The Christian's Workout No.1 God's Sovereignty, Our Responsibility

The following study commences the series entitled The Christian's Workout, but unfortunately due to technical problems, the quality of the recording is very poor. However, rather than erase the entire message, we trust you will be able to follow through Pastor Tony Sargent's meditations on God's sovereignty and our responsibility. We trust that the remaining three studies will be of our usual high quality.

As you may have guessed, we're reading from Jeremiah chapter 18. We shall be reading from verses 1 to 17. Just notice the first few words.

This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord. We should listen then, shouldn't we? This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord. Go down to the potter's house, and there I will give you my message.

So I went down to the potter's house, and I saw him working at the wheel. But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands. So the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.

Then the word of the Lord came to me. O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter does, declares the Lord. Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel.

If at any time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down and destroyed, and if that nation, I warn, repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned. And if at another time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be built up and planted, and if it does evil in my sight and does not obey me, then I will reconsider the good I had intended to do for it. Now therefore say to the people of Judah and those living in Jerusalem, this is what the Lord says.

Look, I am preparing a disaster for you and devising a plan against you. So turn from your evil ways, each one of you, and reform your ways and your actions. But they will reply, it's no use.

We will continue with our own plans, each of us. Each of us will follow the stubbornness of his evil heart. Therefore, this is what the Lord says.

Inquire among the nations. Who has ever heard anything like this? A most horrible thing has been done by virgin Israel. Does the snow of Lebanon ever vanish from its rocky slopes? Do its cool waters from distant sources ever cease to flow? Yet my people have forgotten me.

They burn incense to worthless idols, which make them stumble in their ways and in the ancient paths. They made them walk in by-paths and on roads not built up. Their land will be laid desolate, an object of lasting scorn.

All who pass by will be appalled and will shake their heads. Like a wind from the east, I will scatter them before their enemies. I will show them my back and not my face in the day of their disaster.

And keeping your Bibles open to 19 and verse 19, sorry, verse 10. Then break the jar while those who go with them are watching. And say to them, this is what the Lord Almighty says.

I will smash this nation and this city, just as this potter's jar is smashed and cannot be repaired. Now go to Matthew in chapter 27 and verse 6. Judas has thrown down the money received for the betrayal of the Lord. Matthew 27, verse 6. The chief priests picked up the coins and said, it is against the law to put this into the treasury, since it is blood money.

So they decided to use the money to buy the potter's field as a burial place for foreigners. That is why it has been called the field of blood to this day. Then what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled.

They took the 30 silver coins, the price set on him by the people of Israel, and they used them to buy the potter's field as the Lord commanded me. There are some questions that cannot be answered, and there are some inquiries that are almost impudent. Like the cynical person who, trying to get the better of an open air speaker at Hyde Park, the latter advocating the gospel of Jesus, put up the question, can your God do anything? And the response was yes.

Can he make the biggest stone in the whole world? And the answer was yes. And then the cynical question, can he make a stone bigger than he can lift? And of course, if you answered yes, then you are denying the fact that there is something, or that you are indicating there is something that God cannot do. It's a smart aleck question.

It's an improper question. Because God never goes against himself or against his laws. The questions we need to put when we're thinking in terms of God are sensible and sincere.

One of the hardest things to do, theologically, is to balance the notion of the sovereignty of God. The word sovereign means all-powerful, an ability to act in every situation, to bring everything to a point according to the will of the sovereign. To balance that over against human responsibility.

Does this emphasis which you have frequently from this pulpit indicate therefore that men and women like you and I are reduced to mere puppets on a piece of string? Are we just robots? Does the emphasis upon the sovereignty of God leave Christianity as an advocate of fatalism? Well, that's an issue that we have to look at as we consider this new series of studies. The doctrine of the sovereignty of God. Let me give you a case history.

Here is Joseph. You read of him and the hatred of his brothers in the early chapters of Genesis, at least the middle chapters of Genesis. They put him in a pit and he's sold as a slave.

And as far as they're concerned, that's the last of him. Time goes by and Joseph becomes, through a spectacular series of promotions, the prime minister of all Egypt. And there along his brothers are in front of him and they're clinching and after father Jacob dies they are even more worried because of what they have done, this foul action of theirs.

