Repentance, the sovereignty of God and repentance. I have to say the sovereignty of God is definitely way up there because God is sovereign over all.
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He's in control. No one would dethrone God or impeach Him, but He calls and commands men everywhere to repent, and He calls here for Israel, Judah, to repent.
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I may say Israel and Judah at the same time, but that was divided, the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom, and that's why you see that interchangeably in the text.
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Now we will speak more about this in application later, but I'd like to give you a quote.
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I got many today, but Warren Wiersbe, as I was reading his commentary on this, calls this story as it unfolds from chapter 18 to chapter 20, the prophet, the potter, and the policeman.
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Now we didn't read onward, but the policeman comes in the story later on.
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But here in this story, we have the prophet and the potter. The prophet, obviously, again, is
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Jeremiah and the name of the potter in the story is actually unknown.
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We don't know the name of the potter, do we? Because the Bible doesn't tell us. But he's unknown.
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Again, the potter is symbolic of God, and although he played an important part in the drama, the policeman was
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Pashur, Pashur, the priest. He was a priest in charge of the temple. We can read about him in devotional time in chapter 20.
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He would later on arrest Jeremiah the prophet to be a troublemaker because he considered Jeremiah a troublemaker and punished
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Jeremiah by making him spend a night in stocks in jail, and that was what he got because he preached the word of the
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Lord. As Wiersbe says, Jeremiah the prophet is a chief actor, so to speak, in this three -act drama.
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So as we read about this important story, the potter and the clay, the events probably occurred during the reign of Jericho, Jericho, the king.
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He was the king who would later on burn Jeremiah's prophetic scrolls in Jeremiah 36, 21.
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He hated the word of the Lord. He did not want to have anything to do with God's word or God's prophets.
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So, unlike his father, his father was King Josiah. As you well know,
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King Josiah was a good king. He was a very good king, a godly king, but Jericho had no love for either the
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Lord or his prophet and he did not want to hear the word of God whatsoever.
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He wasn't the least bit interested in what the prophet Jeremiah had to say about things politically or spiritual.
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He despised it. Doesn't that remind you of someone today that's in charge, supposedly, our president today?
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Even though we are to pray for our presidents, and we are commanded to, beloved, according to the apostle
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Paul, that we are to pray for our leaders, and we should.
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But, as in office now in America, Joe Biden, as well as Jericho, has no love whatsoever about God and for the church and for God's people whatsoever.
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This story is very relevant. That's why I'm saying that. It's very relevant to what we are seeing in America today at this very moment, because America has had much more light than Israel had at that time, and we have rejected that light.
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Therefore, God has, we are under judgment, according to Romans chapter 1.
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So America is under this judgment of God Almighty. Just read Romans chapter 1 and you will see that.
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Yet, in the midst of judgment, let me say this. There is hope, and the hope is only found in our sovereign
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God, and in the Lord Jesus Christ, that is, in the gospel. The gospel of Jesus Christ is the remedy, and it's by repentance.
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It's by turning from our sins and turning to God and faith in Jesus Christ.
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So regardless of the judgment that is upon us because of the many, many sins that has come upon us and has come up, let me say this, before God, and it's almost as,
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I remember reading this in Genesis, as God brought judgment upon Sodom and Gomorrah, it's almost as if this sin keeps rising and rising like a cup that's being filled before God, and then
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God says, enough, and He pours out judgment. Now, you see this, but God is sovereign.
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God is in control. He's in full control of this situation. Complete control, and I'm sure in Jeremiah's day, as we look at this story, as he passed by the potter's house many, many times,
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I would think so, that he had no idea that God was going to have a lesson for him about the potter and the clay.
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I'm sure he didn't. You know, it's interesting to note that over thirty words in the
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Hebrew vocabulary relate directly to pottery. Pottery.
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Something small like this. A vessel of pottery. A vessel.
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Because pottery making was a major industry in the near Middle East in that day.
