Context for Jeremiah 17:19-18:23
God reminds Judah through Jeremiah that they are His people, bound to Him in a way that even their rejection cannot break. So, just as the potter forms the clay into whatever he wishes, God would do to Judah whatever it took to restore His people to the way He wished for them to go.
Can we imagine the clay of a potter’s wheel developing a mind of its own? What would the potter do if he was trying to form a vase and the clay insisted on becoming a plate instead?
God uses the illusion of His faithful as clay and Himself as the potter repeatedly throughout Scripture. This illusion is useful, as it reminds us that we are constantly being shaped and molded into what God wants us to be through the Word.
Unlike clay, however, we sometimes push back. God pushes us in one direction, but instead we go another. It is this sort of rebellion that God illustrates through Jeremiah, focusing on the consequences of that rebellion. If we push back too far, that is wander away from God’s grace, God will be forced to mold us by more and more painful means.
Instead of suffering through that kind of discipline, it is far better for us to conform ourselves to God’s will through the Word and the Sacraments, willingly submitting to His shaping as we follow the path He lays before us to Heaven. In doing so, our faith is strengthened, as is our usefulness as God’s special vessels of the Gospel.
