[SPEAKER_00]: Let's all now turn.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's turn to the book of Genesis.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to be doing some Genesis this month.
[SPEAKER_00]: I do that a lot of times September not every year.
[SPEAKER_00]: I used to do that every year with the children.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I always thought it was a good thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: You have to understand they would go to school.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they started in the beginning in school.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I thought it was a good thing to go to the beginning and create you know.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I would do that a lot for them.
[SPEAKER_00]: But either way this year doing a few things like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Genesis chapter 2 verse 7, this is chapter 2 verse 7, if you please stand to honor the reading of God's word, it's only for a moment this week.
[SPEAKER_00]: Genesis chapter 2 verse 7, it says, then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed.
[SPEAKER_00]: into his nostrils and breathe the breath of life.
[SPEAKER_00]: And man became a living being.
[SPEAKER_00]: God bless and honor the reading of his word.
[SPEAKER_00]: You may be seated.
[SPEAKER_00]: God foreman from the dust from clay, if you will.
[SPEAKER_00]: you know, I don't know where y'all live.
[SPEAKER_00]: We live in Claycomo.
[SPEAKER_00]: This church does, but we live in Clay County.
[SPEAKER_00]: Most of us do, not all of us, but many of us do this where this church is at, it's in Claycomo.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's Clay County.
[SPEAKER_00]: We'll talk about that here in a moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: But when I was a child, I go out to play in the, in the backyard.
[SPEAKER_00]: usually with Star Wars action figures and G-I-D-O-X treated team and other things.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I say, you used to, that's true, I still own a whole bunch of stuff.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I don't plan to backguard with them.
[SPEAKER_00]: I plan to base them with them.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, but anyway, but I plan to backguard, there was a hill back there, I love to play in the most, where we had the apple tree.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, what I learned about it was my brother Matthew and I especially gave it to some times but mostly Matthew and I we would dig in this one part and we would make all sorts of Fort Wales at any end, don't.
[SPEAKER_00]: We would learn to make these little scenes because you know, the thing about the old commercials says they make all these scenes.
[SPEAKER_00]: and you know it took them hours upon hours to do for two seconds of playing, but either way we would try to do our best to make that didn't ever work.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I remember there was a lot of clay in that hill.
[SPEAKER_00]: The whole lot clay, I didn't know what to, I thought I was mud.
[SPEAKER_00]: And mom and dad, I remember that said, you got clay all over you.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that what that is.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I learned there's clay in Montespecialy, because you have to do the cleaning, you know.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we would come in with clay getting on the carpet, ugly carpet, but I'm gonna tell you, you still don't want to get clay on it, because it would even be ugly, I don't know how it would, but either way we had clay and I have to learn those different types of clay, because you go to school and you play with clay, you know, so we are in Clay County.
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, we are the last building, this side at least, the last building, Clay Koma, in case you didn't know, like technically this church is in Clay Koma.
[SPEAKER_00]: Technically, you can say can't see it's fine, but because Clay Koma is in Kansas City, but we are technically in Clay Koma.
[SPEAKER_00]: As a kid, when I mean art class, I love to end also at home, but I love to play with play.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love to play with Clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Love it.
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, I still have some old toys from back then.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you look really close to some of the indentations, you can see some green clay and get all clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I don't always push them in there and I think with my play though, but it wasn't.
[SPEAKER_00]: Play was different than play though.
[SPEAKER_00]: My father made a decoration one time out of clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's several times.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it was interesting because he would use the wrong kind of clay on some of them.
[SPEAKER_00]: He would use molding clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was the kind of, well, we'll get into different types of clay here in a moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: With this kind of clay, it wouldn't harden.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he would paint on top of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I remember once I'm looking at one.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he did a good job.
[SPEAKER_00]: It ripped a job.
[SPEAKER_00]: I remember I never understood why it wouldn't harden.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's because of the wrong kind of clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: A lot of Christians,
[SPEAKER_00]: are wanting to be voted by God, but they're the wrong kind of clay for God to use.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, we'll get into that.
