Wednesday  in the Second Week of Lent:

“Broken Vessels in the Potter’s Hands”

     "Have you ever felt so broken that you believed it was a sin for you to exist? Have you ever needed grace so desperately that you could taste the dust of it in your mouth? Lent is not for polished saints. It is for cracked clay." ~ Shane Bryant

Collect

Gracious Father, You are the Potter and we are the clay. When we are shattered by rejection, betrayed by those we loved, and deceived by our own low self-worth, do not discard us. Press us gently back into Your hands. Break what must be broken in us, shape us to be humble servants, and remake what the adversary tried to destroy within us. These things we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Scripture Lessons

Jeremiah 18:1–6 – “Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in My hand.”

Psalm 34:18 – “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.”

Matthew 20:17–28 – “Whoever would be great among you must be your servant.”

Devotional Reading

     The central theme of today’s lessons is this: God does not discard broken vessels. He remakes them. The prophet Jeremiah watches the potter’s wheel spin. The clay collapses under the pressure. It fails. It caves in. But the potter does not throw it away. He reshapes it.

That image has lived in me.

I know what it feels like to be broken.

     I was 6'3" by my sophomore year of high school. I was mocked for being tall. Some boys were jealous. Some girls joined in. I was not handsome, that probably  would not have helped, but I wasn't  ugly either. I was made fun of and ridiculed just for being tall. I lived in constant rejection because I was taller, I looked different. As a tall high school kid, everyone wanted to pick a fight with me, they had to prove something. Sometimes  I fought, often I ignored them, I knew it was coming from a place of jealousy.  Sometimes it felt like I was simply too much — too visible, too different. There were days I honestly felt like it was wrong for me to exist. Like breathing was an offense. I spent my high school years alone, I was an outcast simply for how I looked, which I had no control over. 

That wound followed me.

     At twenty-five, when a woman showed interest in me, I ignored the red flags. In my heart I thought, "If she finds me attractive and she’s not blind, she must be one in a million." That’s how low my self-worth had fallen.

     She had been divorced before. A single mother of two. Her previous husband paid no child support, so she lived with her parents. Her father was a Baptist minister. They kept a strict household. She knew I aspired to ministry. She acted supportive while we were engaged.

     After we married and she left her parents’ home, a very different person emerged. My wife had begun to drinking with friends after work, pills and alcohol  both. Within the first year, I sensed infidelity. I ignored it. I prayed through it. I fasted. I pleaded with Heaven. I started to blame myself, I thought, "If I were just stronger, more convincing, maybe more attractive  she would respect me and herself enough to clean up her life."

Heaven seemed silent.

     About a year before our divorce, she told me plainly: “I never really wanted you. I just needed a man like you willing to work hard to get me away from my parents.” I had been working two jobs. I felt ripped apart inside. Why would she want to throw away what I thought was love? But, it wasn’t  love, it was manipulation. I had been used, and left broken. Humbled.

     We divorced in 2011 after three and a half years. For four years after that, I blamed myself. I told myself I should have been stronger. Better. More desirable. More of a man. If I had been better, she wouldn’t have cheated. If I had been better, she wouldn’t have run around.

But here is the truth that fasting and prayer during Lent has taught me:

     Yes, I was wrong — not for loving her — but for accepting what I knew was wrong. I allowed behavior that diminished me because I believed I was worth very little. To admit that required humility,  it required repentance,  for believing  the lies the enemy has told me! I cound not be a humble servant in the Kingdom  of God, because I didn’t  even love myself! God is love, Christ is love thru sacrifice.  People have to sense and feel love coming from within us.  This has been a hard lesson for me to learn. It was hard for me to have empathy for others, when I didn't  have respect  and empathy  for myself. People  were able to see that too.

And the adversary thrives there.

     The enemy of our souls studies our fractures. He finds the places where we already feel unworthy. He finds our weak spots, the cracks and fractures. He whispers, "This is all you deserve." He pushes us to settle for less than God intends. He tempts us to accept emotional crumbs when we were created for covenant love.

He seeks to shatter what God intends to shape.

    For some five or six years after 2011, I simply let go of my faith. I had stepped outside the boundaries  of grace. I was a hateful  person during those years. I became what I would have preached against in the past. One day I woke up and realized, "this isn’t  what my life was supposed to be."

But the Potter is stronger than the adversary.

     The Potter sees what the enemy tried to destroy and says, "Watch Me remake it." The silence of Heaven during that marriage was not indifference. It was mercy. Some prayers are not answered because God refuses to bless what would ultimately destroy us.

     In the years since, I have dated some. I have also walked away when red flags appeared. I am more guarded now. Perhaps too guarded at times. But I am no longer desperate. I would love to meet someone to share what remains of my life with. But I am also at peace. Because my first healing is not finding someone else. It is submitting to the Potter’s hands.

Humility is the turning point.

Not humiliation. Not shame.

Humility.

“Lord, I was wrong to believe I was worthless. I was wrong to accept what harmed me. Remake me.”

And He does.

Another Story of Reshaping

     Author Joni Eareckson Tada was paralyzed in a diving accident at age seventeen. In the early years after her injury, she wrestled deeply with despair, depression, and questions about God’s goodness. She has written openly about praying for healing that did not come — and about the slow reshaping of her faith through suffering.

Rather than discarding her life, God repurposed it.

      She became an author, speaker, and advocate whose ministry has touched millions. What felt like the shattering of her future became the forming of a deeper one.

The vessel was not thrown away.

It was remade.¹

The Charge

If you feel shattered this Lent —

if you were betrayed,

if someone told you that you were unwanted,

if you settled because you thought that was all you deserved —

Hear this:

You are clay in the Potter’s hands.

Not trash in the adversary’s pile.

Stop agreeing with the voice that says you are worthless.

Agree instead with the hands that are reshaping you.

Humbly submit to the Potter’s  hands.

Let Him remake you before you give your heart away again,

Or believe  the lies and manipulation  of the Adversary. 

 

Prayer

Lord Jesus, You were rejected by men, betrayed by a kiss, and abandoned by friends.

You know what it is to love and not be loved in return.

Take the shattered pieces of my heart.

Silence the voice of the adversary that tells me I am not enough.

Forgive me where I accepted what harmed me.

Restore my worth in You.

Prepare my heart for humble service in Your Kingdom.

Teach me grace, help be to be merciful and loving.

Help me to know and show unconditional love 

But above all,

keep me soft in Your hands.

Amen.

 

Footnote

¹ See Joni by Joni Eareckson Tada, in which she recounts her accident, early despair, and the development of her faith through suffering.