There's a dent in the nice pewter chalice that we use during festival seasons. I noticed it yesterday morning while setting the altar for the day's Eucharist. It's not big. It won't prevent us from using the vessel. But it's definitely there...a little chink in an otherwise beautiful thing.
It got me to thinking about the other vessels through which Christ's presence is delivered...namely the human ones. Undoubtedly, most of us would fall into the "beautiful, but dented" category, too.
St. Paul is right. We're basically a bunch of crack-pots (2 Corinthinians 4:7ff). It makes me all the more thankful for a God who could claim worth enough in us for which to die. I'd like to do better by that God...not that I think my dents will go away, but that at least His grace might be visible in and through them.
1 comment:
I like thinking of the "jars of clay" metaphor as translating to old cardboard boxes today. We don't use (and re-use) a cardboard box becuase of the security it affords us, we do it because it's the usually the most simple vessel we can find. Yet God turns this upside down by placing his love in all of us--the beat up, second hand cardboard boxes that we are. How awesome is that!?!
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