I read recently a fable about a couple who celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary by going to London. They liked antiques and pottery — especially teacups. They saw an antique store and went inside. Spotting a gorgeous teacup, they asked, “May we see that? We have never seen a teacup so beautiful.”
As the shop owner was speaking to them, the teacup suddenly spoke, “I’m glad you like me, but I want you to know that I have not always been a tea cup. There was a time when I was just a lump of red clay. The potter took me and rolled me, pounded me, and patted me over and over until I yelled out, “Don’t do that! I don’t like it! Please leave me alone.” But the potter only smiled, and gently said, ‘Not yet!’”
“Then . . . WHAM! I was placed on a spinning wheel, and suddenly I was spun around and around. ‘Stop it! I’m getting dizzy! I’m going to be sick,’ I screamed. But the potter only nodded and quietly said, ‘Not yet!’ He spun me and poked and prodded and bent me into a new shape, and, if you can believe this, he put me in the oven. I yelled and knocked and pounded at the door. ‘Help me! Get me out of here!’”
“I could see him through the opening and I could read his lips as he shook his head from side to side, ‘Not yet!’ When I thought I couldn’t bear it another minute, the door opened. He carefully took me out and put me on the shelf, and I began to cool. Oh, that felt so good! Ah, this is much better,” I thought.
“But after I had cooled he picked me up and brushed and painted me all over. The fumes were horrible. I thought I would gag. ‘Oh, please; stop it, stop it!’ I cried. He only shook his head and said, ‘Not yet!’ Then suddenly he put me back in the oven. Only this time it was hotter than the first time. In fact, it was twice as hot and I just knew I would suffocate. I begged. I pleaded. I screamed. I cried. I was convinced I would never make it. I was ready to give up. Just then the door opened and he took me out again and placed me on the shelf, where I cooled . . . and waited, ‘What is he going to do with me next?’”
“An hour later he handed me a mirror and said, ‘Look at yourself.’ And I did. I said, ‘That is not me; it couldn’t be me. It is beautiful. I’m beautiful!’ Quietly he spoke: ‘I know it hurt to be rolled and pounded and patted, but had I left you alone, you would have dried up. I know it made you dizzy to spin around on the wheel, but if I had stopped, you would have crumbled. I know it hurt and it was hot and disagreeable in the oven, but if I had not put you there, you would have cracked. I know the fumes were bad when I brushed and painted you all over, but if I had not done that, you never would have been shaped properly. You would not have any color in your life. If I had not put you back in the second oven, you would not have survived for long because the hardness would not have held. Now you are a finished product. Now you are what I had in mind when I first began to shape you.’”
The moral of the story is this: God wants only the very best for us. He is the Potter; we are the clay. He will shape us, and expose us to enough pressures of the right kinds so that we may be made into a flawless vessel to fulfill His good, pleasing and perfect will. Therefore, when life seems hard, and we are being pounded and patted and pushed almost beyond endurance; when our world seems to be spinning out of control; when we feel as though we are in a fiery furnace of trials; when life seems to be more than we can bear, know this: we are in the hands of the divine Potter who loves us and knows what He is doing.
At this point I suggest that you brew yourself a cup of your favorite tea and pour it in your prettiest tea-cup. Then, sit down and think of “The fable of the beautiful tea-cup” — and spend a little time talking to the Potter. “The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer” (I Peter 3:12).
The Paper Pulpit 