Lumps of Clay

Cecilia walked beside her mother on the way to an open house at her sister Kaylynn's school. "How will we find Kaylynn?" asked Cecilia."She said she'd be in her pottery class," answered Mom, "and she gave me directions to get to it." They soon found the place where Kaylynn was working, and they sat down quietly at the back of the room.The class instructor was at his potter's wheel, demonstrating how to make a clay vase. The students watched and then began work on their own projects. "Kaylynn's good, isn't she?" whispered Cecilia, watching her older sister at work."Yes," said Mom. "The vase she's making will be lovely filled with flowers."Cecilia sighed. "Ben plays baseball, Sienna sings in the choir, and Kaylynn makes pottery. But me, I'm like…" Cecilia gestured toward the instructor's table. "I'm like one of those ugly lumps of clay.""Cecilia," said Mom gently, "the vase Kaylynn is making was a lump of clay like those. And so was the one the instructor is making. Those lumps are the clay the potter uses to make beautiful things."Cecilia looked at the instructor. A tall vase was being shaped by his skillful fingers. "Imagine one of those ugly lumps ending up like that!""You know, we're all like lumps of clay," said Mom. "On our own, we can do nothing. But God is our potter, and He skillfully molds and shapes us into something useful and beautiful. We just need to be pliable and--""What does that mean?" asked Cecilia."Pliable? That means soft and easy to mold," explained Mom. "If the clay is hard, it's also hard to mold it, and if we are stubborn and our hearts are hard--if we insist on doing things our way instead of trusting God--then He needs to soften our hearts before He can shape our lives into something beautiful." She smiled at Cecilia. "You're not an ugly lump of clay. You're a pliable one. You know Jesus, who has softened your heart with His love. Just be patient, and little by little God will begin to show you who He's molding you to be."-Tanya Ferdinandusz