Greetings from Austin Street

Happy Tuesday!  All is well here at 811. I made a new recipe tonight. At least it is new for me. I made Dr. Pepper Pork Loin. It is the easiest recipe. Place one 2-3 pound port loin in the crockpot and pour Dr. Pepper over the loin. Cook on low for 8 hours. Remove from the cooking liquid. Shred the meat and pour a bottle of Dr. Pepper BBQ Sauce over the pork and mix together. I served it on King’s Hawaiian Wheat dinner rolls. They were sort of like sliders. Totally delicious.  Super easy! This one will be a repeat!

The candle is lit…

Dear God, I am ready and willing for you to shape me and use me. Lord, I am trusting in you to keep me going in the right direction and follow your will. I praise and thank you Lord for your Presence in my life and the strengthening joy only you can provide. I love you Lord. I pray all these things in Jesus’ name, amen.

One of my favorite songs and if I am given the nod to be ordained into ministry, one of the songs that will be sung  is “The Potter’s Hand.  The first time I heard this piece it spoke of the way God has been with me in the journey of ordination.  Tonight my meditation is based on the story from Jeremiah as he watched the master potter shaping a pile of clay into beautiful vases, pitchers and bowls. Jeremiah writes as he continues to watch this potter as a lump of clay he is molding and shaping is not shaping as he imagines it should be shaped. Instead of casting the clay aside and deeming it unusable, he takes his strong but gentle hands and reworks it into a pile of soft clay once again  and reshapes it, remolding it until it was beautiful and perfect and ready for use and its purpose. Jeremiah began to understand how God works in the lives of those who love him.

How many times have we needed to be reshaped and remolded into the people God created us to be? Are we willing to become clay in the hands of the Master Potter to be reshaped and remolded until we are ready for God’s great purpose?  The truth is we are already the clay in the hands of God. We just need to be willing to allow God to masterfully work re-creation in each of us throughout our lives as we become less resistant to the touch of the Potter’s hand. Trusting ourselves to God and the love God has for us means believing that however we are being re-created for God’s good purpose will bring us great joy for we are the work of God’s hands. 

“He used that clay to make another pot the way he wanted it to be.”

Jeremiah 18: 4

“We are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.”

Isaiah 64: 8

Take joy in the journey praying and praising God as you go.  Wear comfortable shoes and get some sleep. Love you all, Bruce and Gaylene