Scattered Moments
Brief reflections on faith, adversity, and the quiet places where grace appears.
Each episode of Scattered Moments is a brief journey through the unexpected classrooms where God does His deepest work — hospital rooms and sanctuaries, seasons of grief and flashes of joy, the ordinary moments where grace shows up and changes everything.
Drawing from over forty years of writing, ministry, and life in the trenches, Matt Tullos weaves together original poetry, hymn stories, Scripture, and honest reflection to remind you that even adversity, you are not alone.
New episodes every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
Take heart, notice the scattered moments, and share the grace.
Scattered Moments
On The Potter's Wheel
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In this Christian devotional podcast episode, we explore Jeremiah 18 and the image of the Potter’s Wheel…
What happens when life feels like it’s spinning out of control?
When change leaves us disoriented… or even broken?
This reflection includes a personal poem written during a season of deep transition and questioning—a time when the hands of the Potter felt both confusing and necessary.
Drawing from the words of Irenaeus and the prophet Jeremiah, we are reminded that God does not discard what is marred. He reworks it. The pressure is not punishment. The fire is not destruction. It is formation.
If we remain soft in His hands, we begin to see what He sees—not what we are, but what we are becoming.
Take a few quiet moments to listen…
and notice the grace in the process.
Welcome to Scattered Moments. These are quiet reflections on faith, adversity, and the quiet places where grace appears. So I went down to the potter's house, and there he was, working at his wheel, and the vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter's hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter. Irenaeus of Lyon added his thoughts on the transforming work of the potter. If then you are God's workmanship, await the hand of your Maker, which creates everything in due time, offer to him your heart in a soft and tractable state, and preserve the form in which the Creator has fashioned you, having moisture in yourself lest, by becoming hardened, you lose the impression of his fingers. My life is on the wheel. Earthbound clay, spinning, wondering, why are his hands changing me? What is he creating in me? What does he see? Is there a purpose in the pain? Stretching, sensing, swirling, struggling. I'm smaller than I used to be, it seems. The mosaic of broken dreams. I'm dizzy with change. The wheel slows as his eyes scan my shell, halfway hoping he would cast me aside and move on to a more fitting lump of clay. He pauses. Divine rejection is what I feel. Rejection that he sees who I really am, a catastrophic mess, deeply wounded brokenness. He picks me up again and throws me back on the wheel. This is not the way it was supposed to be. Still working. It hurts. Because I'm still me. Can I ever be what he wants me to be? He's creating in my catastrophe. I'm spinning again. Oh God, what do you see? The heat of the oven birthplace of sanctity, above and beyond all treachery that separates my soul from the burning, glazing, waiting stream. I stand before the master of the clay, regaled in glory. I didn't know it then, but I know it now. He smiles at me, my creator, who walked me through the fire of earth, and now I see him. The all things new Messiah, King of castaways, the potter, picture, creator, Jesus. In awe-struck wonder we will stand his masterpiece of grace. Irenaeus, one of the earliest voices of the ancient church, wrote to people who believed the physical world was a mistake, that God would never get his hands dirty with clay. He pushed back with the same image you just heard. God is the potter, you are the clay. And the process requires something of you. Softness. Irenaeus warned. If we harden, if we resist, we lose the impression of his fingers. The shape he was forming in us goes missing. The vessel in Jeremiah was spoiled. But the potter didn't walk away. He reworked it. That is what is happening to you. The spinning isn't punishment. The pressure isn't rejection. The fire isn't destruction. It's formation. You are not a castaway. You are a work in progress. In the hands of a potter who smiles at what he sees. Not what you are yet, but what you are becoming. Potter and King, forgive us of the times we've hardened, for the times we've resisted your hands and mistaken the wheel for punishment. Remind us that you do not discard what is broken. You return it to the wheel. Make us soft enough to be shaped. Make us still enough to feel your hands. And when the fire comes, remind us that heat is how a vessel is made whole. We offer you this clay. Amen. Take heart. Notice the scattered moments and share the grace.
