“Only Human”
2 Corinthians 4:5-12
How many of you watched the Bengals and the Bills game on Monday Night Football this past week?
Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin had a cardiac arrest and collapsed on the field in the first quarter after a violent hit.
The game was stopped, as it should have.
Players were traumatized by what they saw as paramedics and other medical personnel gave him CPR to restart his heart.
A number of them openly wept; others were sobbing into towels.
The Bills team formed a circle around Hamlin; several held hands and prayed.
A writer for USA Today wrote the following day that sometimes we “forget that NFL players are human…there are times when we forget their humanity and think of them as drones with numbers on their backs.”
This was an interesting perspective.
And watching grown men—big and tough grown men--bawling on National TV is undoubtedly an eye-opener.
We sometimes forget that all people are just human, like ourselves.
This could apply to people engaged in wars in far-off countries or migrants trying to get into our country.
They are mothers, brothers, fathers, and caregivers.
And it could also apply to Christians.
Sometimes, we expect those who follow Christ to be super-human.
Or maybe we expect this from ourselves, and if we don’t live up to it, we might question our faith or whether or not we are saved.
But, one of the big puzzles in life is to learn to accept and perhaps even appreciate our idiosyncrasies, especially those of others.
This doesn’t mean we revel in self-destructive behavior or things that hurt ourselves or others.
It means that as Christians, as people who are loved by God and love God and are seeking to follow Christ, we accept that we all have things that remind us and others that we are simply human, and therefore, we must trust in God completely for all we are and all we have.
There is a story about a man who served as the British Ambassador to the United States when the Cold War began.
And as Ambassador, he was often in touch, daily, with the US President and the Prime Minister on the other side of the Atlantic.
He often needed to get urgent, essential, and top-secret messages back and forth between Washington and London.
And at this time, there were no cell phones, and it was far too risky to make telephone calls because the line was almost always bugged.
So, when something was confidential, wholly and utterly top secret, and desperately urgent, he would put the message in an ordinary envelope and send it through the regular mail.
And that is how the important message was delivered, in a plain envelope.
(pause)
In our Scripture Lesson for this morning, Paul says that God has decided to put the most urgent and essential message of all time—the greatest treasure in the world—the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ in “jars of clay.”
Clay jars were used to carry water and other goods during Paul’s day.
And clay is a common substance that is available almost everywhere, and potters mastered the art of forming clay jars on their pottery wheels.
While some clay jars were beautifully decorated, most were humble vessels.
But whether they were plain or beautiful, they had a life-giving function—gathering, preserving, and transporting water to thirsty people.
Clay jars are also fragile—breaking if dropped or hit by a stone.
Not many clay jars survived a person’s lifetime—and even fewer survived to be passed down through several generations.
And Paul uses the metaphor of jars of clay to represent us Christians who carry God’s message of salvation by grace through faith in Christ Jesus—that is the treasure!!!
I think jars of clay are a good metaphor for our brief lives.
We have a few decades to proclaim the Gospel at best.
I also love this metaphor of clay jars because it reminds me of my calling to proclaim the Gospel, but I am also conscious of my inadequacy to do just that.
But notice again what Paul writes in verse 7: “But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.”
Why is this important?
Well, for one thing, it gives us a good reason for humility.
And humility is absolutely essential for anyone of us who seek to be vessels who carry the message of God’s love to other people who are thirsting to hear and see it.
When we forget that Christianity is not about us, is not about our opinions, is not about our rights and privileges—that is when we start to veer off track and cause the Gospel—which is really no Gospel at all—to look like a bad thing to the rest of society, like a judgmental and “I’m better than you” thing.
In our reading, Paul doesn’t lie when he points out that being a bearer of the Gospel in this world is complex.
And this is because we are all human.
We all live with temptations, limitations, and the fragility of being easily broken.
Even Paul admits to being perplexed, hard-pressed, persecuted, and often struck down.
But he says that even though this is the case, we are not left in despair, we are not abandoned, and we are not destroyed.
And this is all because of Jesus and Jesus only!
Even when we get off course and let go of God’s hand, God never lets go of our hand.
Even when we mess up and do really dumb things, God is with us and God’s Holy Spirit leads us to repentance and reconciliation.