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In Wearsby's commentary, Charles Jefferson makes this observation. He says this.
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He, speaking of Jeremiah, did not get his flash of insight while he was praying, but while he was watching.
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Not while he was praying, but while he was watching a potter engaged in his daily work.
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Interesting. That doesn't mean that God doesn't reveal things through prayer. Other prophets, such as Daniel, had revelation come to him through prayer.
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John on the Isle of Patmos, as he was on the Lord's Day, he was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day, God revealed to him, and I would think through prayer, saw the great vision of heaven, the apocalypse.
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But here God reveals himself in strange places, as Jefferson goes on to say, and in unexpected seasons.
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For instance, he once revealed himself in a stable, as Jefferson notes.
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How true that is. God comes and enters into the world in a stable.
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The Lord Jesus Christ. God made flesh incarnate. So in this story,
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God told Jeremiah, go to the house of a potter. I got a lesson for you. The potter was someone who made the pottery, obviously, and like this beautiful piece of pottery vessel that you see here, this is what he made.
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The potter made many, many vessels. And the potter would place a soft piece of clay, as I mentioned to you earlier, on a small round table that would spin round and round.
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Children, do you know what that table is? Do you know what the pottery was being made as it would...
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If you notice in the picture of the bulletin, I'm putting the children on the spot now, you're welcome to answer it, but if you see there's a piece of pottery, and there's hands of the potter, and a piece of clay, and it's on something.
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It spins around and around. What did they call that? A wheel.
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A wheel, right? Now we're not talking about a wheel. We're not talking about a wheel like of a car or a wagon wheel.
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We're talking about something that this thing, that the piece of clay and the vessel was made of, and it would spin.
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It would spin, and the potter's hands, his hands would form and design the pottery.
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His hands, God's hands is on Israel. Now you've got to realize that in this symbolism here, in this lesson,
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God is teaching Jeremiah something very important. The potter was someone who made the pottery, and like this beautiful piece of pottery vessel as you see, the potter would give place of a soft clay on that small round table, that wheel that would spin round and around, and as the potter, as the master designer would form and make this vessel,
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Jeremiah watched and observed the potter as he was forming this vessel, as he was looking at it, and it would shape the clay pot and the clay vessel on his wheel, and as Jeremiah the prophet watched the potter, the word, notice what it says there, the word which came to Jeremiah from the
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Lord saying, he says, Arise, go to the potter's house, and there I will cause you to hear my words.
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God caused him to hear God's words to this prophet.
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So it's not something that hearing of God's word was something original with Jeremiah the prophet.
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God caused his words, God caused his words to be heard to Jeremiah. Then I went down to the potter's house, and there he was, there he was, he's making something at the wheel, at the wheel, he's making it.
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As the potter, the master designer would form this vessel, Jeremiah as he watched the potter, the word of the
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Lord came to Jeremiah, and God being the sovereign Lord, by the way, has the power, now don't miss this, to shape and make the vessel, and by the way, you will see this later on, we're not going to get to this part, but also to shatter
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Israel. He can make the vessel for his purpose and his glory,
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Israel, and you, and me. But the potter has the authority and the power not only to shape it, but to shatter it, to break it into pieces.
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Now, my wife does not want me to break this, okay? So I'm not going to give that illustration to you, but it does say in the later chapter that Jeremiah takes the vessel and he shatters it because they do not come to repentance at that time.
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He shatters it as the potter has the power over the clay.
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He has that power. In other words, God has that right. He has that authority.
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Why? Because he's sovereign. Now this is a doctrine a lot of people do not like, and I want to tell you why they don't like it.
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Because they think, and somewhere in the recesses of their mind, that they are totally in control of their salvation, and that's not true.
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Salvation is of the Lord. It's of God and God alone. God is the sovereign.
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He's over all. He has the right. And by the way, speak about the sovereignty of God. That means only
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God is free to do whatever He pleases. No one on the face of this earth is absolutely free to do whatever they please because people speak of free will.
