THE TEACUP
There was a couple that used to go to England to shop in a beautiful antique store.
This trip was to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary. They both liked antiques
and pottery, and expecially teacups. Spotting an exceptional cup, they asked, "May
we see that? We've never seen a cup quite so beautiful."
As the lady handed it to them, suddenly the teacup spoke, "You don't understand"
It said. "I have not always been a teacup. There was a time when I was just a
lump of red clay. My master took me and rolled me, pounded and patted me over
and over and I yelled out, "Don't do that. I don't like it!" "Let me alone," but he
smiled, and gently said, "Not yet!!"
Then WHAM! I was placed on a spinning wheel and suddenly I was spun around
and around and around. "Stop it!. I'm getting so dizzy! I'm going to get sick!" I screamed.
But the master only nodded and said, quietly, "Not yet." He spun me and poked and
prodded and bent me out of shape to suit himself and then ...
Then he put me in the oven. I never felt such heat. I yelled and knocked and
pounded at the door. "Help! Get me out of here!" I could see him through the
opening and I could read his lips as he shook his head from side to side, "Not yet."
When I thought I couldn't bear it another minute, the door opened. He carefully
took me out and put me on the shelf, and I began to cool. Oh, that felt so good!
"Ah, this is much better," I thought.
But, after I cooled he picked me up and he brushed and painted me all over.
The fumes were horrible. I thought I would gag. "Oh, please, Stop it, Stop it!!" I cried.
He only shook his head and said "Not yet!"
Then suddenly he put be back in to the oven. Only it was not like the first one.
This was twice as hot and I just knew I would suffocate. I begged. I pleaded.
I screamed. I cried. I was convinced I would never make it. I was ready
to give up. Just then the door opened and he took me out and again placed me
on the shelf, where I cooled and waited and waited, wondering, "What's he going
to do to me next?"
An hour later he handed me a mirror and said, "Look at yourself." And I did. I
said, "That's not me; that couldn't be me. It's beautiful. I'm beautiful!"
Quietly he spoke: "I want you to remember," then, he said "I know it hurt to be
rolled and pounded and patted, but had I just left you alone, you'd have dried up. I
know it made you dizzy to spin around on he wheel, but if I had stopped, you
would have crumbled. I know it hurt and it was hot and disagreeable in the oven, but
if I hadn't put you there, you would have cracked. I know the fumes were bad when
I brushed and painted you all over, but if I hadn't done that, you never would have
hardened. You would not have had any color in your life. If I hadn't put you back
in that second oven, you wouldn't have survived for long because the hardness
would not have held. Now you are a finished product. Now you are what I had in
mind when I first began with you."
The moral of this story is this:
God knows what He's doing for each of us. He is the potter, and we are His clay.
He will mold us and make us, and expose us to just enough pressures of just the
right kinds that we may be made into a flawless piece of work to fufill His good,
pleasing and perfect will.
So when life seems hard, and you are being pounded and patted and pushed
almost beyond endurance; when your world sees to be spinning out of control;
when you feel like you are in a fiery furnace of trials; when life seems to "stink,"
try this....come to Tyme Well Spent, have a cup of your favorite tea
in a pretty teacup, sit down and think of this story and then, spend a little
time for yourself relaxing, knowing the Potter has everything under control.
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