2 August 2018 - of every kind

Today's Readings (Audio)

The Kingdom of heaven is like a net thrown into the sea,
which collects fish of every kind.

Spreading the Kingdom is sometimes a highly targeted affair like when Ananias is called to go to Paul or when Philip is called to preach to the Ethiopian eunuch. But it is more often like a broadly cast net or seed widely scattered. We should default to this mode of spreading the Kingdom everywhere we can. 

We often make determinations about the soil before we scatter or about the fish before we try to catch them. We pull up plants too soon and wind up getting the wheat with the weeds. In order to have the harvest and the catch that God desires we must learn to experience his own generosity and his own love for mankind. It is this impulse that makes Paul say, "Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel" (see First Corinthians 9:16). This is why the disciples go to the ends of the earth. This is why disciples today can't shut up about Jesus.

If we aren't used to being so public and indiscriminate about evangelism it may be something new for us to learn. We may have other good things in our storehouse that have given us a solid walk of faith so far. But we are called to bring things old and new from our spiritual storehouse. We're never going to exhaust God's creativity. We always need to be open to the possibility that he wants to work in us in new ways. 

Whenever the object of clay which he was making
turned out badly in his hand, 
he tried again,
making of the clay another object of whatever sort he pleased.
Then the word of the LORD came to me:
Can I not do to you, house of Israel,
as this potter has done? says the LORD.

We need to learn to trust in the hands of the potter. We have all these ideas about what he should be doing and miss what he is doing now. Or else we object to his work because it doesn't seem right to us. We need to get on board with his plans even if the clay seems to be turning out badly. The LORD can change even bad clay to beauty. But if we insist on him doing things in a certain way where the ugliness is always excluded we might miss the beauty entirely. It might not happen at all or God might have to work through others when he wanted to work through us.

Blessed he whose help is the God of Jacob,
whose hope is in the LORD, his God.

We are clay in the potter's hands. Let us trust in his skill. Let us believe in his generosity and his love. Let us surrender ourselves to his plans for us.

Indeed, like clay in the hand of the potter,
so are you in my hand, house of Israel.