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The controversy is about the will, but the will is really not free.
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The will is in bondage. So, as MacArthur would say, the will, the only thing you could will to do is sin.
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That's it. God has the absolute will and perfect will to do whatever
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He pleases. Only God does. Now, Israel did not repent, but God warns them, repent, turn, turn.
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And God's threat of judgment would become a promise of peace, but that did not come that way.
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Wiersbe once again says this, and I love this, this does not mean that God is irresponsible and arbitrary in what
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He does. Even though He is free to act as He pleases, His actions are always consistent with His nature, which is holy, just, wise, and loving.
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He goes on to say this, God doesn't need any advice from us, nor do we have the right to criticize what
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He does. Amen? I'm telling you, God is absolutely in charge and in control of everything.
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I love what R .C. Sproul says about this because Sproul, he says, if man is absolutely free, he said, then
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God is not God. In other words, if God is not sovereign,
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God is not God. And he goes on to say, and I'm paraphrasing Sproul here, there is absolutely not one maverick molecule in this entire universe, and if that was the case, then
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God is not sovereign. Think of that. So this statement is backed up with what
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Wiersbe said here in Scripture. Romans 11 .34, it came to my mind on this, it's quoted from Isaiah 40 .13
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and Jeremiah 23 .18, which says this, for who has known the mind of the
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Lord, or who has become His counselor? Who would dare tap into the eternal mind of God and know
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His mind? We may not know His mind, but we can know His word. Who would dare say, or who has become
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His counselor, the all -knowing, all -wise God? And in Romans 9 .20,
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the Apostle Paul makes this very clear, but indeed, oh man, who are you to reply against God?
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Who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed, will the thing formed say to Him who formed it, why have you made me like this?
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You see this? God is absolutely sovereign over everything.
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Now, so as Jeremiah the prophet watched the potter, he turned, and as he turns and he spins the wheels, and he, and that was joined by a shaft, and he operated it from his feet, and he operated that turning wheel, and as he was making this vessel, he watched and saw that the clay, at first here, if you notice, resisted, resisted the potter's hand so that the vessel was marred, the vessel was ruined.
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Interesting. Was it the potter's fault?
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Something small, we don't know the details here, but something small might have got into the potter as he was turning it, and it marred it.
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It marred it in the hand of the potter, so he, it made it again into another vessel, and I'd like to take that as it was marred.
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The sin of Israel is what marred Israel. It was our sin that marred us.
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It's the sin that marred the vessel, not the potter, not the potter.
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It ruined it, but the potter patiently, by the way, if you notice in the text, he patiently formed the clay and made another vessel.
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Notice that in verse 4, as it seemed, he said, so he made it again into another vessel, and it seemed good to the potter to make.
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It seemed good in his sight. Do you get the picture? You see the potter?
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He's the designer. He's the maker. He's the one that formed the vessel.
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So there's interpretation of the imagery of clay here, and the vessel was national, relating to the house of Israel from verse 6 to 10, calling for a response again, as I mentioned, to the application, which comes down to the people of Judah and Jerusalem, and it comes to an individual.
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Even though God is speaking to the entire nation, Israel, then the response comes down to each individual.
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So what is God saying to Jeremiah the prophet in this object lesson of the potter and the clay? What do you think?
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God is like that potter, and the people of Judah were like the clay vessel.
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Sounds simple, but what's the purpose here? God wanted to shape and to make his people and to make them into a beautiful nation that would be an instrument to keep his laws, to obey his voice, to not disobey him, but to obey and be blessed.
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But if they did not obey the voice of the Lord, then the prophets say, then you will be cursed if you turn against the
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Lord, and if you disobey the voice of the Lord and be stiff -necked and hard -hearted, and that's exactly most of the time what happened.
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But as long as they were obeying the law of God, the voice of God, it was a conditional.
