unadorned cracked pot

We carry this precious Message around in the unadorned clay pots of our ordinary lives.

2 Cor 4:7a MSG

But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.

2 Cor 4:7 NIV

But this beautiful treasure is contained in us – cracked pots made of earth and clay – so that the transcendent character of this power will be clearly seen as coming from God and not from us.

2 Cor 4:7 The Voice

This past few weeks have been ones where a few more of my cracks seems to have become wider gaps.

I feel stretched.

As the Potter’s hand works on clay, He keeps needing to wet the clay in order to reshape it.

When i stop seeking His living water, I get too dry.

And cracks form in my pot as it hardens.

The good news?

God can soften hard pots.

But it leaves cracks behind.

I heard a story about a young gal who had to carry water in a cracked pot back & forth, day in and day out. By the time she got home there wasn’t the amount of water she started out with.

Long story short, beautiful flowers appeared on the side of the road where the water had been dripping, day after day.

God never wastes, not one single drop, from our cracks.

I have often wondered if I didn’t have the flaws & foibles I had if God would use me as much….because i suspect i wouldn’t feel the need for Him as acutely as I do throughout my days.

Today, I felt the cracks, after a few days of God soaking & spinning & pressing & smoothing.

I know how much I need Him, the more He sets me free & guides me.

To Him, I am chosen.
To the world, I appear a pudgy married mom of two young adults, with curly red hair & glasses, with a zany sense of humour, who loves words, tea and right now in this cold spell, her heating pad. 🙂

An unadorned cracked pot.

Yet God chooses to use me…

I know that when I have met someone who radiates Jesus, I don’t pay as close attention to their cracks or flaws….I see Jesus pouring out through them.

That’s my heart’s desire.

To be cracked in all the right places for Jesus to shine through me, so although I am humble clay, the Almighty can use me for His glory.

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The Good News Message for us all?

God can use all of us, despite our cracks, chips & holes.

It’s about our availability, our holding out our hands to be filled, not about our capability.

It’s about His ability, to use the cracked, broken & lowly to shoe the world just how loving, graceful, kind, mighty & powerful He really is!

I’m a cracked pot, how about you?

dry & weary land

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There are places within that are parched, dry, weary.

Broken places I have buried for too long.

Hopes & dreams I wait for.

Wounds that have been partly healed, a crack still open to keep the infection brewing.

There is no 100% cure without God.
None.

You see, the layers within cannot be reached to our very depths by anything we can do or try.

Simply put, we don’t have the right tools without God’s leading us through the layers.

Only He can peel back our defenses to let the truth come to light.

Once the negative roots get exposed, they are uprooted to stop their poisonous growth.

The positive roots are properly planted to burrow deep as originally intended without any more lies choking the life out of them, or the excess layers of soil become so soaked the water can finally spur the roots on to grow.

Dry and weary can mean we need to lay our stuff down, and ask God to release His living water to soak us through and through.

It’s waiting, taking a breather from what’s going on around you, or within your swirling emotions, for God to meet you.

It is stopping the doing, to being in His presence, that leads us to that water.

If you are parched, come to the One who can satisfy you within.

Hope will blossom again, as you rest in His love. The refreshment of knowing you are deeply cared for.

It’s time to get thirsty again.

God is waiting to do all the work, He just needs you to come.