TITLE: JARS OF CLAY AND CRACKED POTS
SCRIPTURE: II CORINTHIANS 4:7
I want to read this text from the King James Version and the NIV- New International Version –
“BUT WE HAVE THIS TEASURE IN EARTHEN VESSELS, THAT THE EXCELLENCY OF THE POWER MAY BE OF GOD, AND NOT OF US?”
“BUT WE HAVE THIS TREASURE IN JARS OF CLAY TO SHOW THAT THIS ALL-SURPASSING POWER IS FROM GOD AND NOT FROM US.”
I want to lift as a thought for our consideration and comfort – Jars of Clay and Cracked Pots. Every once in a while, an event comes into our lives which changes things. The death of a loved one is one of those events.
• Sometimes we have time to plan for it
• Although I don’t really think we can plan or prepare for an impending death
• Sometimes we don't have time to plan and prepare
• When it arrives, we know that life will never be quite the same again
• In a sense, we can go back and re-live our times together with the one who has died
• We can go back in our memories
• We can remember the good times and the not-so-good times
• But, in a real sense, we can never go back
• The door is closed
It seems to me the basic teachings of Christianity come to a focal point at a time like this. It is here we put these teachings to their most important test. I’ve had people over the years tell me the funeral of a faithful Christian believer is very different from that of a person without faith. And I certainly agree with that statement. The one outstanding feature of a Christian funeral is there is a strong sense of hope.
• As God’s people, our sense of loss is tempered by an equally strong promise for the future
• We understand this is not a Finality but simply a transition from Time to Eternity
Hope still speaks this morning because rev. Jobie Kirk’s faith still speaks.
• His faith speaks about his relationship with God
• His faith speaks to acts of service in God’s name
• Bro. Kirk’s funeral is not an admission of Defeat but a statement of Victory
• And that victory is made possible by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ and by the fact that Bro. Jobie believed these words with all his heart
We are comforted this morning in knowing that a special saint – and, in the Bible, a saint is anyone who has faith in god and in his son, jesus – Rev. Kirk has gone home to be with the Lord.
• Bro. Jobie wouldn’t want us to make him the focus of this service today
• He would want the focus to be on the God He worshipped
• Bro. Jobie wouldn’t want to be put on a pedestal
• Jobie Kirk’s life was like a COIN WITH TWO SIDES
• His Humanity was balanced by his Faith
• Each one balanced the other and made him who he was
Let me get right to the heart of the matter. God uses flawed people to demonstrate his grace so that when the victory is won, he alone gets the glory. Paul confirmed this in our text for examination -- “NOW WE HAVE THIS TREASURE IN JARS OF CLAY, SO THAT THIS EXTRAORDINARY POWER MAY BE FROM GOD AND NOT FROM US.” That’s all we are, just clay pots, ordinary kitchenware, clay pots that are easily cracked and often broken.
• We’re not expensive China that you buy in some high-dollar store in New York City or Los Angeles
• We’re ordinary Wal-Mart kitchenware, useful but not expensive
• We’re all cracked and chipped in various places, yet God in His Grace uses us anyway
Clay jars in the first century were Ordinary – Common - Easily Broken - Often Discarded. They were used for carrying water and other ordinary functions. The image of pottery is it is fragile and can easily become cracked, chipped, or broken if dropped. So, it's terribly humbling to realize the APOSTLE PAUL tells us we are clay pots. Harshly unflattering. It would not be so bad if he was talking about our lives B.C. (Before Christ), but he's talking about after we have Christ in us.
God puts the Unbelievable – Inconceivable – Unthinkable – Unimaginable - Implausible Treasure of the Universe "the very presence of the almighty God of the universe" in us!
• You would think that would make us expensive containers
• Precious contents go in valuable containers
• That would make perfect human sense
• But no
• He places this most precious treasure in "JARS OF CLAY"
• So that others will see and experience the treasure of Christ rather than being impressed with us
What happens when a clay pot gets jostled around, bumped - passed from one person to another, or even cracked? The contents spill out. Or in the Apostle Paul's words, what happens when a fragile human being who is filled with Christ is 'Hard Pressed - Perplexed - Persecuted - Struck Down - Faces Death?
• That person spills out the Presence of Christ on all in the area, filling the place with the aroma of Christ
• What happens if it is not Jostled?
• That treasure just sits there
The Shaking and Disruptions in our lives are not because God has abandoned us at all. It is because He believes in us as His treasure holders who spill his presence.
• Problem is that too often we when we are being challenged by the cares of this life
• If we don’t understand what is in us we begin to spill out stuff that does not look, smell or taste like Christ
• Because we've never learned or somehow forgotten that we are clay pots filled with Christ
• Rather than cracked and leaking a treasure that attracts toward Heaven because we focus on the jars of clay instead of the sweet contents
• We are truly "JARS OF CLAY AND CRACKED POTS
Our bodies, these perishable containers, are vessels that are to be used.
• They are meant to be filled and emptied for some purpose
• They are the medium through which something good is made available to others
• Perhaps this container is used for Medicine for the Sick
• That container to provide Water for the Thirsty
• Or this container to offer Soup for the Hungry
As the vessel of life, the human body is used to benefit others, but is itself wasted away.