[SPEAKER_00]: There are different types of clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's molding clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's known as craft clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Air dry clay is part of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: You drive the air and that's kind of self-explanatory.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's
[SPEAKER_00]: polymer clay you bake that you bake polymer clay and then there's oil-based clay that's kind of a father had used which most of the times what we when I like what I'll get to that Man there's a this oil-based clay is a plasticine how to feel like plastic a little bit plasticine non-hardening reusable clay this is what I always like to call kids play clay because that's why I enjoyed playing man
[SPEAKER_00]: That's one of the still all those old toys and things I had at the top.
[SPEAKER_00]: The kids play clay because you know, you make into ball or whatnot and never harden.
[SPEAKER_00]: But boy, they make a mess and boy, trying to get to put mama's, try to get that out of the carpet.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not easy.
[SPEAKER_00]: And let me tell you something, what could get out of the carpet, they try to pick out on me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they did a couple of times.
[SPEAKER_00]: But let me just tell you, that's one type of clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: But there's other types of clay too.
[SPEAKER_00]: Some are interchangeable.
[SPEAKER_00]: In other words, they call that industrial clay, stuff that they build with.
[SPEAKER_00]: They also have ball clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the kind of you'd make balls from it and stuff that comes out of that easily and they can form things from it.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's fire clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: This goes back to Pookie.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's, uh,
[SPEAKER_00]: K-Line, I'm happy to say this right.
[SPEAKER_00]: K-Line, Clay, this is white, Clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pure, poctre Clay, that's what it is.
[SPEAKER_00]: The reason why I say pure is because it's not very, I used to work with this into school, or with several types of clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: And let me tell you the problem with that, though, is it's very wet, it's very, very wet clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: You have to dry it out pretty good.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then there's three types of ceramic clay, and we'll talk about the three types of ceramic clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: You have earth in where clay, that's one type of ceramic clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: You have stoneware, stoneware clay, and you have porcelain.
[SPEAKER_00]: These are the type of pottery based, and you have to interface on the firing.
[SPEAKER_00]: In other words, the firing temperature is that you put them in.
[SPEAKER_00]: It depends on what kind they are, they have to be fired longer.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I'm sure there are some people here who may know more about art than me and they said, oh, I used to use this in this in that's great.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was never graded it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's why I'm wearing a tie of the thinking man, because I'm sure you see and they have him everywhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes they may not stone other times.
[SPEAKER_00]: They may not have different types of pottery.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I like that, of course, and other things they use to make statues.
[SPEAKER_00]: But today we're going to talk about different types of clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the title of today's sermon is Clay County.
[SPEAKER_00]: because we're going to live in a county today of different types of clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: The first thing we're going to look at is clay face.
[SPEAKER_00]: A clay face.
[SPEAKER_00]: There is a character I like from Batman actually.
[SPEAKER_00]: His name is Clayface, he's a villain.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they're actually making a show of him.
[SPEAKER_00]: I imagine it's going to be hard to watch, but either way, Clayface.
[SPEAKER_00]: In this case, we're going to talk about moldable, changeable.
[SPEAKER_00]: uh... more uh... play uh... in other words for the face only by that i mean people sometimes do buy play to put in the face as far as make up those i've seen it happen they make and i saw a whole bunch of this week i've looked up i decided career benefit not to mention every type they have because they had
[SPEAKER_00]: I kid you not about 25 different types of play just to put on your face, it's like I'm not doing that.
[SPEAKER_00]: They had green and blue and each one had its own name and reasoning for it that people put on their face.
[SPEAKER_00]: They think there's a lot of good in that.
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, even when we went to Israel, there were people who put clay on their face and some people who put different types of salt on them and some people put different types of muddy water and stuff.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, people do everything to help themselves out, you never know who a clay they do
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, more time I play face in this case, we're going to talk about how they like to put on a false mask, a false face, some people like to do that.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was actually a character once called false face.
[SPEAKER_00]: But people do that sometimes.
[SPEAKER_00]: They put up on a clay face, a false face.