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If you notice many times it says this, if then, if then, his people make them into a beautiful nation, but unfortunately,
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Judah kept sinning and sinning and sinning because they resisted the will of God, they were disobedient to God's voice, and they were rebellious of what the
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Lord was saying. Their sin was like a, we don't know what it was, maybe like a little stone that went into the vessel that marred it up, or a straw or something that got in the way, but that's the type of sin, it marred it up, and that's what has happened today.
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So the Lord presented two scenarios that illustrated his sovereign power and authority over nations, and you see this in Jeremiah 18, 7 -10.
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Now, again, it's conditional. If then, if then, that's very important. And if God threatened to judge a nation and that nation repented, then he would relent and not send the judgment.
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God did this with Nineveh, did he not? Does that come to mind?
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When God sent this prejudiced prophet by the name of Jonah, and Jonah resisted to obey
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God's voice to preach the word. He went into the opposite direction, got on a boat,
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I believe to Tarshish, and went that opposite direction from Nineveh, he was supposed to go to Nineveh, and then he goes to Tarshish, and then he started hiding in a boat, and he was running from God.
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But you can't run from God. And as you well know, they cast, these heathens cast lots, and then a lot fell on Jonah, and they cast him into the ocean, and there was a storm that came upon them, and that's the reason why they figured out eventually that this
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Hebrew was running from God. This prophet, they even said, well, what are you doing here?
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And after that, they cast lots that fell on Jonah, and they cast him into the ocean, and it became a calm.
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Interesting. See, God's in control of the weather, and in control of all the circumstances there, and it's interesting.
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You know what happened? Children, what happened after Jonah was cast into the ocean? Absolutely. He got ate and swallowed up by a fish.
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Now, the original says in the Hebrew, a sea monster, a sea monster, right?
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How did he do that? Good question. You're talking about how did
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God do that? Well, God actually spoke to the fish.
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That's a good question, Ethan. God spoke to the fish. As God is in charge of the storm, he spoke to the fish to swallow up Jonah.
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Ravenhill said that, think about what God was doing. God was doing multiple things as this fish swallowed up Jonah.
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He was teaching him a lesson. He went to the belly of the whale, the fish, the sea monster.
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He was humbling him. He was discipling him because of his disobedience, and at the same time as God was working on him to humble his soul to preach, he was transporting him.
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As Ravenhill says, it's the first submarine, and he went to Nineveh, and when he got to the destination, the fish, he vomited up Jonah on his own land, and then
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Jonah preached the word of the Lord. You see, the reason I'm mentioning this is because God is in charge.
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God can do whatever he pleases. So if you're running from God today, don't think for one moment that you're going to get away from God.
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He's going to catch up with you sooner or later. If not in this life, you've got to face him at the judgment, and the wisest thing that you can do is face
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God now and repent. Folks, I'm telling you, it's very serious. Well, it's conditional, isn't it?
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And Jonah, as we saw, so the other scenario is this. If he promised to bless a nation as he did in Israel, his covenants, and that nation did evil in his sight, then he could withhold the blessing and send judgment instead.
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It was one of the two. It was a blessing or a curse. It was peace with God, or it was the judgment from God.
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One of the two, and that's the way it is. It's today in our day through Jesus Christ. If we don't come to Jesus Christ, if people do not come to Jesus Christ, they're going to experience an everlasting curse upon them for eternity.
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If we come to Jesus Christ, we have an everlasting blessing. And by the way, it is not within your own willpower to do this.
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God causes this to happen. But let me mention right here, there is something here that is a mystery to all of us, and there is no theologian on this earth that can solve this.
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God is sovereign, and man is responsible. These are parallel in Scripture.
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Man's responsibility, God's sovereignty. Let me speak just a little bit to you about this.
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One way to look at it in the Scripture is that God is always God, and He never acts different from Himself.
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He's unchangeable. He's immutable. He does not change. Scripture says, I am the Lord. I change not.
