Clay Jars and Cracked Pots

This new friend nudged my brain into a memory about clay.

Clay?

Yes. I love the stuff. Brown, moist dirt from the ground.

If you haven't had the opportunity to work with clay, put it on your "to do list".

Clay is an amazing substance. You can work with it. Make something of it. Let it dry out. If you don't like what you made, you can resoak it in water to rehydrate it and start again. It is completely alterable in the clay stage. In fact, if you make a vessel of clay and let it dry and then attempt to keep water in it, you will be disappointed. The water will turn your dried out vessel into mushy clay.

But, once the clay has been allowed to dry, heating the clay to temperatures over 1800 degrees, changes its properties from clay to stoneware.

Simply put: The fire changes the dirt to a useful object which can withstand the elements of water, wind and even more fire.

2 Corinthians 4: 7-10 says: But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.

I still can not fathom why God would choose to use humans, made of dirt/clay, to carry His treasure. I think of the value of the message of Jesus. The importance. The grandeur. The prize of glory. Shouldn't this message be in the best media campaign?

Instead, he gave this super-duper, amazing, extraordinary task to the most ordinary vessels. We leak. We turn mushy and lose our form. We are cracked pots.

In spite of my cracks, my inabilities, the treasured message will be revealed. The All-surpassing power of God. Not from us.

In the fire? God has his plan for His clay jars.