[SPEAKER_00]: They feel that as long as it changed the outlook of who they are, it doesn't matter who they are inside.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, folks, we can't do that.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Bible says that we don't need to just be different on the inside, but different on the what?
[SPEAKER_00]: The inside.
[SPEAKER_00]: God wants to be changed all the way.
[SPEAKER_00]: We'll talk about that.
[SPEAKER_00]: So Luke 122, Luke 122, for there is nothing covered that will not be revealed.
[SPEAKER_00]: or hidden that will not be known.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you may think that you have everybody fooled.
[SPEAKER_00]: I knew someone one time who would get on Facebook and other places.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they would try to make themselves look like the sweetest, most loving person of all time.
[SPEAKER_00]: But behind the scene, they were mean and cruel.
[SPEAKER_00]: There are Hollywood people who act nice on television, but boy, behind the scene that they get known to be a monster.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a nice way to say it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And here's the truth about that.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's starting to get known.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's starting to come out about certain ones.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, so I'm not going in a name.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no need for that.
[SPEAKER_00]: We don't need to know it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you can't hide who you really are behind the front, behind the mask.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can't hide that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Matthew 715.
[SPEAKER_00]: Matthew 715, beware of false prophets who come to you and see clothing.
[SPEAKER_00]: But inwardly, they are ravenous, I've known many ministers, Christians and other people who come up trying to pretend to be kind and not political people to try to pretend to be the nicest person in the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: But behind them, they pretend to be godly.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well,
[SPEAKER_00]: only guy knows the heart, but you can quote the Bible all day long and get it wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: Get the meaning wrong, man, I did, I hate to say, but when I first started teaching, I would get the point and correct sometimes.
[SPEAKER_00]: You ever had a pencil that you tried to sharpen, I think it depends on the kind of wood that's made out of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you tried to sharpen it and the
[SPEAKER_00]: The lead just keeps cuff all on out and you can't get sharpened no matter what, you probably have memories right now being in school.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just when you start at step snaps, it's just as easy to go back to it again, folks, some people are like that with a word of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: They keep on keeping on trying to sharpen it to what they want them to be, but they keep missing the point no matter what they try, they knock that point right off and they can't get to it, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: They can't use it, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's on them.
[SPEAKER_00]: because they're not praying for the Holy Spirit to point it out for them.
[SPEAKER_00]: It happens a lot.
[SPEAKER_00]: Second Corinthians chapter five.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 17.
[SPEAKER_00]: Second Corinthians chapter five verse 17 says, therefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Some say creature in a new creation.
[SPEAKER_00]: All things have passed away and look, all things have become new.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not just a face, it's everything, it's inside and out.
[SPEAKER_00]: We use that a lot because it's true.
[SPEAKER_00]: The next thing to look at is clay feet, clay feet.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mentioned to you that people will oftentimes go and have their face messed around with with clay and people knew it with feet too.
[SPEAKER_00]: They go and they have their feet played around with a little bit.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not talking about for tickling reasons, but to make it comfortable, I got bad feet.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm all sound for low shins, a plenty.
[SPEAKER_00]: things to help especially is the season change I've noticed you know but there's clay you can buy and I was looking up the term clay and boy right away I had facial things sent to me and mistake mistake because I was really looking up things for the sermon.
[SPEAKER_00]: Suddenly I had people saying, you want to buy clay, you want to buy clay, and I had all these things from my feet, my face, and everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for our industry, the house, and they're wanting to know for our land, baby clay, and no, we're even play county.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think we need more clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: But they wanted all these things for clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: But clay feet has a different meaning than the clay face.
[SPEAKER_00]: Clay feet.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's take a look at Daniel chapter two.
[SPEAKER_00]: excuse me Daniel chapter 2 Daniel chapter 2 verse 31 your 45 now I could go through an awful lot but I'm going to try not to Daniel chapter 2 verse 35 excuse me 31 you have to understand the king had it had a dream.
[SPEAKER_00]: King Nebuchadnezzard had a dream and he was dreaming about the great big statue and mostly about himself but he was going because right after this he built
[SPEAKER_00]: but he asks someone to tell him about the dream and he did.
