trbccoffeebreak

One of my favorite word pictures in the Bible is 2 Corinthians 4:7:  “But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.”   (NIV)

Jars of clay. Picture a potter sitting down at his wheel with a large lump of shapeless, gray, nondescript clay, throwing it on the wheel, then beginning to work it with his slurred hands as the wheel spins, pulling up and up, molding and shaping, caressing the clay into the shape that he wants. Finally, it goes through the firing and glazing process. Now it’s complete. It will work for his intended purpose – to hold olive oil. He places it on the shelf, waiting for a buyer.

Let’s stretch our imaginations and give the jar human emotions. It sits proudly on the shelf, eager and ready to be put into service. It feels sorry for those little jars made for nothing but to hold herbs, or, even worse, to sit around and look pretty. It even feels a bit haughty, looking down its spout at the lesser jars.

Oops! Someone bumps it off the shelf, and it breaks into pieces. Now it’s no longer suitable for doing its job, even after the potter uses glue to put the pieces back together. And now it has those ugly scars. It can’t even be used as an accent piece in the décor. Being put back together enables it to handle some jobs, but it is still embarrassed at its condition. Now it feels inferior to the other jars, believing no one will ever want to use it.

In the meantime, customers come and go, buying the perfect jars and ignoring the patched one.

Business is good, and the potter spends and saves his earnings wisely until he has a small stash of gold coins. He needs to find a place for his valuables that thieves would likely overlook. Eventually, the potter stores his coins inside the broken clay jar, giving it a noble purpose. The jar rejoices. It knows it isn’t noble of itself, but because of the riches inside.

You know where I’m going with this. That’s what God did. He put His treasure inside us, the broken and unworthy jars of clay. If we go back to verse 6, we see what the treasure is – it’s the knowledge of God’s glory as displayed in the face of Christ. Think about that—we now have personal knowledge of His glory! We didn’t have it before we believed. That is a light reserved only for His children, and where did He put it?  In us, in plain jars of clay, with all of our flaws, with all of our cracks, with all of our un-specialness. We have this treasure in jars of clay. We can stand in awe of His gracious favor in allowing us to be vessels of His glory.

“Lord God, we are grateful that you have given us the honor of being your clay jars, vessels of your Light. We pray for Your help in living lives worthy of this calling.”

For His Glory

Cherie Williams (www.cherharbridgewilliams.com)
TRBC Women’s Life