Day 60: Treasure in Clay Jars

I'll admit it:  embedded in these four chapters of 2 Corinthians are some of my favorite verses in the New Testament:
"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ; there is a new creation; everything old has passed away; everything has become new!"
 "For the love of Christ controls us, for we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore all have died."
"We have this treasure in clay jars so that the awesome power belongs to God and doesn't come from us."

Paul is unleashing persuasive powers on the Corinthians.  In his first letter, he admonished them; now he's trying to paint a picture of the riches of the gospel, in order to convince them of the beauty and truth of the message he brings.

It seems that Paul still has competition for respect among the Corinthians; he still has to make his case that he ought to be listened to and respected as an apostle.  But it also appears that his warnings have borne fruit; he believes that even though he made the church in Corinth sad, that they are turning from their sins and returning to God, and that is a good thing.

For a long time I thought that the verses at the end of chapter 4 and the beginning of chapter 5 "even if our bodies are breaking down on the outside, the person that we are on the inside is being renewed every day" were about eternal life, and the "building from God" was simply about heaven.

But now I see it a little more expansively.  I think our "inner nature" doesn't refer to a spiritual reality apart from our bodies, but that our "inner nature" and our "outer nature" have to do with the difference between how the world judges us and how God sees us.  So, for example, "the world" judged Jesus in a certain way because of what they saw:  we saw a poor carpenter who preached justice and who died a criminal's death.  But God saw him differently; God saw that he lived the kind of life that was blessed by God; that he was, in fact, God's son.

So, invisibly, God's grace and love is working in is, to renew our inner nature.  We might be experiencing hardship and trials, but that is not what defines our life.

That's what Paul is telling the Corinthians, both about them and about himself.  He is experiencing hardship, and frustration and poverty and persecution.  But that doesn't mean that he is a failure as an apostle.  And  it is the same with the Corinthians.  God is with them not only in their success, but in their failure, and is working through them.  They can't judge God's favor by what they see on the outside.

At the close, it seems that none of the words I have written are half as powerful as Paul's own:

"If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation; everything old has passed away; everything has become new."

We do have this treasure in clay jars, God's grace somehow shines through in the clay jars of our own imperfect lives, in our own imperfect words, in our own imperfect actions.