Treasure in Earthen Vessels
2 Cor. iv. 7.
‘YhHAT treasure? The ’ light of the glory of God, But why put such a resplendent treasure into commonplace earthen vessels? In order that we may not think more of the vessel than we do of the treasure it contains. It is possible for a man to think more about the binding of a book than of the truth which the book reveals; and so God often enshrines His truth in books of very poor and unattractive binding. God likes to show His loveliest flowers in very plain and commonplace pots. He likes to put a handful of His jewels inio an almost forbidding casket. He likes to kindle the light of His glory on very ungainly lamps. And why? That the treasure n6 (TlUfcitaftone for Qutef QTlomente
may not be eclipsed by the fascinations of the vessel which holds it; that the truth may not be obscured by the personal or social grandeur of the man who proclaims it; that the divine may not be lost in the boastful protrusion of the human; ’ that the exceeding greatness may be of God, and not from ourselves, Let us look for examples of this method of Providence in the broad field of human life.
i. God puts His treasure into earthen vessels when He kindles the prophetic fire in the heart of a nobody. How innumerable have been the instances where God has chosen a nobody to be the prophet of his time! Look back. Away yonder, far back in the history of Israel, the nation is riotous and full of sin, abounding in cruelty and injustice and superstition. Into this people must be brought the consuming fire of the divine word. Who shall be the vessel to bear it? On the hills of Tekoa there wanders a lonely herdsman following his flock. He is unknown to the grandees of the metropolis, and when he shall stand in their spacious squares his appearance will betray him as a greenhorn from the country. Yet this rough and unkempt herdsman, made of very common clay, was chosen
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to be the bearer of the treasure of the Lord.
Take the Book of Revelation, through which you get glimpses into the very heart and home of God. In what kind of magnificent casket were these magnificent visions reposed? In the heart of a fisherman named John, who had one day been found by the Lord, ’ with James his brother, as they were in the ship ‘mending their nets, He was chosen to be the bearer of revelations whose deep and far-reaching splendours have even yet not been all disclosed. The treasure was put into an earthen vessel.
In the last century, and especially in its early years, our own nation was deeply sunk in moral apathy and spiritual death. Yonder, at the Bell Inn, Gloucester, standing behind the bar as a common drawer, is a young fellow named George Whitefield, and he is the chosen vessel to bear the treasure of prophetic truth. Truly a very earthen vessel, of very common clay; but in him was kindled the fire of the Holy Ghost, by whose burning the iniquity was consumed in innumerable hearts.
2. The Lord puts His treasure into earthen vessels when He puts the power of the Holy Ghost into so-called foolish and contemptible n8 QHeWaftone for Qute* QUotnenfs
speech. It is possible to have a golden casket of eloquence, and yet for that golden casket to contain no treasure, no power of the Holy Ghost. Eloquence may be a wind-bag. Stammering lips may be burdened with the very fullness of God. I do not wish to disparage the great ministry of eloquent speech; I believe that God often puts His apples of gold into pictures of silver, and His beautiful revelations into beautiful speech. But I wish to emphasize the peril that the golden vessel may draw attention to itself, and fix the admiration there. Eloquence may point to itself, while ‘contemptible speech’ may point to God. Some of our Easter cards have pictures of the cross all wreathed in exquisite flowers. You think more of the flowers than you do of the cross. And a speaker may bury his Lord in flowery language, so that we pay compliments to the speaker when we should be worshipping his Lord. Thus the Lord chooses the plain, unlettered man, who cannot paint flowers and speak them, the rough, uncultured man who can just put out his finger and point to the King.
3. The Lord puts His treasure into earthen vessels when He puts His strength and beauty into bodies of decrepitude and weakness.
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Paul was satirized as having a ‘bodily presence ’ which was ’ weak.’ It was a characteristic criticism from a nation of athletes. God sent to the Greeks a diminutive-looking Jew, small and insignificant. The treasure was put into a most frail and ungainly vessel. How often it happens that ‘the light of the glory of God ’ shows most splendidly through the invalid of the family! What an amazingly beautiful treasure was put into the frail vessel of Frances Ridley Havergal!
The Lord loves to use ‘the weak things, and ’ things that are despised, He loves to put the treasure of His grace into the feeble, that the world may be compelled to ask, ‘Whence hath this man this power? ’