Prophecy

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In this vision, I saw a beautiful fine china vase. It was delicate and exquisite in appearance. There were no chips or cracks but seemed flawless and perfect. It was painted in an array of gorgeous colors that caught your attention right away. One glance at this exquisite vase told you that it was something unique and special.

While I viewed this beautiful vase, I saw that it rested in someone’s strong but gentle looking hand. I immediately knew it was the hand of God. I saw that He didn’t have a grip on the vase. It sat loosely in the palm of His hand. Directly, I saw this change.

With a soft cloth in His other hand, the Lord began wiping off the paint from the delicate vase. As He did, I could hear the vase protesting in surprised frustration. “What are you doing? You’re ruining me after I’ve worked so hard to look like this!”

The Lord seemingly ignored the protests and continued to gently wipe off every trace of paint from the vase. “Oh no! Look what you’ve done to me!” Moaned the vase in despair. “I’m so ugly now. I’ll never be the same again.” How true this would turn out to be.

After the Lord had stripped the vase of everything it had done before to dress itself up, I watched as the gentle hand of the Master closed around the vase and crushed it into pieces. The little vase cried out loudly in pain and shock. “Now, look what you’ve done to me! How will I ever get myself back together? Oh, that hurts.”

As I continued to watch in this vision, I couldn’t help but notice that not one piece of the vase fell out of the Lord’s hand to hit the floor. God redeems every part of our lives. Nothing is lost. He truly does hold us close to Him in our brokenness. With the greatest of care, I watched as the Lord took each broken piece of the vase and began to put it together again. The vase was quiet and subdued now. (be still and know that I am God Ps.46:10).

As the Lord worked meticously and precisely on the vase, I saw that He didn’t remove the scars where it had been broken. Instead, He used them to create new patterns of color and light in the vase. It had a translucent quality about it now. The vase glowed from the inside to the outside with a brilliancy that could only come from being filled with the glory of God. The vase was more beautiful now than it had ever been before but its beauty wasn’t because it was perfect. It was exquisitely beautiful because of the scars of brokenness.

When the vase looked to see what the Lord had done, it began to cry. “Look at me,” it said with wonder and amazement. “I’m so beautiful now.”One might think that its tears would mar the transformation the Lord had done but not so. Each tear that ran down the sides of the vase only made it shine that much brighter. It had been self-made before and though it had been pretty on the outside; it had never had the quality and beauty that it had now from the inside out. Now, the vase was God-made. It had become a vessel of honor fit for the Master’s use in His Kingdom.

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COMMENTS:
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I think the vision of the broken vase speaks for itself. It represents each and every child of God that must come to this place of brokenness. This place of submission to the will of God, our Father. Years ago there was a popular gospel song with the words that said, “Whatever it takes, Lord, for my will to break, that's what I’m willing to do.” I’ve been here at this place myself. I’ve been the little vase who tried to cover up all the beauty God had created in me.

I’ve known this crushing but I’ve also known the joy of deeper intimacy with my Father God because of it. Can you imagine, I thought He was out to kill me. He was. He was trying to kill the old life so the new could truly come forth in glory. Many of you will recognize yourself in the little vase as well. You will be able to look where you were before and see how far you’ve come now because of being molded and shaped by the hand of the Master. Was the crushing worth it? Oh yes! What glory and love in the Father’s presence.

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MAKE-OVERS:
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This vision talks about allowing a loving Father to break our will so that we can say in loving submission, “Not my will be done, but Your will be done.” Jesus went before us and set the example in the garden of Gethsemane. Each one of us must have our own Gethsemane experience. You can even call it “wrestling with God,” if you will (Gen.32:24-32). Jacob had such an encounter with God at Bethel. He left that place of his Gethsemane with a limp. He bore the scars of conformity and submission to the will of God.

As portrayed in the vision, we try to make ourselves into images that are not of God. Because we feel inadequate and inferior to others, we try to create an outside image of perfection. We pick out just the right colors and we begin the process of make-over. If you believe that you are unacceptable and you’ve been rejected from early childhood and on into adulthood, then out comes the bright colors and design to cover the fear that is at the base of it all. This type person will either try to over compensate by trying to prove their worth to others, or they will slip into an attitude of defeat and withdraw into depression.

People strive to keep those colors bright on the outside, being creative in their self-made image. We may even look at our handy work and think we’ve done a pretty good job of creating just the right image for ourselves. We may even pat ourselves on the back and think our color selection and paint job is rather beautiful. The question is, what does God see about me? He see’s a different picture. He see’s the real you that you’ve tried to bury. The “you” that He created in His image and made in His likeness (Gen.1:26). His creation you’ve tried to bury because you believed the lie that you’re worthless, unacceptable, no good, unwanted, unlovable, and so on.

God see’s the hurt. He see’s the pain of rejection you’ve experienced that made you withdraw in fear behind that gaily painted exterior. He understands the fear and the tears you’ve cried. They haven’t escaped His ever-watchful eye. In fact, He’s bottled every tear you’ve ever cried (Ps.56:8).