If we are willing vessels, God can accomplish some very good things through us even when we make mistakes…
…because…
…it’s NOT ABOUT US—it’s about the treasure of Jesus Christ and Him Crucified and Risen that is the “surpassing power from God.”
I hope this enables us to be honest about our frailty, our human-ness—not only with God and others but with ourselves.
Phariseeism, or trying to be perfect according to the Law according to our own strength, can and will cause us all kinds of problems, such as low self-esteem, frustration, and possibly mental illness.
But when we accept that God accepts us—even as imperfect jars of clay- we can accept ourselves and others and enjoy the fruitful journey of being one of Christ’s very human disciples.
And that is the healthy way to live.
And that is attractive to other people.
Because no one is perfect.
And if we try and pretend we are perfect, we will find ourselves in a lonely place and a broken place.
Sometimes, as Christians, we misunderstand our role in all this stuff.
God makes God’s light shine in our hearts, for “we preach not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord….”
If the message of God is going to be robust throughout our lives, we must get out of the way.
And what a relief that is.
It is a relief to know we don’t have to try and save the world—we are not expected to save the world.
Only the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ can and will save the world.
So, we are free to be humble.
We are free to be ourselves.
We are free to be wholly and fully human.
We no longer have to live with the pressure of fighting for all the attention or demanding our rights, our way, and so forth.
We don’t have to judge the world and tell the world it is wrong and we are right.
We are to allow God’s light to shine through our lives simply and humbly.
The life of a humble servant of Christ may not be easy, but it should be a stress reducer.
Paul says, “For we who are alive are being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may also be revealed in our mortal body.”
We are to die to self and live for Christ.
We are to die to our wants and live for what Christ wants.
We are to die to selfishness, envy and the like and live lives of humble transparency and love.
The world talks a whole lot about human power, but the real characteristic of a human being is not our power but our weakness and what God can and will achieve through that weakness.
There is a story about a water carrier in India who had two large clay jars, and each jar hung on either end of a pole that she carried across her shoulders.
One of the jars had a crack in it, and the other did not.
After the long walk from the source of water, the cracked jar always arrived at its destination half full.
And this caused the jar with no crack to become proud of its own accomplishments.
But the cracked jar was ashamed of its imperfection and was miserable that it could only accomplish half of what it was created to do.
One day, the cracked jar spoke to the water carrier, “I am ashamed of myself,” it said.
“You need not be ashamed of yourself,” replied the water carrier who had an appreciation for the old cracked jar.
She said, “As we return to our destination, I want you to notice the beautiful flowers along the path.”
And sure enough, as they went down the path, the old cracked jar saw the sun warming the beautiful flowers on the side of the path.
But at the end of the trail, the cracked jar felt bad again because it had leaked half its load.
The water carrier asked, “Did you notice that there were flowers on your side of the path, but not on the other side?
That is because I have always known about your flaw, and I took advantage of it.
I planted flower seeds on your side of the path and every day while we walk back from the stream, you’ve watered them.
For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate my master’s table.
Without you being just the way you are, he would not have this beauty in his house.”
Each of us have our own unique flaws.
We are all cracked jars.
We are all only human, weak and fragile.
But God is able to do great things, even through our weakness if we allow Him.
And that is a reason to rejoice in whom God has created us to be.
Football is arguably America’s favorite sport, and on Monday night there was a BIG game to be played.
But then, the horror of what we saw happened.
And we remembered our collective humanity.
Players stopped in their tracks, crying, kneeling, praying and holding hands.
The game was forgotten and canceled.
Eventually, the crowd left the stadium with 5 minutes left in the first quarter.
And football was secondary to or not even secondary to the need to take care of a fellow human being who fell on the field.
God calls us to be who we are—human.
And we are most fully human when we are allowing God’s light and love—the treasure of His Gospel of Jesus Christ—to shine through the cracks in our lives.
May it be so with you and with me.
Amen.
Let us pray:
Lord, we thank You that You have not left the burden of trying to save the world up to us.
But You allow us to be in on the sharing and the shining of Your Good News into the darkness of our world.
And Your light shines most brightly through us when we remember who we are, human—created to love and be loved—just like everyone else.
In Jesus’ name and for His sake we pray.
Amen.
