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Monday, June 26, 2006
Alipio: Taking risks
By Fr. Jose Alipio
Lifelines
Jeremiah 18:1-6
THIS passage from the book of Jeremiah contains one of the most familiar symbols of God's providence in the Bible. Jeremiah was instructed by God to go to the potter's shed and see the man at work on the wheel. What he saw came as a surprise because the potter failed more often than he succeeded in throwing a pot.
But whenever the object of clay that he was making turned out badly, he tried again. He simply clumped the clay together again on the wheel and started over. The potter was in complete control of the clay, making any object that he pleased.
"That's how I relate to my people," the Lord told Jeremiah. "My people are like clay in my hands. I am molding them into something useful and beautiful. If they do not turn out right, I try again to shape them into a thing of value."
There's another reason to be learned from the familiar metaphor of the potter's wheel. We can learn from our mistakes. Some lessons we can only learn by trying things out for ourselves. You can't learn how to be brave by just reading adventure stories. You have to take some risks in life, and where there is risk there will always be failure. But better to fail in an attempt at courage than to succeed in an act of timidity.
You can't learn to be a loving person just by reading romantic poetry. You have to risk yourself in meaningful relationships that more than likely will end in failure. But you can learn from failed relationships to be a more honest and caring person. Each of us has a fair share of the raw material of life - the clay out of which character can be molded if we learn from our mistakes.
(June 26, 2006 issue)
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