[SPEAKER_00]: And whenever the dream came forward, when the dream came forward, this is what Daniel said is one of the things he said to him.
[SPEAKER_00]: He said in verse 31 of Daniel chapter two, he said, you okay, we're watching.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there was a great image.
[SPEAKER_00]: This image whose brightness was excellent.
[SPEAKER_00]: Still before you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And his form was awesome.
[SPEAKER_00]: This image is head was a fine though.
[SPEAKER_00]: its breasts and its arms of silver its belly and its thighs of bronze its legs of iron and its feet partially are excuse me partly of iron and partly of clay you watched until the stone was cut out
[SPEAKER_00]: without hands which struck the image upon its feet in other words, a great big stone, a great big rock come flying down.
[SPEAKER_00]: Nobody cut it, just come flying down.
[SPEAKER_00]: Anyway, which were a wire clay broken in it, I'll say to get, you watch and tell the stone was cut without hands which struck the image upon its feet, which were of iron and clay and broke them into pieces.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then the iron, the clay, the bronze and the silver and the gold were broken into pieces together, they became like the chaff of the summer, freshing floors, and the wind carried them away so that no trace of them was found, but the stone that struck the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.
[SPEAKER_00]: This was the dream.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now we will tell the interpretation for the king.
[SPEAKER_00]: You, okay, are the king of kings?
[SPEAKER_00]: Being of that time does mean Jesus, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: You, okay, are the king kings for the God of heaven has given you a kingdom power and strength and glory.
[SPEAKER_00]: Wherever the sons of men dwell or the animals of the field or the fouls of the heavens, he has given them into your hand and has made you ruler over them all.
[SPEAKER_00]: You are the head of gold.
[SPEAKER_00]: After you, another kingdom inferior to you, shall arise, and a third kingdom of bronze with shall rule over all the earth.
[SPEAKER_00]: and the fourth kingdom which shall be strong as iron, for iron breaks in pieces and shatters everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: And like iron that crushes it shall, shall crush and shatter all these.
[SPEAKER_00]: As you saw, the feet and toes partially a potter's clay and partially of iron, the kingdom shall be divided.
[SPEAKER_00]: But there shall be in it some of the strength of the iron, as much as you saw the iron mix with Mary Clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: As the toes of the feet were partitive iron and partitive clay, so the kingdom shall be partially strong and partly broken.
[SPEAKER_00]: There is you saw iron mix with
[SPEAKER_00]: even as iron does not mix with clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: In the days of these kings of God of heaven shall set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed, and the kingdom shall not be left into another people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever in as much as you saw the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and it broke.
[SPEAKER_00]: in pieces, the iron, the bronze, the clay, and the silver in the gold, the great God has made known to the king, what shall come to pass here after and the dream of certain and the interpretation is sure.
[SPEAKER_00]: No matter what kingdom people have made, the kingdom of God will be carried down.
[SPEAKER_00]: The kingdom of God will stand forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the word clay feet,
[SPEAKER_00]: It's strong and worldly deceit and lies, but weak and biblical truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are not to have clay feet or to have strong feet of the Word and of not of the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: The world, a lot of times, thanks to the straw, but they're not.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just this week, we saw people who thought they were strong.
[SPEAKER_00]: They thought they destroyed someone of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: But there we, God is much stronger than what man can do.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so the last part, before we get to the main part, the last part is, I believe we're not Harry Pottery, Harry Pottery.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now by Harry, I'm talking about here, H-8-I-R, Harry Pottery.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now what do I mean by that?
[SPEAKER_00]: people who are trying to reform and reshape pottery ends up being a hairy situation.
[SPEAKER_00]: They tried to make pottery on their own behalf, getting away from the potter himself.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is people who try to turn things upside down and make it to be their own.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've seen many Christians do the same thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: They try to take the Word of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: the meaning of God, the things of God, and make it their own.
