{"id":3500,"date":"2023-07-06T02:52:01","date_gmt":"2023-07-06T07:52:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hebrew4christians.com\/training\/?p=3500"},"modified":"2023-07-06T17:12:04","modified_gmt":"2023-07-06T22:12:04","slug":"on-potters-wheel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hebrew4christians.com\/training\/on-potters-wheel\/","title":{"rendered":"On the Potter’s Wheel…."},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The Lord is likened to a potter and we are as clay in his hand (Isa. 64:8). Life on the “potter’s wheel” can be messy, unsettling, and sometimes excruciatingly hard, but it is God’s sovereign work to form your life according to his design and purposes….<\/p>\n

Contrary to the assumption that the life of faith should always be triumphant, we all inevitably will experience various setbacks, pratfalls, troubles and sorrows in our lives. This does not mean that God does not care for us however, because on the contrary, this is by his design; a plan supervised by God’s love and blessing, and the afflictions we therefore encounter are part of his work for our good (Rom. 8:28; Heb. 12:6). We descend in order to ascend. It make seem counterintuitive, but the heart of faith gives thanks for all things – the good as well as the evil (see Job 2:10). We affirm: “This too is for the good,” yea, even in the midst of our struggle, no, even more — precisely in the midst of our struggle — for this, too, is for our good. Faith is the resolution to trust in the reality of God’s goodness even during hard times when we feel abandoned or lost (Isa. 50:10). The Lord uses the “troubles of love” (\u05d9\u05b4\u05e1\u05bc\u05d5\u05bc\u05e8\u05b5\u05d9 \u05d0\u05b7\u05d4\u05b2\u05d1\u05b8\u05d4) for our good – to wake us up and cling to him all the more, since this is what is most essential, after all…<\/p>\n

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The difficulty of personal suffering is intensely intimate<\/em>: how do you keep hope in the midst of this tension? \u201cLord I believe; help my unbelief\u201d (Mark 9:24). How do you affirm that your heavenly Father will heal you but at the present hour you must endure suffering? Do you devise a \u201csoul-building theodicy\u201d seeking to explain your struggle \u2013 providing an answer about the \u201cwhy\u201d of your suffering \u2013 or do you attempt to sanctify suffering as a means of healing others by the grace of the Messiah (Col. 1:24)? Or do you wither in your despair? As Soren Kierkegaard said, \u201cIt is one thing to conquer in the hardship, to overcome the hardship as one overcomes an enemy, while continuing in the idea that the hardship is one’s enemy; but it is more than conquering to believe that the hardship is one’s friend, that it is not the opposition but the road, is not what obstructs but what develops, is not what disheartens but ennobles” (Four Upbuilding Discourses, 1844).<\/p>\n

When Yeshua victoriously proclaimed, \u201cIt is finished\u201d just before he died on the cross, he foreknew that his followers would experience a \u201cpurging process,\u201d a \u201crefining fire,\u201d and time on the \u201cpotter\u2019s wheel\u201d to perfect their sanctification. At the cross of Yeshua death itself was overcome \u2013 and all that it implies \u2013 and yet it is nevertheless true that we will suffer and die and that death persists an enemy (1 Cor. 15:26). While we celebrate the reality of the final redemption, the \u201cinstrumentality of our sanctification\u201d needs to be willingly accepted and endured. I say \u201cendured\u201d here because I don\u2019t think we will ever have a complete answer to the question of \u201cwhy\u201d we undergo the various tests we face in this life. Our disposition in the midst of this ambiguity, in the midst of seemingly unanswered prayers, is where our faith is disclosed: will we despair of all temporal hope or not?\u00a0 Will we console ourselves with the vision of a future without tears and loss \u2013 a heaven prepared for us? Will we trust God with our pain and submit to his will, or will we \u201ccurse God and die\u201d inside \u2013 losing hope and despairing of all remedy?<\/p>\n

God forbid we should give up now, friends. Faith \u201csees the unseen\u201d and believes that the day of our ultimate healing draws near. You are in good hands as the Lord forms your soul for the glory of his purposes… Stay strong and keep your hope alive (Psalm 27:14).<\/p>\n

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Hebrew Lesson:<\/strong>
\nPsalm 90:17 Reading<\/em><\/p>\n

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