And Joseph says almost in the last chapter of Genesis, what happened was actually in the purposes of God. You meant it for evil. God meant it for good.

So does that mean the brothers were not to blame? Or does it mean that in the overarching purposes of God, our understanding of his sovereignty, he makes an allowance for our treachery? The times when we raise our fists against him. Here is our beloved Lord. You see him as some of us did in the 945 service, depicted at any rate, nailed to the cross.

Why is he there? Well, listen to the historian Luke as he writes in Acts 2 and Acts 4, he's there because of what evil men have done, Herod, Pontius, Pilate and the priests. But Dr. Luke also makes a remarkable comment that Jesus is predestined to die. It was the express purpose of God.

Does that then mean that there was no guilt that was to be directed towards Pontius Pilate? No guilt towards Herod? No guilt that sat on the shoulders of the high priests Caiaphas and Annas? Not a bit. Men and women are guilty and responsible for their actions if they sin against God. But the sovereignty of God also has within its perspective the way that men and women will or might respond.

So here is Jeremiah and you see he's got a problem. He's one of the most remarkable prophets of the Old Testament. I'm always attracted to Jeremiah, he's an emotional man and at times he couldn't control his tears.

He has some indication from God as to the fact that the Lord is indeed the sovereign ruler of the universe. In the 12th verse of the 17th chapter God says to Jeremiah a glorious throne exalted from the beginning is the place of our sanctuary. From here I reign.

A glorious throne exalted from the beginning. But God, how do you work out that sovereignty that is yours amongst the warp and woof of our activities in Jerusalem? Here we are in Judah. Largely we have dismissed you.