[SPEAKER_00]: But if you try to take a master-plucker potter and then you try to make it your own, me at times you're going to destroy it.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I was a kid and we made pottery a lot of times at school, there would be a mold, there would be a mold.
[SPEAKER_00]: You would pour the clay in there, you know, if you kind of watery and all but you pour it in there,
[SPEAKER_00]: But in the mode would dry and you pour it, take it out.
[SPEAKER_00]: But if you decided halfway through to undo the mode, you would pour out everywhere, wouldn't it?
[SPEAKER_00]: And then you try to remote it into your own shape.
[SPEAKER_00]: You have everything messed up, and it would not be good, especially if you'd make it in base.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, you would mess up, apparently, it would not be a good sense of posture, and tell, that's what a lot of people try to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: They try to make it their own and do what they want to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not what God would happen to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's look at Isaiah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Isaiah chapter 29, we got a couple of Isaiah chapter 29 verse 16.
[SPEAKER_00]: Isaiah 29, 16 says, surely you turn things upside down.
[SPEAKER_00]: Child up pocket be a steam as the potter's clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Child what is made say to its maker?
[SPEAKER_00]: He did not make me, or shall the thing form, say to him, who formed it, he has no understanding.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't we live in a world like that right now, who people are trying to say that there is no potter.
[SPEAKER_00]: There is no potter, or the potter he looks up to at the potters and to say, hey, you made me wrong, or who are you to tell me that I'm not a man, or who are you to tell me that I'm not a woman stuck in this wrong body.
[SPEAKER_00]: aren't we trying to tell the potter that, hey, I really like women or no, I like men or no, I know what's right and you don't know a thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: The potter knows what his hands made.
[SPEAKER_00]: Who are we to tell the potter's hands that he's wrong?
[SPEAKER_00]: A people do it all the time.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if someone tries to help the potter by showing the pottery where they made a mistake or where there might be a crack in the pottery, they might get angry and try to destroy the one he's trying to help them.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll be honest with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's times that I've been afraid to say the truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not because I'm afraid to speak the truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm afraid of what the person who hears him might do.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the truth will went out.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I fear what the potter would do to me if I stay quiet.
[SPEAKER_00]: More than what a crack potter he will do to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_00]: Isaiah 45.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whoa, to the one who quarrels with his maker, a piece of pottery among the other earthenware pottery pieces.
[SPEAKER_00]: Will the clay say to the potter, what are you doing?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or the thing, you are making say, he has no hands.
[SPEAKER_00]: Folks, though, we live in a world like that, trying to tell the God that he's not real, he don't have hands, he can't do his thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: We live in this world, but you're also pottery.
[SPEAKER_00]: Instead of arguing, this let the potter refine you and let the truth of the potter be seen through you the pottery.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the best we can do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Says in Romans chapter nine, verse 2221, rather,
[SPEAKER_00]: Romans 9, 20, 21.
[SPEAKER_00]: Rather, oh, man, who are you to enter back to God?
[SPEAKER_00]: Shall the thing form, say to him, who formed it?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why have you made me like this?
[SPEAKER_00]: Does the potter not have power over the clay to make from the same lump, one vessel, for honor and another for dishonor?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, God is the potter.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are to be his clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Where to be his client?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where to let God mold us and make us?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where to let him mold us and make us?
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, as I said before, I'm wearing the thanking man here on my tie.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's a nice piece of work.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just got done, I didn't watch all of it, but I watched most of maybe you all say younger because I'm being nice too.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe you younger folks, remember, Dobe Gillis, Dobe Gillis, it's not a new show.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's been around since the 1950s, but the many loves of Dobe Gillis and every single episode started off with him going to the thinking man in their park.
[SPEAKER_00]: and he was set there in just like the thinking man, and he was trying to think most of the thinking about girls, to be honest with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: But he was thinking about why can't he find one?
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, the truth is, many times we think that we're smarter than the hands it made us.
[SPEAKER_00]: But even though the thinking man is a wonderful piece of art, he's not really a thinking man.
[SPEAKER_00]: it's just pottery, it's just art, it's just stone, it's just a looks like a man thinking really, it's just art sitting there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Someone made it look like it's thinking.
