What did he do? Throw the clay away as useless? No. He made
it again another vessel. He was determined to make, not anything,
but something useful and good. And if the clay, being faulty, failed
him once, he would try again. He would change his purpose and plan,
but not his right will to make good and useful vessels; them he WOULD
make, if not by one way, then by another. And Jeremiah watched him;
and as he watched, the Spirit of the Lord came on him, and taught him
that that poor potter's way of working with his clay, was a pattern
and likeness of the Lord's work on earth. Oh shame, that this great
parable should have been twisted by men to make out that God is an
arbitrary tyrant, who works by a brute necessity! It taught Jeremiah
the very opposite. It taught him what it ought to teach us, that God
does change, because man changes, that God's steadfast will is the
good of men, and therefore because men change their weak self-willed
course, and fall, and seek out many inventions, therefore God changes
to follow them, like a good shepherd, tracking and following the lost
and wandering sheep up and down, right and left, over hill and dale,
if by any means He may find him, and bring him home on His shoulders
to the fold, calling upon the angels of God: "Rejoice with me, for I
have found my sheep which I had lost.
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