Pastor Shane Vaughn Teaches "Parables of The Kingdom" Part 1 - THE POTTER WHEEL

Pastor Shane Vaughn Teaches "Parables of The Kingdom" Part 1 - THE POTTER WHEEL Shane Vaughn ——— First Harvest Ministries International 1 This is part one of the parables of the kingdom. Hello. I'm Pastor Shane Vaughn, First Harvest Ministries. I want this series that I'm going to teach you to revolutionize how you see the parables in the word of God. Most people do not realize that the parables in the Bible, Old Testament and New, are all pointing to the same story. It's really going to shock you when you realize the parables of the scripture all point to the exact same story. 2 In each of these series or each of segments of this series, I'm going to take one parable and we're going to study it together and I'm going to show you the literal meaning of each parable. Let's go to the very first one that I'd like to teach you. The book of Jeremiah chapter 18 verse one. Grab your Bibles and read along with me. Okay? Never believe anything I teach you. Always read it for yourself. Jeremiah 18 We'll start with verse one. 3 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh saying, "Arise and go down to the potter's house and there I will cause you to hear my words." Then I went down to the potter's house and behold he worked a work on the wheel. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter. So he made it again, another vessel as seemed good to the potter to make it. Then the word of Yahweh came to me saying, "O house of Israel cannot I do with you as the potter saith Yahweh? Behold, as the clay is in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel. 4 At what moment I shall speak concerning a nation, concerning a kingdom, to pluck it up, to pull it down and to destroy it, if that nation against whom I have pronounced would just turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I was going to do unto them. And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it, if it do evil in my sight, that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good that I said I would do to them. Now, this is a parable. This is a story with a great message behind it. 5 Unfortunately, because we do not understand the house of Israel, ministers that preach about this parable do a great injustice by spiritualizing it rather than giving the literal physical interpretation of this parable. Many preachers use this parable to speak of our spiritual condition. And while that application can always be made, it is not the meaning of this parable. I'm sure you've heard this parable preached about how God can take you and uh put you on his wheel and transform you. Well, that makes for good preaching, but that is not the meaning of this parable. 6 I'd like to show you the true meaning. In this parable, we have a potter. We have a workshop and a lump of clay. And the parrot the the passage of scripture plainly tells us who the potter is. Yahweh. Who is the clay? Many preachers would say the clay is me and you. No. In this parable, the clay is a nation, the house of Israel. Because this parable is not about you, the individual. This parable is a national parable and its meaning can be found by studying the events that resulted from God handling his nation. This is a parable about how God handles nations, specifically his nation. 7 Now, to understand the parable, we need to go back to where the the potter, Yahweh, first handled the clay. And that would have been at Mount Sinai after Moses brought his people out of the house of Egypt. This is the first time that Yahweh is going to handle his clay. It is here at Sinai that the molding of the house of Israel began. Now, in the book of Moses or the Torah, there are recorded many commandments, statutes, and judgments by which this nation was to be brought into shape. The purpose of Yahweh's commandments was not to make our life hard. 8 It was to give us the tools whereby to shape ourself from a son of man to a son of Yahweh. These commandments and statutes was to make the nation beautiful. It was to raise them up above the animals and to raise them up above human beings that were living like animals. These commandments were the hands of Yahweh molding his people. There was laws of health that he gave, what to eat, what not to eat. There was diet, finance, social relationships were all clearly laid down by the Torah. 9 This is the molding of the house of Israel through these amendments, all 613 that are found in the Torah, standards of conduct, how they should live their lives on a daily, consistent basis. This was instructions in holiness and instructions in righteousness, detailed instructions leaving no stone left unturned. In these instructions, they were given their duty to both Yahweh and to their fellow man. To enforce upon them the importance of service and kindness and love. They were given severe punishment if they did not mold. 10 Severe punishment if they did not abide by this wonderful tool called the Torah. Now, Yahweh, when they first begin to be molded, was their king. He ruled over Israel through their prophets such as Moses and their judges and then later he'd ruled over them through their kings. Now, the first time that the clay has gotten up on the wheel of the potter. While they were living in sin in Egypt, they could not get on the wheel. They were lost in sin. Whenever you or them come out of sin, there must begin transformation or a change on the potter's wheel. This is what happened to the house of Israel. 