[SPEAKER_00]: The point is that a lot of times we think that we cannot thank God, but we can't.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're just art, we're pottery, we're not to sit there and try to outthink the hands it made us.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're to think like the one who made us.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we're to be his claim.
[SPEAKER_00]: One of the greatest verses of the whole Bible, and I'll repeat it tonight at Promise, or today.
[SPEAKER_00]: Isaiah 64 verse 8, I believe you should write that on your heart.
[SPEAKER_00]: write that in your mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: Write that for you to say every single day.
[SPEAKER_00]: Isaiah 64 verse 8.
[SPEAKER_00]: For it says this, but now O Lord, you are our Father, we are the clay, and you are our potter, and we are the work of your hand.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're to let God be the one to design us, to mold us, to make us into what we should be.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now we should always want to be what God wants us to be, the problem is, as a thinking man.
[SPEAKER_00]: We sometimes think ourselves into trouble, don't we?
[SPEAKER_00]: We think ourselves into situation when we're watching the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: We outthink.
[SPEAKER_00]: what we need.
[SPEAKER_00]: We outthink or so.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just earlier, I was so proud of some of the people here in the church who were here in this fake area in Senate's woman to say, they were talking about how God provided, he provided money for them, money they didn't know they had and other things.
[SPEAKER_00]: God can give us more than we could possibly need at times.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes he allows us to go through difficulty so that when the answer comes, we can be thankful for God's given us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's do what it says in Ephesians chapter 2 verse 10, Ephesians 2 10, for we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we should walk in them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus made you, we don't think that way all of them, but what does it say in John
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus made you two, Jesus in you and He's helping to make you even now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Psalm 100, verse 3, Psalm 100, verse 3.
[SPEAKER_00]: Know that the Lord, He is God.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is He who made us and not we ourselves, we are His people and the sheep of His pasture.
[SPEAKER_00]: We need to remember that you're not charged.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you and our entourage,
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I've been near sheep.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you've been in a sheep's field, who watch where you go, it's a mess.
[SPEAKER_00]: A point is, if it weren't for the shepherd who are leading the sheep, it'd be a bigger mess.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now I'm now going to turn to Jeremiah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jeremiah 18.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jeremiah 18 was two through sales.
[SPEAKER_00]: It says, a rise and go down to the Potter's house.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there I will cause you to hear my words.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then I went down to the Potter's house and there he was making something on the wheel yet the vessel that he made out of clay was spoiled in the hand of the Potter.
[SPEAKER_00]: So he made it again into another vessel.
[SPEAKER_00]: seemed good to the Potter to make it.
[SPEAKER_00]: When the word of the Lord came to me saying, oh, how severe can I not do with you as this Potter?
[SPEAKER_00]: You see, God is going to make us into things of His hand.
[SPEAKER_00]: It says, uh,
[SPEAKER_00]: I just want you to know that God wants to make us into something better than we can make for ourselves.
[SPEAKER_00]: He can make something better than what we can make for ourselves.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm now going to retake you 2 Corinthians, chapter 4.
[SPEAKER_00]: 2 Corinthians, chapter 4, 4 through 10.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it says, 2 Corinthians, chapter 4, 4 through 10.
[SPEAKER_00]: The God of this world has blinded the minds of those who do not believe.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm talking about the loss and talking about Satan who's blinded all the, think about those people this week who saw a Christian man, a good Christian man murdered.
[SPEAKER_00]: And what do they do?
[SPEAKER_00]: They got online.
[SPEAKER_00]: They got on television.
[SPEAKER_00]: They shot their mouth off.
[SPEAKER_00]: They didn't think thanks through.
[SPEAKER_00]: They were thinking with the hateful heart.
[SPEAKER_00]: They weren't thinking with the heart of purity at all.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so this is again, the God of this world has blinded the minds of those who do not believe less the light of the glorious gospel who is the image of God should shine on them.
