Rerun

OK, I'm lazy. Not really. The truth is I'm heading out of town this afternoon to preach at the church I served when I came back to Indiana over 15 years ago. But I was assigned a text different than the one most of the readers of this blog will hear.

So, I decided that it would be less confusing to rerun a bible study I wrote three years ago on the text that Kent will be using at Aldersgate in the morning. That way I can spend the morning preparing my sermon for Elkhart Trinity and perhaps be a little less nervous than I might have been.

The added advantage to this rerun is that it contains an explanation of the name of this bible study. In case you forgot! Now, here's the tricky part: since I was honest and admitted this was a rerun, will anybody claim they remembered it from the first time? :)

Playdoh Edition

Just to let the newcomers in on the joke - there is a reason why this is called the “Late Night Bible Study.” If I could only remember what it was. No, just kidding. I do remember. A long time ago in a galaxy far away, sorry ... A few years back my former associate pastor Taylor Burton Edwards started an online bible study designed to engage folks in a dialogue around the gospel text for the following Sunday. He would give some background and then pose some questions and once in a while someone would answer or at least respond to the rest of the group. I don’t know how long he did this nor do I know how many folks ever responded to what he was doing, but at least it gave the participants food for thought.

When he left First Anderson, he told me that he thought I ought to continue the study. So, I took it over and changed it. Not really on purpose, I just changed it because I got my hands on it. I’m a different person with my own ways of doing things, my own ways of seeing things and hearing things. So this study came out different too.

When I started it, it was a part of my final sermon preparation which takes place on Saturday night. Sometimes really late. That’s not because I don’t do any sermon prep before Saturday, I’m working on sermons almost all the time. At least in some corner of my mind I am. But I’m putting the final touches on it on Saturday night. So, I would write the bible study late at night. Hence the title.

The problem with this is not everyone is a late night person. Many folks, who enjoyed reading the bible studies and using them to prepare for worship the next morning, didn’t want to wait until after midnight (sometimes) to get the email. So, they asked politely if I would consider doing them earlier. And since I was asked so nicely I started doing it earlier in the day. But for some reason I kept the name. Don’t know why exactly, just liked it I guess.

I also shifted from a true bible study to something more like a commentary. Or as I like to think of them, sermon seeds. It is my form of a blog, really, comments on a biblical text and insight into the sermon I am still preparing. And here in Fort Wayne it serves as something like the printed sermons that some folks were used to getting each Sunday morning. Since I no longer write out the whole sermon, this is as close as I get.

So, now you know why this is called Late Night Bible Study, even though it isn’t done late at night and isn’t really a bible study. I hope I do manage to say something about the text in this space, but I try for more than just understanding.

Like many things, this has evolved over the years into the form you now see before you. I can’t help but change and grow ... at least we hope it is growth. We add our influence to the things we do, we shape them by the images and ideas that are in our heads. Our fingerprints are on the things we do.

Which is what our lesson is about this week. Jeremiah was one of the prophets of God, which meant that sometimes he had to give bad news. What is amazing about the prophetic books is that when you look closely the bad news is surrounded by good news. But sometimes it is hard to see.

Jeremiah 18:1-11 The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD: 2 "Come, go down to the potter's house, and there I will let you hear my words." 3 So I went down to the potter's house, and there he was working at his wheel. 4 The vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter's hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as seemed good to him. 5 Then the word of the LORD came to me: 6 Can I not do with you, O house of Israel, just as this potter has done? says the LORD. Just like the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel. 7 At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, 8 but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will change my mind about the disaster that I intended to bring on it. 9 And at another moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it, 10 but if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will change my mind about the good that I had intended to do to it. 11 Now, therefore, say to the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem: Thus says the LORD: Look, I am a potter shaping evil against you and devising a plan against you. Turn now, all of you from your evil way, and amend your ways and your doings.

Jeremiah isn’t the only one to use the image of the potter to represent the creative power of God, but there is a depth here that is unique. The potter is the one who takes the seemingly insignificant elements of the earth and shapes them into something beautiful. God takes “what is low and despised in the world” to use Paul’s words, and makes it into something of glory.

The bad news here is that sometimes things go wrong. The pot being shaped on the wheel is spoiled, goes bad. The Hebrew word here used to describe the ruined vessel means marred or spoiled or ruined, but it also can mean corrupted or perverted. There is a moral element here, a judgment made.

The good news is that the ruined pot is not discarded but remade. Re-created in the hands of the potter. What is interesting about the passage is that the word for create is a different one than what appears in the beginning of Genesis. The word for create in Genesis is used only for God, the divine creator, something we cannot duplicate. But the word in this passage is used both for God’s activity and for our own. We are co-creators with God in this reclamation project. We are participants in the act of re-creation, not passive subjects acted upon by unseen, outside forces.

That is why the passage ends with a call to change: “Turn now, all of you from your evil way, and amend your ways and your doings.” God has chosen to let us participate in the act of creation. We put our own fingerprints on the aspects of our lives that we remold. We make choices. We are not helpless, according to God’s words through Jeremiah, victims of circumstances beyond our control. We are partners in the process of the re-creation of our own lives. How shall we live? What shall we choose? Who shall we be?

One last interpretive image - when Jeremiah reports that the potter was “working at his wheel” the literal translation is “making a work on the stones.” The ancient potter’s wheel is not like the ones we see today. It was more like a millstone, two large stones that sat on top of one another and were caused to spin by great effort. It took the potter’s whole body to spin the stone to make the pot. By identifying God as the potter, Jeremiah is making the claim of God’s great effort expended on our behalf. He literally wraps himself around us as he works to make us new.

So, what about the “edition” in the title of the Late Night Bible Study? Well, it’s a teaser, I guess. A little hint as to what the whole thing is about. In this case, Play-doh, the kids equivalent of potter’s clay. Or in this case, a quick description of the human condition. I hope I’m one of the brighter colors!

Shalom,
Derek