Jeremiah 18:1 The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD saying, 2 “Arise and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will announce My words to you.” 3 Then I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was, making something on the wheel. 4 But the vessel that he was making of clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter; so he remade it into another vessel, as it pleased the potter to make. 5 Then the word of the LORD came to me saying, 6 “Can I not, O house of Israel, deal with you as this potter does?” declares the LORD. “Behold, like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel.”
Isaiah 64:6 For all of us have become like one who is unclean, And all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment; And all of us wither like a leaf, And our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. 7 There is no one who calls on Your name, Who arouses himself to take hold of You; For You have hidden Your face from us And have delivered us into the power of our iniquities. 8 But now, O LORD, You are our Father, We are the clay, and You our potter; And all of us are the work of Your hand. 9 Do not be angry beyond measure, O LORD, Nor remember iniquity forever; Behold, look now, all of us are Your people.
The whole concept and practice of prayer is in a state of massive confusion in our day. God is simply the doting being in the sky that wants what is best for all men and yet depends on them to do many things for themselves. He is pictured as the being that is more powerful than men, but cannot do anything without them. Prayer is viewed as asking things from this being that is more powerful and so we need his help, but he also needs us to do certain things as well. God needs no one and needs nothing from anyone. There is simply nothing that a human being can do for God, but instead the human needs to receive all things from God. As the Scriptures point out with a greatly ignored but powerful statement, “What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it? (I Cor 4:7).
Acts 17:24 “The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands; 25 nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things; 26 and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation, 27 that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; 28 for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His children.’
Man’s utter and absolute dependency on God for his every breath and all things that man must have to even exist is clearly stated in the text above. This should drive a stake in the heart of all of man’s pride and his abilities in his physical life on earth, but even more his spiritual life. God has absolutely no need of man and man cannot do anything for God because God has no needs. Man cannot serve God because there is nothing that man can do for God. Instead of that, man depends on God for his every breath and every moment of his existence.
When we think of prayer and what it means to pray, the very fact that man receives every breath from God and his existence is upheld every moment at the pleasure of God should bring man to bow humble before God. But even more, when man sees that all spiritual gifts and blessings are in Christ and only come to men in Christ and because of grace, there should be no pride left in the hearts of men. But pride blinds man to his utter dependency upon God in all things and perhaps especially in prayer. This leaves us with a God that has no need of man and yet He dispenses blessings in some way through prayer.
Man must come to God in humility if man is to seek God in prayer, because if man is not humbled and broken from self man will do nothing but seek self in prayer rather than God. This is what seems to happen the vast majority of time when men do what they think of as prayer. But man cannot come to the living and true God except in a large measure of humility since God needs no one and He only gives blessings by grace. Man can only come to the Divine Potter and seek blessings if those blessings are to the glory of God. Coming to the Divine Potter as clay teaches us that we are to come to God in humility and wanting to be changed rather than to change God. It is blasphemous to think that the clay should change the Potter, yet it seems to be tried a vast majority of the time that people come and claim that they are praying. Prayer is when God changes things, but we tend to forget that His people are what needs to be changed more than circumstances. But God has not.
God Loves... Himself 
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