11 Well, as luck would have it, they began to be marred. The potter looks on the potter's wheel at this clay that he has been forming with his Torah. What does he see? He sees the first marring of that clay. What was the marring of that clay? Idolatry. For 500 years, Yahweh molded this nation. Under his righteous leaders, he taught them the right way under their pastors and under their shepherds. And at times this clay appeared to be taking shape. It appeared to be coming into light. It had promising success. But eventually, the hard rebellious clay began to twist and turn. 12 And that meant the vessel that Yahweh was making was marred in the hand of the potter. And because of that, Israel forsook the law of Yahweh. They rejected it. They rebelled against the restraining influence of the commandments of Yahweh. Those restraining influences in our lives that force us to bend and to become something that we were not before we got on the potter's wheel. They began to forsake the ordinances of worship, assembling themselves together. They began to rebel against the righteous ways of Yahweh. And that caused them to drift into the sensuality of idolatry. 13 Then what happened? Just as the potter removed the twisted made vessel from the wheel, so Yahweh ceased to mold Israel and he cast them away from him for a time. Now, this is where the parable gets really interesting. Because they would not be molded and changed, they were of no value to the master. He did not need a regular people. He did a holy people. So, he took them off of his wheel and threw them in the potter's field. In other words, he divorced them. He put them away for a time. 14 The prophet Micah picks up on some of this uh uh parable and he tells us that the prophetic vision was withdrawn from Israel when they went into idolatry and captivity. And there is no indication in the scripture of the return of this divine gift until the day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit returned to Israel. Now, this is where the remolding begins on the day of Pentecost. The clay that Yahweh set aside, threw away, he set it aside for a season. And he said uh the potter said he made it again another vessel. He did not remake the same vessel he was working on. No. 15 But according to the parable, he made it again. What? The clay that he threw away. He took the same clay, but he was going to make a totally different or another vessel as it seemed good to the potter to make it. So, he now takes the same lump of clay and remolds it, working on it patiently, skillfully. And this time the clay begins to respond to the handiwork and is made into a vessel which seems good to the potter, which is remnant Israel. He took the same clay, which is the descendants of Abraham. He took the same lost tribes of Israel, the same clay. 16 But what he was going to make of them this time would not be natural Israel. He would use natural Israel to create remnant Israel. Now, the clay or the nation that he set aside, that same nation is reformed. He does not take different clay. He doesn't take Gentile clay, no matter what your Christian churches have taught you. He is not remaking this vessel with Gentile clay. No, no, no, no. He is remaking this vessel with the same clay. The children of Abraham that were scattered across the world, so much so that they could not be numbered. 17 And because of their idolatry, they thought that they were Gentiles. They lost their identity. They lived among the Gentiles until they could tell no difference between them and the Gentile. So, therefore, that's why the Christian church, not understanding this, believes that in this hour that Yahweh is reforming this out of Gentiles. No. He's reforming it out of the exact same clay, which is the lost tribes of the house of Israel. 18 And when his Holy Spirit calls that clay, in the book of Acts chapter 2 verse 38 and verse 39, when it speaks of the infilling of the Holy Spirit, be ye baptized in his name. He says that there is a promise that is being given of the infilling of the law of God in our minds, sometimes called the Ruach Kodesh or the Holy Spirit. Now, he tells us plainly that that promise is going to be given to one group of people. As in verse 39 of Acts chapter 2, for this promise of the infilling of the law of God, which is the Holy Spirit, is unto you. Who is he referring to with unto you? 19 Those that were in his audience, which was the house of Judah, the Jewish people. Because remember, the gospel is always to the Jew first. Although they rejected it, it went to them first. Then he said this promise is unto those also. So, there there's another group of people that this promise is to. Those Read it in your own Bible, Acts 2:39. Those that are afar off. Now, we as Christians automatically think that is referring to the Gentiles. We could never be further from the truth. 