Our people have done those things they ought not to have done and left undone those things they ought to have done. Now God, if you're sovereign how do you work it all out? Are these people free? Are they not to blame? If you control everything and bring everything together according to your purpose God says to Jeremiah as he said to Isaiah the man who saw the holiness of God in the Old Testament more than any other as he says to Zechariah who saw an unfolding of the history of the world the future of the world in his day in a remarkable fashion only equaled by Daniel as later on he says to the apostle Paul as he writes the letter to the Romans go down go down to the potter's house and there you'll get an insight into the way that my sovereignty is to be understood. It's a wonderful parable the parable of the potter wonderful because well it's timeless you see it seems to me it's one of the few habits of mankind that have been consistent all the way down the centuries I mean by that we still have potters today and they're the same as their forebears were three thousand four thousand years ago they use clay the same as their forebears do or did all that time ago the only thing that may have changed is the wheel but the wheel well it's secondary to the potter and to the clay eventually it's put on one side it has an importance but the aspects that will command the attention of Jeremiah as he follows the invitation of the Lord that will command Jeremiah's attention is the potter and the clay and God is teaching Jeremiah something about him the Lord and something about humanity and so he says go down to the potter's house so we're going to go as did Isaiah as did Zechariah as did the apostle Paul go down to the potter's house and see see what well see there the potter himself, what is a potter well he's a craftsman an intelligent capable worker and in this little bit of craftsmanship he is the main mover he is the one who is behind the construction of whatever will be formed on the wheel as for the wheel well it's the tool the potter's tool which will spin round as a result of the dictate of the potter who through a treadle who through pedals at the base will have the wheel rise up or drop down will cause it to spin at certain revolutions or to slow down as for the clay there's no substitute for clay try sand it won't work even plasticine which is perhaps the nearest equivalent to clay doesn't have the same pliability the potter, you look at him the clay you look at it and then consider consider what the parable will teach you about God learn from the potter of God's interest learn of his attention learn of his power amongst the nations for this is directly the teaching that God is going to put before Jeremiah but it works not at a communal basis alone, it also has application at an individual level God has power God has influence on the nations and on ordinary people as for the wheel well, the wheel revolves and it spins and behind the wheel there is once more I repeat the authority of the potter but what does the wheel refer to in the imagery that is now before Jeremiah for he looks not on the scene literally but also he endeavors to glean he's been taught by the Lord that there are some spiritual principles the wheel stands for circumstance it stands for life yesterday last week last month last year listen to Robert Browning who tells us about the wheel he says this dance of plastic circumstance this present thou forsooth would feign arrest machinery just meant to give thy soul its bent try thee and turn thee forth sufficiently impressed your circumstances the dance of plastic circumstance what moulds your character your books well yes but only in a short measure what moulds your character what develops your personality is the passing of the weeks the months and the years and what you learn from that and don't you understand that that is the wheel the wheel spinning around the plastic circumstance of life and it's not divorced from the control of the potter as to the clay well the clay is the very stuff the potter wants you see there's nothing else that he can take as an option you can't think of a potter without the clay now it's not Isaiah who breaks first of all open on the page of scripture the imagery of the potter you go back to the earliest times here is the creator God you find him depicted in Genesis chapter 2 and what is the imagery? it is that of the potter who takes a handful of azama which is a Hebrew for clay or for soil and he molds it and out of the dust azama he creates azam Adam you see how basic to the symbolism of scripture is this concept of the potter and the clay it says Campbell Morgan let us think well of ourselves when we are in God's presence we are the clay the very stuff he wants you can't substitute the value of clay as far as a potter is concerned you cannot substitute the value of a human life as far as God is concerned it's the stuff that he wants it's the stuff with which he deals therefore here I put it to you brothers and sisters in this parable there is in this imagery, in this narrative from the life of Jeremiah there is first of all a principle and then I have to point out that the principle is contained within a parable and the parable leads you to a person the principle is the sovereignty of God and that can be quite terrifying taken on its own you see as far as literally speaking the clay is concerned it has no power oh yes there is there is something latent within it but there is no way that the clay can develop its own potentiality it is left to the potter the clay can do nothing it stays like plastic on the wheel unless the potter starts to make a move and the wheel has no control over against the potter it is dependent on the craftsman so that's the principle the sovereignty of God but it is set in the context of a parable you see I am not clay not literal clay clay has no will of its own I do clay has no decision making potential I have and you cannot push this parable too far you have to recognize that there is a spiritual dimension involved in it the clay does not know what the wheel and the hands of the potter will achieve only the potter has in mind what can be fashioned here is Simon Peter as he walks down the seashore of Galilee here is the Lord Jesus the potter and he sees this human clay and not just what he is at this moment commands the attention of Jesus but what he can be when placed within the potter's hands God has given certain characteristics to aspects of his creation he gives the seed the potentiality to germinate he gives the fruit bush the possibility of blossoming and fruiting and he gives to the farmer he gives to man the potentiality to express his own will to make his own decisions and the potter who is sovereign in the working of his hands on the life of the individual also recognizes the right of the person to make certain choices which run alongside the will of the potter or unfortunately crazily are against what the potter wants the distance between the potter and the clay is minimal the distance arguably between God and man is infinite but that is wrong according to Christian teaching, God is near nearer to you and me than the potter is to the clay and recognizing our ability to