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He is faithful. Study the attributes of God. Study God's attributes.
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He is faithful. He is merciful. He is just. He is faithful in mercy if people repent, and He is faithful in justice even if they don't repent.
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So God will always keep His word. You know what I've just said to you? God must punish sin.
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Keep that in mind. God must punish sin. Because why? He's holy.
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The Bible says He is the holy one of Israel. He is the most holy
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God, and the Bible says also that God is angry with the wicked, what?
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Every day. He will not have nothing to do with sin, folks.
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Why do you think Jesus came? He took that sin on the cross.
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He took the blows. He took the wrath of God that much that God loves us, and He poured it out on His Son.
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He hates sin. And by the way, we don't know how much God hates sin.
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It's beyond our mind. And if Israel did not repent, either way or regardless,
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God is faithful to His word. He keeps His word. He keeps His promise. He cannot go back on His word.
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So He will punish sin. He must punish sin. He keeps
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His promises regardless, and God will always punish sin regardless.
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There's also a wonderful verse I like, and we looked at this a while back ago when we went through the gospel, the epistle
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I should say of James. James 1, 17, 18. Listen to this. Every good gift, every perfect gift is from above.
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Now when he talks about gifts, he's just not talking about external gifts, which they are freely given to us from God.
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But what James the apostle has in mind here is the gift of salvation, the gift of regeneration, the gift of coming to Christ.
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Every gift, every perfect gift comes from above and comes down.
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It descends from the Father of light with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.
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Of His own will, He brought us forth by the word of truth that we might be a kind of first fruits of His creature.
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He's talking about regeneration. So being saved from the wrath of God is a gift.
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It is a gift. It is a gift of God's own will. Notice that.
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God's own will. So God has the sovereign freedom to alter His actions depending on the responses of the people.
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Here again we see this mystery involved in the relationship between divine sovereignty and human responsibility.
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And let me make a footnote here. We don't understand all this, beloved. If you hear any theologian says, well,
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I got it all figured out, don't buy that. No man alive has this figured out.
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Again, man's responsibility, God's sovereignty runs a parallel course. It's mysterious, we don't understand it.
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So keep in mind, we don't have to understand this mystery to believe the gospel.
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Deuteronomy 29 .29 comes to mind. The secret things, the secret things belong to the
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Lord our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever that we may do all the words of this law.
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Isn't that wonderful? You see that? The sovereignty of God and man's responsibility.
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The things that are revealed to us is from the scriptures, 66 books of the
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Bible, not the Apocrypha, is not inspired of God, but these 66 books, all of God, 39 of the
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Old Testament, 27 of the New Testament, Genesis of Revelation is the revelation of God.
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Whatever is in this book is revealed to us. Outside of that, we don't know. There's a lot of things we don't know and how that operates, we don't know, but we do know it works because God is backing it up and He's sovereign.
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Now, we live by the divine promises from God's word, not by theological explanations.
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It really angers me at times that these theologians would try to explain this and I even heard one so -called theologian that was in the most modalist branch, the
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Jesus -only branch, and he was a false teacher, the modalist, trying to explain the
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Trinity, that these are just names of God and it's like God is not one
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God in three persons and he was trying to explain. He said, well, these are just names of God, nothing else, just symbols.
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That is false. There's a mystery within the Trinity that's a unity of the
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Father, the Son, and the Spirit. We don't know all about this and if we did know about it, God wouldn't be God.
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Again, Paul says, who are you, old man? So we don't need theological explanations.
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God doesn't owe us, by the way, God does not owe us answers and explanations, does
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He? God is God, folks. We bow to His authority.
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We bow in submission to His Word. Oh, isn't it wonderful that He is in charge?
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As Spurgeon says, you can rest your head on this pillow that God is sovereign. No matter what you go through in life, the trials that come your way, the afflictions, the hardships, and everything that takes place,
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God is absolutely in charge. Isn't it wonderful? Well, that's important.
