THURSDAY, JANUARY 18
“But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.”
2 Corinthians 4:7 ESV
WHEN LIFE HAPPENS: DON’T SETTLE
A woman found an eagle’s egg and put it in the nest of a backyard hen. The eaglet hatched with the brood of chicks and grew up with them. All his life the eagle lived as a chicken. He scratched the earth for worms and insects. Clucked and cackled. Occasionally, he would thrash his wings and fly a few feet into the air. Years passed, and the eagle grew very old. One day he saw a magnificent bird far above him in the cloudless sky. It glided in the powerful wind currents, with scarcely a beat of its strong wings. The old eagle looked up in awe. “Who’s that?” he asked. “That’s the eagle, the king of the birds,” said his neighbor. “He belongs to the sky. We belong to the earth — we’re chickens.” So, the eagle lived and died a chicken, for that is what he thought he was.
If you are a Christian, God’s presence and power is within you. That’s the “treasure in jars of clay” Paul was talking about in 2 Corinthians 2:47. God chose us in our weakness so that it would be clear our life change had to be due to God’s power and not our own. In a sense, we are chickens with eagle abilities because of God’s presence.
Author John Jewett wrote: “There is something wrong when the vessel robs the treasure of its glory, when the casket attracts more attention than the jewel which it bears. There is a very perverse emphasis when the picture takes second place to the frame, and when the ware which is used at the feast becomes a substitute for the meal. There is something deadly in Christian service when “the excellency of the power” is of us and not God. Such excellency is of a very fleeting kind, and it will speedily wither as the green herb and pass into oblivion.”
Every trial in life is an opportunity to display God’s power and goodness in our lives. If we take short cuts or settle, we are missing an opportunity to point others to Jesus. God wants to use you and your weakness. Your flaws are part of His plan. Ask God to use your weakness today.
In 1 Corinthians 1:27-29 the Apostle Paul wrote:
“God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, God has chosen what is low and despised in the world, things that are not to reduce to nothing the things that are, so that no person might boast before God.”