[SPEAKER_00]: It says in verse 5, for we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus the Lord and ourselves, your servants for Christ for Jesus' sake, for God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shown in our hearts
[SPEAKER_00]: to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we have this treasure in earth and vessels.
[SPEAKER_00]: The excellency of the power being from God and not of ourselves.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, that's about that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not of ourselves.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are troubled on every side yet not distressed.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are perplexed, but not in despair, persecuted, but not forsaken, cast down, but not destroyed, and always carrying around in the body, the death of the Lord Jesus, that also, the life of Jesus might be expressed in our bodies.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I'm sure there was at least a dare to it, maybe even more.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe you're still now that you've been depressed this week.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was when I saw my brother in Christ be shot and murdered.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was depressed.
[SPEAKER_00]: I went into a depression for a few days.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was very sad to see that to see what someone do to someone like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I'm talking about Charlie Kirk.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, that happens often, not just him, but with others.
[SPEAKER_00]: When people go into that church and kill those little children.
[SPEAKER_00]: a couple weeks back.
[SPEAKER_00]: When people were destroyed, it has nothing to do with the children.
[SPEAKER_00]: It really has nothing to do with Charlie Kirk.
[SPEAKER_00]: It has nothing to do with them.
[SPEAKER_00]: It has to do with Jesus Christ who lives in those vessels.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they're saying with you, if someone came here right now and tried to do the same with me, I know it would destroy the session.
[SPEAKER_00]: it would destroy the service, it would destroy your heart for a while, but know this.
[SPEAKER_00]: That Jesus Christ lives in this beautiful vest, or not because I'm beautiful, but because Jesus Christ takes the clay that I made out of and reformes me every day.
[SPEAKER_00]: He shuts my mouth when it needs to be shut.
[SPEAKER_00]: He reformes my body every day, both inward and outward, and he'll do the same for you, because greatest he who's in you than he is of the world, and you'll continue to form you if you let him.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I say, Mona's Lord, make us Lord, your will, Lord, let me go through the fire and be toughened.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's why the difficulties we go through through life make us better than the easy times.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, the pottery we were talking about, they have to go through fire.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, as the pottery could talk, you know what would say, ow, it would say, ow, because the pottery has to be tough and through fire, it has to go through all that.
[SPEAKER_00]: But guess what, good news.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's through the toughening, I guess you could say, it's through the difficulty, it's through the fire that the pottery is to be used.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't bring it out of us going to bring the little lamps that I had, the little light lamps that we got from Israel, those were made through pottery.
[SPEAKER_00]: those remain.
[SPEAKER_00]: If they had not gone through the fire, guess what?
[SPEAKER_00]: They would be useful.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you didn't go through the difficulties, you wouldn't be of any use.
[SPEAKER_00]: You'd be Clay that would go bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: You'd be Clay that's sitting there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I told you earlier that white clay, man, I made a huge mistake and I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I won't admit it anyway.
[SPEAKER_00]: One time this kid threw Clay and hit me right in the head.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was hard Clay to hit me right in the head
[SPEAKER_00]: I got in the flesh, there's not a good thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not anything I proud of.
[SPEAKER_00]: I got in the flesh, I put my hand into the little barrel that had water and clay in the white clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: In there, I picked it up.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I didn't understand, I was 16 years old.
[SPEAKER_00]: I picked it up and I threw it back at him.
[SPEAKER_00]: But here's the thing, did he hit him?
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, I got him good.
[SPEAKER_00]: But here's the problem with that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's the problem with that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not only did I get him good.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was still wet and that wet clay,
[SPEAKER_00]: Spread out across the room, and I hit about five other people too.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe more, maybe less, I don't know.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I destroyed something there are.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I didn't use clay correctly, and I'm telling you folks, you are clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you allow your flesh to use the clay incorrectly, you won't be used to God.
[SPEAKER_00]: All you do is make a mess, and I did.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I had to do a lot of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Stay in after school to make it up too.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you see, I'm not bragging, I'm not bragging at all.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am going to quote something real quick before I quote it, let's get to what we end here, listen what we need to be like when we are molded from God, we need to be toughen.
