About Me

Pearl City, HI, United States
Husband, father, grandfather, friend...a few of the roles acquired in 69 years of living. I keep an upbeat attitude, loving humor and the singular freedom of a perfect laugh. I don't let curmudgeons ruin my day; that only gives them power over me. Having experienced death once, I no longer fear it, although I am still frightened by the process of dying. I love to write because it allows me the freedom to vent those complex feelings that bounce restlessly off the walls of my mind; and express the beauty that can only be found within the human heart.

Monday, May 27, 2024

Jars of Clay

 



Adobe Stock Images

It is early morning, the dew still upon the grass. Within a humble shed, a small turntable begins to spin. The steady tread of a foot pedal joins the sounds of cheerful birdsong in the air.

A pair of hands, strong and capable, but skilled in the delicate and fine, deposits a mound of wet clay on the turntable.  For now, it is just a lump, gray and formless.  Muddy drops of water fall to the floor.  As yet, it is ugly.  But in the artist’s eyes, something beautiful can be seen.  Slowly, patiently, the hands begin to shape the clay.  Out of that formless lump a vessel emerges, tall and graceful.  The process is hard to follow from the outside, seeming to emerge by magic, because it is in the artist’s vision, soul, and skillful hands that this vessel is brought to life.

In the scriptures, we are these earthenware vessels, these jars of clay.  We are born and shaped in the eyes of God, the artist.  But we are fragile, easily chipped, cracked, and even shattered.  As jars, we can no longer hold water.  But what we carry inside our imperfect selves is not water, but light; the light of God’s love, the light of His Gospel.  Through our cracks, around our chips, even from our shattered pieces, that light shines out into this world of darkness.  Our value is no longer what we hold within, but rather what was hidden within now flows and floods out of us.  That light within us is like holy water, that douses the thirst of sorrow, anger, hate, and despair.  It is only when it is allowed to flow freely that it delivers the blessing. 

Take stock not of our imperfections, of what we think we can no longer do.  But rather, what we are able to do, and commanded to do, as keepers of the light of God.