• Like the candle that gives forth light, it grows shorter with each passing hour until all its resources are expended
Yes, my brothers and sisters, we are nothing more than Jars of Clay and Cracked Pots. This is why God often highlights our inferiority by exposing to hardship and difficulty.
• Why does God do this?
• God does this in order to cause the focus to be placed upon the treasure and not upon the container
• The weakness of the container allows the wealth of the contents to shine through
• We have this TREASURE IN JARS OF CLAY to show this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us
Preachers and ministers are men, that's all. And men are not perfect so there is no hope of perfection in the ministry. If God could not use poor instruments and feeble voices, He couldn't make music. All of us, each and every one of us are simply Jars of Clay and Cracked Pots. And God would not have it any other way.
• We are harder on one another than God is on us
• ABRAHAM -- guilty of duplicity, and yet he became the man of faith and the friend of God
• MOSES -- stuttering speech, quick temper, yet he was the man chosen to make a nation and commune with God and receive His law
• DAVID -- guilty of adultery, conspiracy, murder, unfaithfulness as a husband, father - repented, became a man after God's own heart and the number one song writer of all history and we still sing his songs, the sweet singer of Israel
• ELIJAH -- running from Jezebel, asking for Euthanasia, Elijah who had stood on Mount Carmel, defied Ahab and all the prophets of Baal and yet heard the still small voice of God at Horeb
• ISAIAH -- in the presence of the heavenly vision says, "I'm a man with a dirty mouth, I live among people with dirty mouths, I'm certainly useless to You, O God" - But when he had been cleansed he said, "Here am I, send me," and God said go
• PETER -- another clay pot, the leader, the spokesman of the twelve Apostles who denied his Lord with oaths and curses, who even had the audacity to correct the Lord and yet was restored by the compassion of Jesus in the midst of his disobedience and was enabled by the power of the Holy Spirit to speak with such force on the Day of Pentecost as to be the agency by which God brought to birth the great Pentecostal introduction to the church
• Are you getting the picture here?
• We are nothing more than JARS OF CLAY AND CRACKED POTS
We as Christians are merely “clay pots - while the Gospel is the treasure.
• Earthen vessels (clay pots) are common and cheap
• Ones like those red flowerpots we can buy today for very little money
• Earthen vessels (clay pots) are also fragile and easily broken
• Earthen vessels (clay pots) are “earthy” and “earthly” - they are of this world
• Remember we were made of the Dust of the Earth
• Earthen vessels are fashioned by the Potter, who creates them for His own purposes
• Clay pots have nothing in which to boast - they have no basis for feeling superior
• The treasure gains nothing from the pots
• If anything, the pots gain from the Glory of the Treasure
We spend too much time focusing upon the Jars of Clay while our attention should be placed on the Treasure, what is inside of the Clay Pot.
• We focus too often upon the Cracks within the Jars of Clay
• We focus too often upon the Brokenness of the Jars of Clay
• We focus too often upon the Chips and the Defects of the Jars of Clay
When we do such we miss the value of what has been placed in the Jars of Clay. The Lord places this most precious treasure in Jars of Clay - so that others will see and experience the treasure of Christ rather than being impressed with or find fault in us.
Jesus was at dinner at the house of a self righteous pharisee and there is this woman that everybody in town knows to be is a sinner, she is a woman from the Red Light District and before they can say anything to condemn or escort her out of the gathering, she broke open her alabaster box of ointment while crying and wiping the feet of jesus.
• And she is kissing his feet and she anoints them with the ointment
• She is a sinner at the feet of Jesus
• All eyes were on her and the way she lived her life
• All eyes were on her to condemn her life choices
Notice that Jesus does not stop the woman.
• He knew that the woman was a lady of the night - but He didn’t stop her
• He knew she was a sinner - but He didn’t Condemn her
• Everyone else in the room had focused upon the SCARS – CRACKS – BROKENESS of her life
• Jesus focused upon the SWEET TREASURE WITHIN HER
As this woman with so many issues begins to cry at the feet of Jesus she breaks open the alabaster box she is carrying and begins to anoint the head and feet of Jesus.
• The box was not worth very much
• The real treasure was the contents within the Alabaster Box
• When the Box was Broken
• When the Box was Fragmented
• When the Box was Damaged
• What was inside was Revealed
• The Sweet Aroma of what was on the inside
• The True Value was on the inside
--If we ever learn to take our eyes off of the Jars of Clay
--We will then be able to appreciate what the Lord has placed on the inside of each of us
--We’re all cracked and chipped in various places - yet God in His Grace uses us anyway
--Our faith, halting and imperfect, is still approved by God
--We try to care for these jars of clay, but eventually, inevitably they wear out
--They do not last forever, and that causes us great grief and disappointment
--We thank God for this Earthen Vessel in the life of Rev. Jobie Kirk
--We thank God for his ministry
--We thank God for the so many families blessed by his Kindness and Generosity
--We thank God for the JARS OF CLAY AND CRACKED POTS
--For that is the only condition in which God can use us