[SPEAKER_00]: Someone said, maybe a year ago, said, I'm far more interested in what God wants from me than what I want from God, I'll say it again.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm far more interested in what God wants from me than what I want from God, Charlie Kirk said that.
[SPEAKER_00]: One person said online that God lost and Charlie lost by what happened.
[SPEAKER_00]: I said, you're completely wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: God won and Charlie won because he's home now receiving his rewards.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just because we can't see it, does it mean that we can't believe it?
[SPEAKER_00]: God formed him and continued to.
[SPEAKER_00]: By the way, this is not a blood spray to try to hurt moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want you to stand there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm praising the Lord God who used him.
[SPEAKER_00]: He was ready to be molded and made and we need to do the same.
[SPEAKER_00]: Be like, be like, chartered, no, be like God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Be like Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: More of Jesus, less of me.
[SPEAKER_00]: First Corinthians two five.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I will quote Isaiah 64 verse eight again, except I'm going to just quote part of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want you to stand up taking it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not out of context, but just putting the boards I want to remember.
[SPEAKER_00]: Lord, you are the potter.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are the clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we are the work of your hand.
[SPEAKER_00]: You are the potter.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am the clay.
[SPEAKER_00]: We need to be molded to make mold me and make me.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is what I
[SPEAKER_00]: That's part of a song that I used to sing every day.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I've worked, where I read it go, does a potter wear the clay?
[SPEAKER_00]: We need to be molded and made.
[SPEAKER_00]: So when God shows you the lumps that are in you, sin, faults, things need to work on it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And says, yeah, yeah, but God loves me anyway.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, no, no, no.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let that potter flatten out, unlump you, so to speak, unlump you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Leave it to Beaver, use to have this character named Wompie.
[SPEAKER_00]: As a Christian, I don't want, I may look like Wompie, but I don't want to be Wompie as a Christian.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want the Lord God to be smooth me out, and it may hurt.
[SPEAKER_00]: It may be uncomfortable but folks, what we need, more Jesus, less of me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_00]: But John the Baptist were saying, we said, I must decrease.
[SPEAKER_00]: He must increase.
[SPEAKER_00]: I must decrease.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll finish and close by saying this.
[SPEAKER_00]: First John chapter three, verses two, three,
[SPEAKER_00]: Before I refer a strong tactic to Hebrews 2 to 3, I just want to say, I know.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know that right now, you might be thinking how difficult it is to allow God to change you completely.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know that, but God will do so.
[SPEAKER_00]: That might be very uncomfortable sometimes, but he will.
[SPEAKER_00]: That might be embarrassing to show all your faults, but I want you to know that God knows it already.
[SPEAKER_00]: All you have to do is admit it to yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: He will take all those lumps out one by one.
[SPEAKER_00]: and look at the beautiful pottery God can make for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: But he can't do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, well, well, you think God can't know.
[SPEAKER_00]: He won't do it until you arrived.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: God's a gentleman.
[SPEAKER_00]: He always says, well, he gave us free will.
[SPEAKER_00]: He won't make you as beautiful as you can be until you let him.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now are we children of God and has it not yet been revealed that we shall be, but we know that when he appears, we shall be like him.
[SPEAKER_00]: For we shall see him as he is.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everyone who has this hope in him, purifies himself just as he, if you, has found for it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Dear precious Heavenly Father,
[SPEAKER_00]: and for those who are not.
[SPEAKER_00]: For those right now who are reminded of the lumps in their life, but they feel like they can't be made into pottery, they can't be made, they're looking at all the clay and they feel like a mess that can't be recreated or made into something more pure.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray in Lord God that they will look not at themselves or their own hands, but they'll look at your hands or the potter's hands.
[SPEAKER_00]: And remember that you are absolutely perfect Lord and with you, we could be perfected each and every day.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray that we all allow Lord and not close up our ears, but we'll remove our hands from our ears to hear your word, to apply it, to let you apply it, to let you soften us and make us better.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray for all this Lord God as we live in this
[SPEAKER_00]: and Jesus, most holy and precious name I pray, amen, amen.