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Now, we come to a personal application of this story. And I just gave you the story in a nugget because this morning we have communion, but I want to talk to you in application of the potter and the clay and the sense of nations are made up of individuals.
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Individuals make up a nation, just as the masses make up an individual and individuals.
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But God is concerned for the nation, but He's also concerned for each individual. Because God is a personal
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God. Aren't you glad when you see the masses out there and you think, God, I'm so small and insignificant, but do you see me?
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He does. God, Jesus said this about God. He says, He knows the number of your hair.
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By the way, it just doesn't refer to the omniscience and all knowingness of God. It speaks about that God really cares about you.
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Every hair in your head, God knows by number. And you know what it's speaking of? It's just not talking about, yes,
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He knows it in His omniscience, but He cares about every little thing.
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Well, whether we believe it or not, it's true. Faith, we have to believe it.
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We must believe it in faith or if we reject it, we reject it in unbelief.
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So the application is found really today, in today's bulletin.
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I would just briefly go through this because of the time frame I have. But if you notice, you see it here.
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Formed, deformed, informed, transformed, conformed, reformed.
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There's a lot of forms in there. But I'm not going to touch on all of that, but the main part of it is, let's look at it.
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God formed us, just like God the potter formed the clay. Like the potter that formed the clay by his hands,
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God formed man from the dust of the earth in Genesis 2 .7.
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Genesis 2 .7. What does that wonderful verse say? It talks about when
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God created man and the Lord God formed man of the dust of the earth, the dust of the ground.
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Did you get that? The dust, the clay. And breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living being, a living soul.
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The breath that we have in us is by the mercy and goodness of God. God has given us breath to praise
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Him, to love Him, and breath to tell people about Jesus, not to spit out horrible things and gossip and all these horrible sins, but to love
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God and to share the good news and to praise Him. God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.
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Isn't that wonderful? God's mercy, God's goodness. Think about that.
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Jeremiah 1 .5, if you go back to Jeremiah and you can see this, God spoke to the prophet
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Jeremiah. He needed to know this as he was commissioned by God, ordained by God to preach the word.
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What does he say? Before I formed you, before I formed you in the womb,
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God says I knew you. Before you were born, before you were born.
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Think about this. Before any of us was born. And he says here specifically, to Jeremiah the prophet,
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I sanctified you. You know what that means? I set you apart. God made this choice before he was born.
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He sanctified him. He set him apart. And what else did he do? He ordained him.
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He says and ordained you a prophet to the nations. I've already chosen you. You are ordained just like God chose the prophets, the apostles, and all those that would be used of God in the history of the patriarchs, the prophets, the godly men, the women that were chosen of God in the respect like Deborah and Mary and Hannah as a vessel that God used for the glory, for his glory.
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God formed them. Beloved, this is one of those wonderful verses that so many people hate.
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Why did they hate such a verse like that? Did you notice? Because it clearly brings out the attention of the awesome sovereignty and the control of God that Jeremiah had nothing to do with that.
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He didn't choose to do that. God chose it for him. God formed us.
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Sin deformed us. Look at Genesis 3. Sin deformed us. When sin came into the world, after, if you see in verse 6,
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Genesis 3, so when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and the tree desirable to make one wise, she bought the lie that Satan was speaking through the serpent, basically that God is not good to you.
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God is not thinking about you in the sense of that you are made in the image of God, and God somehow is, he was actually slandering
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God's character. He was slandering the word of God, this liar, this father of lies.
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And then what happened? She took of its fruit and ate, not that the fruit itself had poison to it, in which so many, that's so erroneous.
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It was the disobedience. So, she also gave to her husband while he passively stood by and allowed the enemy to come right into the situation, and with her, and deceived her, and he ate it.
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And that's exactly what Satan wanted. He knew how to get to the man, to Adam, through the woman.
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That's how cunning he was. And don't you think that Satan is a very cunning operator.