He’s see’s the distress you go through and it touches His heart. He also see’s the anger, the bitterness, the pride, the selfishness and unforgiveness undealt with. Though He see’s all of these things, He doesn’t condemn you (Rom.8:1). He wants to heal you and restore you. He wants you to know that He loves you with an everlasting love that you can’t comprehend with your natural mind. He loves you beyond measure and He wants to remove bitterness from your heart and heal the wounds.

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THE CRUSHING:
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God wants to bring forth the sweet nectar of an obedient and compassionate heart in each of His children, but in order to bring forth that sweet wine, the grapes must first go through a crushing. God has never employed the devil to bring crushing to our lives. The devil is self-employed and he does seek to crush God’s people (all people) because he’s a thief who comes to steal, kill and destroy (John 10:10). In that same verse, Jesus said, “I’ve come to give you life and that you might have it more abundantly.” God comes to restore back to us the right image in our soul (Gen.1:26).

We do as Adam did when he lost the God-image in him because of sin. He sewed fig leaves together and covered himself with a new image. He said, “...I hid my-’self.’ Thus, you hear people say, “I’m a self-made man or woman.” God has to come along and remove all the paint of cover-up we’ve used in creating a new image for ourselves. Adam hid himself from God because he was “afraid.” Was he acceptable now? Would he be rejected? Things haven’t changed. We cover-up ourselves with a new image because of these same fears. If people can’t get to the real you behind the make-over, you believe they won’t be able to hurt you. This, of course, is a lie because we still experience hurts.

The Bible says, God holds us in the palm of His hand. He has our picture imprinted upon His hand Isaiah 49:16). It’s okay to be in the hand of our Father as long as He doesn’t start messing in our affairs. We usually don’t like it when He begins removing this and readjusting that and tearing down what we’ve spent years creating. We let our protests be heard loudly in a variety of ways while God lovingly continues to do His work of renewal in our hearts and lives. Thank God, He does! He knows exactly what He’s doing. We only end up making a mess of things.

We do our natural children in much the same way as God does each of us. When small children have gotten dirty from outside play, they need a bath. They often protest loudly in a variety of ways from crying, running away to hide, stomping their feet, getting angry, but what do we do? Speaking from my own experience with my child, who’s grown now. I knew what needed to be done and I went about completing the task because she would like the outcome. I bathed off what she had accumulated from outside play and brought her back to her original image. We also must be cleansed by the “washing of the water of the word” (Eph.5:26-27). We must be cleansed by the blood of Jesus and renewed to the image of God, Who is our Creator and Father.

God doesn’t over-ride our will. And even though we may protest His work in our lives by stomping our feet in angry resistance, God is patient in His loving-kindness. He never gives up on us. He will continue His work until the time of the crushing. Even then, He will hold you with such love and tenderness. You may feel like you’ve been broken into a million pieces while your tears flow like a river.

You may feel as if you’re going to die because your soul is in such agony. Jesus felt this same thing in the garden of Gethsemane, and it’s not a strange thing that you may be experiencing it now. And even though you may feel as if you can’t survive the crushing, you can trust that His grace is ever present to empower you to go on through. Jesus said, “I’ll never leave you, nor forsake you. I’ll be with you til the end of the age” ( Heb.13:5).

Though you’re going through this thing that is totally beyond your control, somewhere in the midst of it begins a trust in God that goes deeper than you’ve ever know before. Somewhere in the midst of your crushing is a reminder of the truth that God loves you and all of His plans for you are good and not evil (Jer.29:11). You grow quiet and are subdued at the wonder of God’s ability to crush you and yet restore you in such a way that astounds you beyond words.

A deep peace and joy settles in your soul as you realize even more, what an awesome God holds you in the palm of His hand. He is your Father and He’s come to restore His beautiful image in you so you can finally see yourself as He see’s you. He wants you to see that you are a beautiful creation who is being made into a vessel of honor. One that is filled with His love and glory to be poured out to do the works of Jesus, and even greater works for the Kingdom of God.

Our heavenly Father heals our wounds but He doesn’t remove the scars. Rather, He turns them into stars of victorious testimonies to reach the hearts of people who are hungering and thirsting after righteousness. We are to lead them to the fountain of Living Water, Himself, where they may drink freely and never thirst again (John 4:14). The wounds Jesus suffered before and after He was put on the cross have been healed but the scars remain. After His resurrection from the dead, Jesus showed His disciples the scars on His hands where the nails had been
(John 20:20,27).

God takes the scars of our lives and gives us anointing and authority to speak into the lives of other people and help to bring healing and restoration to them. But first, we must pass through our own Gethsemane---the garden of crushing, as it were, to say, “not my will be done, but Your will be done.” We must allow the crushing so we are willing to become pliable in the Lord’s hand to mold us and make us into vessel’s of honor, fit for the Master’s use in His Kingdom.


Plain As Day Ministries

Shirley Williams

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