The quark potential model is used to investigate the low-energy elastic scattering of πN system. The model potential consists of the t-channel and s-channel one-gluon exchange potentials and the harmonic oscillator confining potential. By means of the resonating group method, a nonlocal effective potential for the πN system is derived from the interquark potentials and used to calculate the πN elastic scattering phase shifts. By considering the effect of QCD renormalization, the suppression of the spin-orbital coupling and the contribution of the color octet of the clusters (qq̄) and (qqq), the numerical results are in fairly good agreement with the experimental data. The same model and method are employed to investigate the possible πN resonances. For this purpose, the resonating group equation is transformed into a standard Schrödinger equation in which the nonlocal effective πN interaction potential is included. Solving the Schrödinger equation by the variational method, we are able to reproduce the masses of some currently concerned πN resonances.