Have Thine Own Way Lord, Have Thine Own Way

Have Thine own way Lord
Have Thine own way
Thou art the potter I am the clay
Mold me and make me after Thy will
While I am waiting yielded and still  by Adelaide A. Pollard (1906)

⁴ But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.” Jer 18:4

Have you ever had plans for your day, week, or life and God asked you to change your plans? Maybe something came up that changed everything.  I remembered this hymn from growing up and it is a song of surrender to God and His plans for your life.    

Adelaide Pollard wrote this song after attending a prayer meeting in 1902.  She heard and old mother praying that it really didn’t matter what God did to them but that He have His way in their lives.  Now that is total surrender.  It didn’t matter to them what He did but as long as He had His will in their lives.  Adelaide went home and read Jeremiah 18 and Isaiah 64:8 about the potter.

Adelaide realized that we are clay in the hands of our Potter, which is the Lord. He molds us, shapes us, and works all the lumps and bumps out of us.  If we are marred, he can reshape us, break us down and start over again.  He is working things in and out of us so that we can be the vessel that He needs us to be to accomplish the work that He has called us to accomplish. 

How can I, the pot, tell the Potter how to form me?  I can try but it doesn’t work that way.  The Potter is the creator, the pot is the creation.  The Potter gets to decide the shape, height, weight, color, etc. of the creation not the other way around.  As I yield to the shaping of the Potter (God), I become who He wants me to be.  But if I buck or rebel, then I become marred, and He has to break me down and make me over. 

Marred means impair the appearance of: to disfigure; to ruin or diminish the perfection or wholeness of: SPOIL; blemish. The pot that the potter was shaping was marred, disfigured, ruined, had blemishes, or spoiled.  We come marred, hurt by past relationships, broken marriages, sickness and diseases, mentally and physically abused, depressed, lonely, cast aside, underappreciated, etc. All these things that can mar a vessel or a human life.  But the scripture says, that He forms it into another pot.  God lovingly adds His Spirit and remakes us into a vessel of honor to be used in His Kingdom.  You can be made over, you can become new. 2 Cor. 5:17, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”

 All of this happens if we surrender to the Lord’s reshaping and remaking of our lives.  We have to lay down our agenda and allow Him to (as the song says), Have thing own way Lord, Have thine own Way. He wants to make us new and gives us an abundant life in Him. Let Him have His way and you will see that the Potter, Our loving God, know what He is doing.

Be blessed today.