20 As you go back and study the lost tribes of Israel, the natural blood descendants of Abraham, millions of them that were lost to the pages of history, although we have found them in my new series called Tracking the Tribes, which you can watch at our website fhtv.tv. But he said those that are afar off, as you study those lost tribes, which is the northern tribes of the house of Israel, you will find they were always referred to in the prophets as those that were afar off. They were afar off from the covenant of God. They had been rejected from the marriage covenant. 21 Only the tribe of Judah remained in the marriage covenant. The others were afar off. They were that clay that had been cast aside for a time. They were that chunk of clay that was cast aside for a period of time, and now the prophet or the apostle says that this promise is unto you and to them that are far off, the lost tribes of Israel, the same clay. The same clay is going to be reformed into a different vessel. And then, lest we think he's talking about all the Jews and all the lost tribes of Israel, he breaks it down even further in verse 39 of Acts 2. As many as Yahweh shall call. 22 Now, if you go back in your Bible, you'll find that only a remnant of Israel is going to return to Yahweh. Their hearts are going to be turned back to the fathers. Only a remnant of Judah and Israel, not all of them. Not in this this age. They will come in the next age, but not this age. So, he said this promise is unto the Jew and the lost tribes and only as many of them as Yahweh shall call. Cuz we know according to John 6:44, he's not calling everyone, many, but not everyone. Let's continue with the finishing of this parable. 23 According to the parable, this nation, this holy nation, remnant Israel, will undergo a second phase in its history. And that the result will be successful. That's what the parable is teaching us. Yahweh will still be the potter and he will still be planting his law, the same thing he used in the Old Testament. Remember what the prophet Jeremiah said? That in that day that he will write his law in our minds. 24 So, the same he's using the same hands of his Torah, which is what we receive when we receive the Holy Spirit, that spirit comes into our mind and that process begins on this house of Israel one more time. The lost sheep of the house of Israel are still the clay in his hand. He sent his son to earth that he might soften the clay. There, brothers and sisters, is the purpose of the Holy Spirit in your life and in all of our lives collectively to soften the clay. 25 If you've ever done any yard work, planting, horticultural work, you know when you begin to dig and you run into clay that you've got a problem. Why? Because it will hold the water. It will not allow anything to permeate through it. The root can't even get through that clay from your flowers. So, you have to mix that clay with sand. You also have to mix it with topsoil or else nothing can be done with it. Your clay is your flesh. When the Holy Spirit moves in, the first thing he will begin to do is soften you. 26 Your your your animosity, your hate, your unkindness, your sharpness, he will begin to break your fallow ground so that you can join the house of Israel in continuing to go round and round up on that clay. He has put his house of Israel back on the wheel on the day of Pentecost and with his tender bleeding hands shaping and guiding us, forming us, reforming us, bringing his pattern into us, molding us into the shape of his son, Yeshua the Messiah, until it begins to appear as a vessel that is pleasing to Yahweh. The great remolding of the act of the potter has begun. 27 In the end time, we are told that the voice of Elijah would go forth to prepare the way, turning the hearts of the children back to the apostolic fathers of Israel, Abraham, Jacob, and Isaac, that this softening would begin that would turn us back to where he always wanted us to be. In closing, the first vessel was natural Israel, marred by sin and idolatry. The second vessel will also be Israel, same clay, different vessel. It will be brought back to its normal condition by the redemption of Yeshua and the operation of the Holy Spirit. Now, why did I want to break that parable down for you? 28 Because if we're not careful, we over spiritualize the parables and we take away the meaning of its greater fulfillment. This has caused a great injustice towards the house of Israel. It's given rise to dispensationalism and replacement theology. For truly, the Christian church believes that Yahweh threw that clay away and went and found new clay and created something called the church while forgetting the natural descendants of Abraham. That is why you must know the meaning of this parable. You must know that he put the clay away for a period of time. 29 Exactly, the time was 2,520 years until he put them back on the clay to you and to your children, those that are far off, the house of Israel, the house of Judah. As many of them as Yahweh shall call, he'll put them back on the wheel and he will create again the house of Israel where we that were lost have been grafted back in, our identity reconfirmed and revealed by the infilling of the Holy Spirit. Thank you so much.