But as though a video or a movie just began to unfold before my eyes I saw myself walking into an old room, a dark, sort of dark room with… you know, not a very finished room. Almost like a cave looking building.
And I saw a potter sitting on a little place, a little stool, with a potter’s wheel in front of him. And there was a little oil lamp beside him. And I remembered, as I was seeing this again, I remembered that somehow in the Spirit in the night, I had visited with this potter. And I found that so strange.
And the Lord kept speaking a Word to me, a phrase to me, as I watched the scene. I saw the potter as he was making out this clay. I saw him as he would reach into a bowl of water and he would keep wetting the clay. Because, you know the clay has a tendency, as it’s spinning, the force of the spinning and the air that is created has a tendency to dry out the clay. And I could see the water being applied to the clay.
I saw the potter several times starting over, because perhaps too much pressure was applied, or not enough pressure was applied. And the vessel took on a shape or a form that he was not pleased with.
So metaphorically, you know… Because we’ve heard this before. We all are familiar with the vision that God gave Jeremiah. I can read it, and almost see it in my mind. But I appreciate the Lord. Because in this last night He made it so real to me, as though I was Jeremiah, and though He had called me to the potter’s house.
And I saw at least two or three times how the potter would just start over. He would just crush the clay all the way down into a lump, and take it off and round it up again and throw it back on the wheel. All the time his foot was pressing the pedal, so that the wheel would continue to turn.
And I knew that the Lord was speaking to me about several different things, several different aspects. I kept hearing the phrase, “Applied pressure. Applied pressure.” And I could see as the potter would use the insides of his thumbs. It was kind of a strange thing that I could focus in and see how that the potter was using the inside of his thumbs to apply the amount of pressure that was needed to cause the clay to mold up into a vessel that he wanted.
And I believe it has a two-fold meaning.
I believe that God is speaking to us concerning the nation of Israel this morning. I believe that He’s also speaking to us as individual believers, that God, of course, desires to continue to mold us and make us. And then I heard a phrase. I’m getting a little bit ahead of myself. But then I heard the Lord say, “And Jerusalem is My furnace.”