Word of Salvation – Vol. 39 No.27 – July 1994

 

Treasures In Clay Jars

 

Sermon by Rev. K. Rietveld

Reading: Mark 14:1-9

Text: 2Corinthians 4:1-7

Hymns: B.o.W. 445, 433, 210

 

Beloved in the Lord Jesus,

All of you have no doubt heard the saying’ you can’t judge a book by its cover.’  I have tested the truth of this saying on some young children by using two different gifts.  One gift was wrapped in newspaper and the other was wrapped in shiny and colourful paper with a bright bow.  In almost every case the child chose the pretty parcel, only to be disappointed with its contents.  Then when I opened the parcel wrapped in newspaper, it would contain something precious, much to their surprise.  We have all no doubt learned the lesson that things are not always what they appear to be on the outside.  Apples at the supermarket may look shiny, healthy, feel good and in all respects look like a good buy.  But we’ve all had the odd apple that is brown on the inside and perhaps even contain a grub or two.  That experience has taught many of us that we still have much to learn about making the right judgement.  What we see on the outside is not always what it is like on the inside.

In a way Christianity is like that.  Christianity comes in an outer wrapping an outer cover.  And the cover of Christianity is Christians.  Christians are the wrappings of the Christian faith.  And given the fact that Christians are far from perfect, the outer cover can be somewhat deceptive.  The apostle Paul savs, ‘We have this treasure’ (and he is talking about the treasure of the Lord Jesus) ‘we have this treasure in clay jars.’  And the treasure is more important than the wrapping.  The clay jar is expendable.  The clay jar can be thrown out.  The treasure is all important.  Today I want to focus first of all on the treasure.  But I also want to say something later about the clay jars.

Firstly, let us look again at verse 6 of our text.  There we have the answer to the question, ‘what is the treasure?’  It says, ‘For God, who let light shine out of the darkness, made His light shine in our hearts.’  Here God is identified as the Creator.  He is called the God who created light out of darkness.  He is the same God who made light shine in our hearts.

There is the treasure!  God’s light shining in our hearts.  People who have the treasure have the light of God shining in their hearts.  What exactly is this light?  Our text goes on to say that, ‘He made this light shine in our hearts… to give us the knowledge of the glory of God.’  In other words, the light that God puts in our hearts is given so that we might know the glory of God.  This is not just meant in a theoretical sense.  So often we talk about knowing’ things when what we really mean is knowing about them.  But when this verse speaks about knowing the glory of God, it talks about knowing it intimately; knowing it experientially, as something real and personal.

I know a lot of people.  I know many of you here personally, and I know a lot more people besides you here.  But there are even more people whom I know about.  I know about Paul Keating and Bob Hawke and I know about John Major and Bill Clinton.  I have not met those people but I know about them.  I can read about them , learn about them from TV or radio.  But I do not KNOW them in that deeper sense of having an intimate acquaintance with them.

That raises another question.  How do we come to know God?  How do we come to know God who is so exalted, so glorious and who is so beyond our understanding and our grasp?  Let us read the whole of verse 6 again……..  The verse finishes with, ‘In the face of Christ.’  You see we can only know the glory of God through looking at Christ.  When Jesus walked this earth, one of His disciples Philip, came to Him one day.  Philip was also probably thinking about how he might KNOW God.  He came up to Jesus and he said, ‘Jesus will you show us the Father?’  And you know what Jesus said to him?  Jesus answered, ‘Philip, do you not know Me?  Philip, haven’t I been with you so long and you don’t know Me?’  What Jesus was saying was, ‘when you see me you see the Father, because the Father and I are one.’

Friends, if we want to have that personal experience with God.  If we want to have that knowledge of the glory of God, that light of God in our hearts, then there is only one way we can ever have that.  That is by coming to Jesus Christ, because Jesus is the image of God.  How do we come to Jesus Christ?  Well, that is what the gospel is all about.  The apostle Paul says, ‘We proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord.’

Let me in just a few words, try and set forth this message of the gospel for you.  It is this.  God created people right at the beginning of history.  He made them pure and righteous and holy.  But very shortly after the creation was complete, Adam and Eve disobeyed and destroyed that original intimate relationship with Him.  They were alienated from God.  And ever since, all of mankind throughout the generations has been living in alienation from God.  People are trying somehow to find a sense of fulfilment and a sense of satisfaction in the way they live.  They try and do that in all sorts of ways.  For example, through involvement in sport, through creating a positive self image, or through meditation of one kind or another.  Others may try to build up assets or do good works in the community so that somehow they might experience a sense of fulfilment in their lives.  Yet all find that it comes to nothing.  None of these things satisfy that inner hunger we all have.  The reason for this is that the inner hunger can only be satisfied by a right relationship with God.

God was fully aware of man’s searching and his inability to return to God, so He sent His Son Jesus into the world to die on the cross.  In that way, He took away this barrier of sin and all its consequences.  Thus He opened the way to the Father.  Now, people who come to Jesus Christ in faith, and who say, ‘Jesus I need you for the forgiveness of my sins.  I need you so that I might be reconciled to the Father, come to know God.  Only those who come to Jesus in this manner can begin to experience the real treasure of KNOWING God, and knowing His glory as a personal reality in their lives.