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He knows exactly how to operate in lies and deceitfulness to get to what he wants to accomplish.
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And by the way, he works more in the church than he does outside in that world. That's why we must be on guard and in prayer before God on our knees and asking
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God for wisdom and discernment to spot the enemy if he's coming about, and we must deal with that.
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But you know right here, it's sad. Adam was passively just watching this whole situation play before him.
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And what happened? Then the eyes of both of them were opened and they knew that they were naked. They sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.
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They were trying to hide themselves from God, somehow their own religion. Verse 8, and they heard the sound of the
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Lord, God, walking in the garden of the cool of the day. And Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the
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Lord God among the trees of the garden. This is what man is doing today. He's still running. He's still trying to hide.
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And God is seeking them and going after them and says, look, he asked the question like a heavenly parent.
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Listen to what he says. Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to him, where are you? God knew where exactly he was and where she was.
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What God wanted them to know is where are you? Like a heavenly parent, he's asking them the question, the soul search.
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Do you know this today? Do you know where you are? So he said,
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I heard your voice in the garden. I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself.
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And he said, God said to him, who told you that you were naked?
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God already knew this. Again, God is asking this question like a heavenly parent for him to probe his own heart.
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Have you eaten from the tree at which I commanded you that you should not eat? And the man said, the woman you whom you gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree.
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And I notice how he's just casting the buck. Oh, passing the buck started right here. The blame game.
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The Lord God said to the woman, what is this you have done? And the woman said, the serpent deceived me and I ate.
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So the Lord God said to the serpent, notice God doesn't argue with them. He doesn't give explanations.
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He just asked the questions and patience. And he says to the serpent, because you've done this, you are cursed more than all the cattle, more than every beast of the field.
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And on your belly you should go and you shall eat dust and all the days of your life. And here it is, folks.
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God preaches the gospel to him. And I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed.
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Notice her seed, the seed is, the S is capital. That speaks of Christ.
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He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel. That speaks of Calvary, folks. He will crush the head of the serpent.
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Jesus will be bruised, but the victory will be won. Well, sin deformed us, but it's
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Jesus Christ that transforms us. Jesus Christ at 2
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Corinthians 5 saying, therefore, if any man be in Christ, he's a new creature. Old things have passed away.
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Behold, all things have become new. God makes a new person.
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The word of God informs us through a messenger to be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ.
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You know, Paul prayed that the church would be conformed to the image of Christ. Romans 8, 29.
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That's the end of our Christian relationship, our relationship with God, that we would be more like Jesus, conformed into his image.
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What about Romans 12 and 2? And be not conformed to this world, but be you transformed by the renewing of your mind.
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To be conformed, our mind must be transformed. God makes a complete person, a beautiful piece of pottery in Jesus Christ.
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Isn't it wonderful? Do not be conformed to this world, but be you transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and what?
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Perfect will of God. God's will for you. All through Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ alone.
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Well, the key verse is Jeremiah 18, 11. I need to get through this. I have something to say, and I think it's very important.
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Time is running out, but it's based upon one of the key verses, verse 8, 11.
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So now say to the men of Judah and to the residents of Jerusalem, this is what the Lord says.
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Look, I am about to bring harm to you and make plans against you. Turn now each from your evil way and correct your ways and your deeds.
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That's the message. It's to repent. Let me give you a quote from Spurgeon on this.
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His commentary on this says this, and this is very important. Turn now each from your own evil way.
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This text is always Spurgeon, all about repentance, all about repentance. It's an exhortation from God, brief but earnest and plain.
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This is the call of mercy. But remember, that is equally the call of a holy
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God, the God who knows you cannot be saved unless you turn from your evil ways.
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A holy God will give no salvation to a person who continues in unrighteousness. Turn, to turn involves a picture of a person who is going the wrong way.
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The first thing such a person needs to do is to stop and consider where he or she is going. But suppose a person did stop.
