Becoming An Open Vessel. -That’s God!

Becoming An Open Vessel. -That’s God!

-2 Corinthians 4:7

Illustration. Hold a clay jar.

Can that which is little contain that which is big?

Can that which is finite encompass that which is infinite?

Yes. How?

Left the jar and remove the cap from its top.) It can. -It can, if it’s an open vessel.

Ephesians 3:19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Remember, God is the Master potter. We are the clay.

Peter Marshall, in a sermon entitled, "Disciples in Clay," pictured the apostles before an examining board which was appointed to choose Jesus' close associates. Peter stood there smelling of fish -- unrefined, uncultured, impulsive, and passionate. Andrew, James, and John also reeked of fish and lacked refinement. Philip appeared to be indecisive. Thomas seemed cynical. Matthew was considered a traitor. Simon the Zealot was a dangerous patriot. Judas was a thief.

The NT tells it like it was. This was a group not likely to succeed. It is most likely they would not have been chosen by a board for Jesus, but they were chosen by Jesus.

-Infinity In A Jar; infinity in a clay jar!

In the western panhandle of Texas is a small town named Texline. It was seeking to attract attention, beginning in the late 1800s as a thriving center along a new railroad line.

Within a few years, though, most of the shops had closed and the town's population shriveled to about 400. In the year 2000, the population was still just over 500.

One online description of Texline states, that it has a city limit sign at one end, another at the other end, and not much in between.

What a waste, if the same description could be given of our spiritual journey!

-Not much in-between?

-The journey of the Christian life on earth begins at the moment of faith in Jesus, and ends, when the believer goes to be with the Lord.

This raises an important question, “What happens in between?”

2 Corinthians 4:7AMP ”But we have this precious treasure [the good news about salvation] in [unworthy] earthen vessels [of human frailty], so that the grandeur and surpassing greatness of the power will be [shown to be] from God [His sufficiency] and not from ourselves.“

So the question is, “Will you be a closed, or an open vessel?”

A closed vessel can never contain anything larger than its own size.

.Small Vision. “Us 4 and no more.”

.The vision statement reads, “We Get By.”

.We go by my rules. “What if your rules aren’t right?”

-Again, However, an open vessel has no limitations.

Again, 2 Corinthians 4:7MSG ”If you only look at us, you might well miss the brightness. We carry this precious Message around in the- unadorned clay pots of our ordinary lives. That’s to prevent anyone from confusing God’s incomparable power with us.

Again, A closed vessel can never contain anything larger than its own size.

-But an open vessel has no limitations.

When you become an open vessel you begin asking God to expand your vision, territory. -You begin seeing the harvest! P.H

-Can you see the harvest?

Because you’ve decided to be an open vessel, In return, you get the God factor! -Your life now can contain the blowing of the wind, or the outpouring of the rain. -The oxygen of the fire.

-It can even contain the flowing of a river. Yes, God can create a river!

Listen to the optimism in Jesus about the coming days. John 7:37-38AMP Now on the last and most important day of the feast, Jesus stood and called out [in a loud voice], “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink! 38 He who believes in Me [who adheres to, trusts in, and relies on Me], as the Scripture has said, ‘From his innermost being will flow continually rivers of living water.’?”

Again, Jesus states in, John 4:14AMP ”But whoever drinks the water that I give him will never be thirsty again. But the water that I give him will become in him a spring of water [satisfying his thirst for God] welling up [continually flowing, bubbling within him] to eternal life.”“

Here’s the powerful part of these verses. For Jesus was speaking of our day and time!

John 7:39AMP But He was speaking of the [Holy] Spirit, whom those who believed in Him [as Savior] were to receive afterward. The Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified (raised to honor).“

This ‘living water’ now resides within clay jars! We have become ‘temples’ of the Holy Spirit. We house the very presence of God,

1 Corinthians 3:16.

Here’s another question, which is larger, that which you know, or that which you don’t know?