My friends, that is the gospel which we proclaim.  That is the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.  That is what Jesus has done on the Cross of Calvary and that is what enables you to be right with God.  You need to respond to that with your heart.  You can only know the glory of God through a faith relationship with His Son Jesus.  When you do that, when you come to Jesus Christ in true faith, then something wonderful happens.  God causes that light to shine in your hearts so that you may KNOW His glory through Jesus Christ.  In Christ Jesus, God reveals himself not only as an awesome God but as a loving Father.  When you believe in Jesus you will be one of those people who have that treasure in their hearts.  We sing about that treasure in the song: ‘Jesus priceless treasure.’ That treasure adds meaning and purpose to life.  That treasure gives your life complete fulfilment.  It is the treasure that changes your life.

But, you may ask: ‘How does this treasure come to us?’ In verse 7 of our text Paul says, ‘we have this treasure in jars of clay.’  There may be people here who have never been able to find the treasure because the jars of clay have been in the way.  Sometimes, the people who are interested in the treasure are looking in the wrong place.  They cannot get past looking at the clay jars.  They are judging the book by its cover, rather than by its contents.  There are many people who judge Christianity by Christians, instead of judging it by Christ.  And let me say that when you judge Christianity by Christians, you are always going to get a very imperfect picture and you are always going to be disappointed because Christians have many imperfections.  Young people will know this especially because Christian parents in the home sometimes set a very bad example.  Young people see their parents fight and they see them making lame excuses for copping out of church activities.  They see dishonesty.  They hear their parents gossip.  And the clay jars become a significant barrier which prevents young people from seeing the treasure.  That is not only the case in the home, but also wherever you find Christians.

Christians can be very poor ambassadors for Christianity.  I think perhaps I need to apologise to you at this time.  If you have been looking for the treasure and you have not been able to see the treasure, perhaps the clay jar has gotten in the way.  Let me encourage you that if you are looking for that treasure, then look at Jesus Christ.  The apostle Paul says, ‘we do not preach ourselves, but Christ crucified.’  The Christian faith is not just some nice club of people or social unit that somehow builds itself up all the time.  It doesn’t always do that.  The divisions that have happened in the church throughout history are a very sad reflection upon the church of the Lord Jesus Christ.  But I want to suggest to you that you need to look beyond that, and that if you want that treasure in your heart then you must look beyond Christians.  Look at Jesus Christ!  Look at the perfect Son of God!  Look at His love.  Look at how He came to lay down His life at the Cross of Calvary to take away your sins.  He did that to give you real life.

There’s a second problem with clay jars, and that is that at times you can’t find the treasure in them.  There are Christians who think that the clay jars are as important as the treasure, and fail to see that clay jars are expendable.  The apostle Paul in verse 10 of the chapter says this: ‘we always carry around in our body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.’  That’s a very interesting verse.  Let me tell you what it means.  To carry around the death of Jesus, means that we need to carry around inside ourselves the attitude of Jesus.  We must display the sacrificial, self- giving attitude that Jesus Christ demonstrated in His life and in His death.  You see, Jesus humbled Himself, even to the point of dying on the cross.  Christians need to do that too.  Christians need to be humble people.  Christians need to be broken people.

I think you may be familiar with the story of the woman who came to Jesus with an alabaster jar of ointment.  She came in to the room where Jesus was sitting, and she broke that alabaster jar and poured the ointment all over Jesus’ feet.  It wasn’t until that jar was broken, that the ointment could be effectively used to anoint the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ.  It is just like that with us as Christians.  If God is to use us effectively to pour out His love into this world, we need to be broken people.  We need to see ourselves as being expendable.  We need to carry around in our bodies the death of Jesus so that others might see the life of Jesus in us.

The apostle Paul was writing from experience when he wrote this letter.  He too was a man who had been full of pride.  He thought that he had his religious act together.  However, on the road to Damascus, when he was out to persecute Christians, Jesus came to him and humbled him and broke him.  Later on in his life that same apostle wrote: ‘I delight in weakness, so that God’s power might be seen in me.’  As Christians we need to delight in weakness, so that people everywhere might see God’s power and God’s light in us.  Too many of us do not delight in weakness.  Too many of us do not delight in brokenness because we are too concerned with the importance of clay.  As a result, the treasure becomes hard to find.  Again I need to apologise to those who are searching for that treasure.  We, who are Christians, have not carried the death of Jesus in our lives.  Please forgive us!

I want to finish off with two challenges.  Let me first of all make a challenge to those who have already committed their lives to Jesus.  The challenge is this, dear friends.  You are a clay jar, but are you broken?  Do you carry around the death of the Lord Jesus Christ in your body?  Are you humble?  Does the life of the Lord Jesus Christ flow out of you?  Can people see in you that Jesus Christ is alive?  Or are you carried away by your own self-importance?  If you are, then you need to humble yourself before God.  You need to come before Him in confession.  You need to make that prayer that David made in Psalm 51: ‘Lord create in me a clean heart and renew a right spirit within me.’  Lord, destroy my pride, destroy my masks, so that I may more perfectly show the Lord Jesus Christ.

My second challenge is this: and it is directed to those who have not yet found the treasure.  My friends, look beyond the clay jars.  Do not look at the people sitting here in church.  Do not look at Christians, because you will be disappointed.  Look at the Lord Jesus Christ.  He came as the Son of God into this world, and made that supreme sacrifice so that you might have life and have it abundantly.  He came so that you might have everlasting life.  Your hunger and emptiness van be filled by Him.  You may experience the love and the glory of God in your own life as a reality.  Will you come to Jesus?  Will you look to him to receive that gift of life?

AMEN