choose and make decisions the divine potter will apply his ministries in our lives and secure his objective you see, the potter who is very much central to this particular narrative knows what he's about and he is doing something he's not playing for time he's not fooling around says Jeremiah, I went down to the potter's house, I saw him working at the wheel but the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hand so the potter formed it into another pot shaping it as seemed best to him there are parts which on the wheel of life have become broken and fractured when still in the hands of the potter they can be squeezed and the whole thing refashioned he can start again and the possibility of what the clay can become is seen by the earthenware polished vases that are on the shelves that Jeremiah must have espied as he watches the craftsman at work there is the possibility of a pot that is made to the honor of the craftsman's trade there is the possibility of a fractured pot which when hardened loses any ability at all to be remade so Jeremiah later on takes one of these pots and he dashes it publicly in front of the citizens of Jerusalem and indicates that they have so resisted, gone against the deft skillful fingers of the potter who wants to equip these people to be his own people they have decided to go their own way and as a result the potter's vase is smashed and their nation collectively and themselves as individuals are in ruins but you know to fully understand this particular passage you have to pick out again and re-emphasize what I've said and then take it to the ministry of our Lord Jesus you have to recognize what the Old Testament is teaching in the whole gamut of its narrative passage and didactic, that is doctrinal passages and that is, we are responsible for our actions despite the overarching sovereignty of the Lord he never reduced Israel to being a nation of robots there was the potentiality God had his hand upon that nation when it was walking in obedience and God's hand was still there even when it was disobedient but there is no way that when Israel fell into the latter category that God excused them and said it doesn't matter it's according to my foresight God counted them responsible when they resisted his will our actions, don't you see my friend in the present century and in the present context are real and they do change the course of events you can be obedient too you can comply with the will of the potter or you can go against the grain, you can go against the tread, you can go against all that the potter wants to do in your life and because he's sovereign and has all knowledge he has an appreciation of what your response will be he will not condone it he will condemn it and you are answerable to him for the wrong that you have done your actions are real and change the course of events what is more on a more positive note your prayers are real your prayers are valid you're concerned to be the sort of person that God wants you to be that you are not to take for granted that's the reason why we underline the ministry and the necessity of prayer within the sovereignty of the potter he has given the clay the potentiality for intercession and the clay refuses I speak as a fool but you understand what I'm saying, for the clay here is referring to Adam to the sons of Adam, to you and me the clay has the potential has the gifting of being able to intercede and with the potter change the course of events therefore Christian people are always to be people of action, never men and women who sit down on the chair and say well if God is sovereign, let him do what he wants to do if God will reach the Chinese, then let him reach the Chinese, if God will reach the Muslim, let him reach the Muslim no, it's the clay and the potter working in tandem the potentiality of the clay of the human clay is such that it can work alongside the express wishes of the potter or it can go against his wishes but the potter will always triumph in terms of knowing what the end will be as far as the vessel is concerned you see my friends you have an advantage over Jeremiah and over Isaiah and over Zechariah these three Old Testament characters who use the imagery of the potter to understand something are the purposes of God why do I say you have an advantage, well because you've seen the Lord Jesus that is you've seen him on the page of scripture, you know of him here he comes down life and the highway of life and he calls to you, you see him as he called to people in the days of his earthly ministry and you've watched how he fashioned people and how he brought them into a new way of life, how he built beauty, how he polished them that did not apply to everyone did it there were those who were resistant look at Pontius Pilate, look at Herod they resisted, look at the Pharisees look at the Sadducees, large numbers of people, they resisted, there were those however who did not resist and I say that the Lord was sovereign, both amongst those who resisted and those who were compliant look don't you see that when Jeremiah literally was watching his potter he would eventually have left the potter's house and he'd have gone into the field at the back of the potter's house and there would be all the broken bits past failed attempts at making something good out of this hardened clay now isn't it interesting that when our Lord died the money that was paid to Judas was eventually used to buy what? the field of the divine potter where were all the broken bits and don't you see you and I part of the broken bits hardened resistant but then the divine potter comes along and now the metaphor has to be blown apart because it won't fit the divine potter can take the broken bits, the marred bits the hardened bits and by his spirit he can grant a moisture making resistant humanity compliant and malleable so he takes Peter and he takes Saul and he takes you and he puts you on the wheel and you can, as they did with him work alongside the purposes of God want for yourself what he wants for you and ultimately he makes a finished product he knows what he's about he expresses his sovereignty but he also respects within limits your freedoms to comply or to resist let's pray father we place ourselves again in your hands at your disposal we don't understand all that there is about your sovereignty or all that there is about our freedom but we recognize our dependence upon you and we want in our lives what you want for us so take us and break us and melt us and mould us here I am wholly available as for me I will suffer lord the fields are white and harvest but oh the labourers are so few so lord can I give myself everything to gather precious souls unto you here I am wholly available as for me I will suffer lord the time is right in the nation for works of power and authority gods looking for a people who are willing to be counted in his glorious victory here I am wholly available as for me I will suffer lord as souls are we ready to savour in darkness are we ready to be light gods seeking out a very special people to manifest his truth and his might here I am wholly available as for me I will suffer lord here I am wholly available as for me I will suffer lord you you you you you you