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Suppose he did stop. That would not be turning. Listen very carefully. It is but the commencement of the turn when a person stops.
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But it would be necessary for him next to turn around. He must turn his face in the opposite direction from that in which he was traveling.
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When are sinners to turn? When are sinners to turn? You notice what the text says? Spurgeon goes on.
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Turn now. Now. Today is the day of salvation.
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Notice what he says. This should be immediate. People are willing to promise to turn around.
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They make promises. And he says, when they have gone a little farther, but now is always an ugly word to them.
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Tomorrow they like much better. Tomorrow, much better. But if you do not turn now, you may not live to turn at all.
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Listen to this. Who is to turn? The text says, turn now each from your evil ways.
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Your evil way. Each of your evil way includes all of us. Amen. Whosoever will.
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Every man, every woman, every child who has not turned.
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Hear the voice of the Lord repeatedly in this message to them. And from what are these people to turn?
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From your evil way. From sin. Amen. Amen, Brother Keith.
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From sin. Jesus came to save us from what? Our sin.
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Each person, Spurgeon says, has a way of his own. This is convicting because we are self -willed.
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This is why Jesus said you must deny yourself to follow him. That is the gospel, folks. He goes on to say, some personal form of sin.
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You have a personal form of sin. Such evil ways may be because of some peculiar constitution, circumstances or habits.
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What is the sin into which you must frequently fall? What kind of sin do you frequently fall into?
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This is the evil way from which you are especially called on to turn from. End quote.
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I know that was a lengthy quote, but I think it was worth every bit of it. We need to turn from our sin.
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Turn to God now. Mark 11, I'm sorry, Mark 115, Jesus says, the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand.
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Repent and believe the gospel. Jesus said, repent or you likewise perish.
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Romans, I'm sorry, Acts 17, God commands men everywhere to repent.
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Romans 10, 13, for whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.
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He shall be delivered. Today is the day of salvation. Come to Jesus Christ and believe the gospel.
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John Erickson taught him. The heavenly potter will use hardships to make you into something new.
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When you place yourself in his hands, you will find peace in that promise. Ephesians 2, 10, for we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which
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God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Isaiah 64, 8, but now listen to this prayer.
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Oh Lord, you are our father. We are the clay and you are our potter and all we are the work of your hand.
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Like the potter and the clay, we're not going to sing it. Have thy own way, Lord, have thy own way. Thou art the potter,
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I am the clay. Mold me, make me after thy will. While I'm waiting, yielded and still.
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Search me, try me, master today. Wider than snow, Lord, wash me just now as in thy presence
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I humbly bow. Wounded and weary, help me,
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I pray. Power of all power, surely is thine. Touch me and heal me,
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Savior divine. Hold over my being, absolute sway.
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Fill with thy spirit, take over my heart. Until all shall see Christ only, always living in me.
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Have thy own way, Lord, have thy own way. Let me close with this.
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J. Wilbur Chapman said this, the clay is not attractive in itself, but when the hands of the potter touch it and the thought of the potter is brought to bear upon it and the plan of the potter is worked out in it and through it, then there is a real transformation.
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Praise God. Do you want to be transformed completely and made new as a vessel in the hands of God?
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Turn now to Him and He will change you.
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Turn now and make you all new. Amen. Let's pray. Father, we thank you and we praise you for our time together.
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Lord is here in your word. Your word goes forth and it does not return void. Lord, you bring forth the fruits.
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Lord, I've just delivered it. That's all I do. I'm just a voice. Ministering your holy word to your people.
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We thank you, Lord, that your word is all powerful, sharper than any two -edged sword, pierces, cuts, two -edged.
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It cuts and it heals. We thank you for that, Father, and we bless your name. Lord, bring those to repentance,
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Lord, those that have not come yet. May they not leave this place until they have made their peace with you through Jesus Christ and believe in the gospel.
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Lord, may we bless you now and bless our time of communion as we remember the sufferings and the death of your beloved son, the