Broken pottery…
A friend sent picture of a broken bowl mended with gold…a Japanese technique, kintsukuroi, which makes the bowl so much more beautiful…even in it brokenness…
It reminded me of some chunks of white quartz from the California gold bearing area which has gold stringers running through it, beautifully created by God at some point in time…He filled the cracks in the rock with gold…
Another picture came to mind, one taken around Panama, a discard heap of broken pottery used to fill in spaces around the plants/trees…
And then Job, using a piece of broken pottery to scrape his sores as he sat in the ashes…in his pain physically…
And he took a piece of broken pottery with which to scrape himself while he sat in the ashes.
Then his wife said to him, “Do you still hold fast your integrity? Curse God and die.”
But he said to her, “You speak as one of the foolish women would speak. Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil?”
In all this Job did not sin with his lips.
And they sat with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his suffering was very great.
Job.2.8-10,Job.2.13
Broken pottery….
Paul speaks of jars of clay…a wonder that God uses us, jars of clay, to portray this treasure, the Good News of salvation…
And here could be another description of Job, afflicted, perplexed, struck down, but not destroyed…
So many lessons for each of us…even in brokenness God uses the shards, as they are or puts the pots back together in righteousness, gold with his hand ever ready to restore…refined …
But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed;
2Cor.4.7-9
But we have this precious treasure [the good news about salvation] in [unworthy] earthen vessels [of human frailty], so that the grandeur and surpassing greatness of the power will be [shown to be] from God [His sufficiency] and not from ourselves.
2Cor.4.7AMP
Thank YOU
Vessels of clay….
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