And there the great God almighty
Who lit the sun and fixed it in the sky,
Who flung the stars to the most far corner of the night,
Who rounded the earth in the middle of his hand;
That Great God,
Like a mammy bending over her baby,
Kneeled down in the dust,
Tolling over a lump of clay
Till he shaped it in his own image;
Then into it he blew the breath of life,
And man became a living soul.
And God said:  That's good!
Amen.  Amen.

Here is how Jeremiah understood the exile.  The Israelites had contributed to their own downfall.  The captivity and being taken into exile did not mean doom for the Israelites.  Rather, the exile became a time of discipline, humility, and learning. Humility means to be teachable and Jeremiah appealed to the humility, the teachableness of the Israelites who were in exile.  The Exile was what life had dealt them and they had contributed to their own downfall.  God was willing, even eager, to work with them in spite of the terrible conditions.  Here is the good news in Jeremiah, and this theme is found throughout Scripture.  God is never finished with us even when we are finished with God.  God is still available to us if, when we change our minds, we decide we want God to be a part of our lives.  Amazingly, God always is able to begin to fashion new people.  It is amazing how much God can do with so little.
           
What becomes clearer in Jeremiah's use of the potter analogy and through examining the events that transpired during the Exile is what has been true of God's involvement with people from the beginning.  Regardless of what happens to us, regardless of what a mess we make of our lives, regardless of what horrible things happen to us, regardless of the tragedies that may come to our lives, God promises to be with us.  God does not bring destruction or harm or illness on us.  These and other things may happen to us.  Our relationship with God will not, cannot keep these things from happening to us.  However, our relationship with God will affect our interpretation and understanding of the events that happen in our lives.  God is willing to help us pick up the pieces and put our lives back together.  God will take whatever we offer that we have made of our lives, in spite of the mess we have made of it and help us make something healthy and wholesome out of it.
           
Have you ever watched a potter at work at a potter’s wheel?  It is a creative enterprise.  I’m fascinated, even spell-bound when I watch a potter at work.  Several factors contribute to the spell binding fascination.  First, I know nothing of how to work with clay on a potter’s wheel to mold and shape the clay in anything recognizable or usable.  I suspect that were I to try my hands at it, when I finished and it would not take me long to finish, what you would see is the same clump of clay that I started with only it would look worse for the wear and for my efforts at trying to make something out of it.  So my own ineptness at pottery making contributes to my fascination.  Second, I am fascinated that a potter can have an image in mind of what she wants to form out of the clay then to know how to combine the use of her hands and turning of the wheel to transfer this image from her mind into a clay vessel that is both beautiful and useful. 
           
In modern times many contemporary artisans have recaptured the art of the potter’s work.  The truth Jeremiah stated about twenty six hundred years ago is the truth about the potter and the clay today.  “Whenever a piece of pottery turns out imperfect, the potter takes the clay and makes it into something else.”  The basic ingredient is the same, clay, but the permanent shape or form of the clay may be a bowl, a cup, or a tray.
           
The work of the potter with the clay as described by Jeremiah is a powerful, graceful image of God. We never have the last word on ourselves or anyone else.  God does.  This text from Jeremiah speaks gracefully, “God is not finished with us yet.”  What a model this is for us.  We are to be graceful with others.  Who has been graceful to you?  Think of someone who has been kind, loving, careful with you and as a result helped you accept yourself for who you are, actually helped you learn more about yourself and helped you become a better person.  My high school basketball coach was graceful to me.  He was a demanding coach.  Practices were grueling at times, especially when we began in the fall.  However, he was very clear about what he expected and why he had these expectations.  He told us at the outset that practices were going to be difficult and challenging because that was necessary for our physical conditioning.  He said, “We will play some teams who have better players than some of our players.  We will play some teams who overall are better teams than we are, but we will not play a team that is in better condition that we are.  We may loose a game because it is a better team but we will not lose a game because a team is in better condition than we are.”  He also said there is no excuse not to hustle and stated clearly that hustle had nothing to do with skill and ability but had everything to do with desire and intention.  My high school had an outstanding reputation for its basketball teams through the years.  Frankly, I was amazed when I was selected to start in the center position my senior year.  Joe Harper saw more in me than I saw in myself.  I recall hearing him interviewed just before our season started my senior year. When asked a general question about the team, he responded that he thought we would have better team speed than he had anticipated.  He said, “I thought Howard Roberts was going to be awfully slow but he’s often one of first players down the floor filling a lane on the fast break.”  What a graceful comment!  Who has been a conveyor of grace to you?
To whom have you been graceful?  While I was seminary student Peggy and I were in a marriage growth group with several couples.  During one session one of the women was really angry and seemed to be attacking everyone in the group.  I recall thinking at the time that this didn’t have anything to do with any of us and had everything to do some situation in her past.  I was able to stay in conversation with her as she seemed to roll out the barrels of hostility at us.  By staying in conversation with her, eventually the acceptance melted her hostility and she experienced grace from the group as we were able to offer her our acceptance, understanding, and support.  People are in need of grace and they need it to flow from others who have been touched by grace and are willing to let it flow through them to others.

What about us as a congregation?  Are we a graceful congregation?  We have a wonderful slogan that communicates grace: “No matter who you are or where you are on life’s journey, you are welcome here.”  How well do we live that slogan as we interact with each other?  When you are in a board meeting do you feel empowered by the way you are treated?  Do you empower others by the way you interact with them?  All of us have been the recipients of grace from God and from others.  May we all strive to be graceful in our interactions and relationships with each other.   
           
Not only is the story of the potter and the clay an image of graceful power and the power of grace, but also what an image of humility it is for us.  Humility means teachable.  To be humble is to be open to learning, to be malleable and pliable, to be open to being formed and shaped, reformed and reshaped.

Our lives are the clay with which God as the potter is able to work.  God takes what we give to God and shapes and molds us into people who are valuable, people of worth, and guides us to be useful and helpful to others.  God continually has to adjust to a changing situation because we often give ourselves to God and then we cut off the relationship.  Whenever we are willing to come back into the relationship, God is willing to receive us.  All of this is God's effort to help us find the way we should go and then guide us in that direction.
A full and effective response by us to God can open up a totally changed prospect for the future.  God's purpose and effort always allows the freedom of human response including our repenting, changing our minds, turning around and going in another direction.  All of us are free to choose the response we will make to God.  Like the potter molding and shaping the clay, God takes our lives as we offer them to God and molds and shapes us into the best human beings we can be.  In so doing, we never lose our individuality or our freedom.  Always we are living beings created in the image of God.  God continually seeks to help us discover the way we are to go.  As we make that discovery, we are molded and shaped into new people.  As it was for Jeremiah, it had been for the storytellers of creation, so it is for us, God is the potter, we are the clay.  May we allow God to mold us, shape us, and make us the best human beings we can be and make us the most graceful congregation anywhere.  I can think of no better rallying call for us on this Rally Day than the call for us to be a graceful people and a graceful congregation.  May we allow God to shape us and mold us into a graceful people and a graceful congregation.