Clay Jars

Rodney Gehman « 2 Corinthians 4:7-18 « July 20, 2025

[ 001 ] WELCOME/INTRO

Dismiss KidCity

Back in early 1947, a couple of [ 002 ] Bedouin shepherds were watching their sheep in the desert just outside of Jerusalem in Israel, and one of them noticed in the hills a bit of what looked like a cave opening, not something very unusual in that area, and probably out of boredom, he grabbed a stone, and threw it into the hole. And what they heard sounded like something shattering. So they climbed up into the cave, and found clay jars that were full of leather and [ 003 ]papyrus scrolls that later were estimated to be 2000 years old. Other archaeologists came along over the next couple of years, and unearthed more jars containing between 800-900 manuscript fragments – something we now know as the Dead Sea Scrolls, which are considered one of the most important archaeological discoveries of the 20th century.

In fact, throughout the decades leading up to this discovery, people had been asking the question over and over, how do we know that the Bible we’re reading hasn’t been changed? How do we know that over time, it hasn’t drifted from the original? And what they found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, among other writings and books, were pieces of every single book of the OT except Esther that were almost spot on word for word what was in our Bibles – proving that what we have in our hands today is the same Old Testament that Jesus read.

And at least a few people over the years have probably wondered why in the world would you take something so valuable and put it in a clay jar in a desert cave? Why not something in a safe or something made with Bronze. Iron. Even thick wood? With a massive lock on it. Why clay?

We probably ask that because we live in a world that values strength. No one applauds the weak. So if you’re going to store something valuable – like a handgun, or passport, you want something strong. That’s why we have safes. Thick steel lined with concrete. That’s how you protect the valuables.

And yet, here’s the illustration Paul uses in 2 Corinthians 4, [ 004 ]starting in verse 7 Now we have this treasure in clay jars, so that this extraordinary power may be from God and not from us.

We’re camping out here in this verse today, and we have stops to make:

Identifying the Treasure. What are the valuables being kept in the clay jars? What do we need to know about the treasure?

Identifying the Clay Jars. What do we need to know about the container that holds the treasure?

Identifying the “So that”. What is the purpose of putting the treasure in clay jars? And as part of that, we’ll also explore what the “extraordinary power” is.

So let’s pray and then we’ll dive straight on into it.

PRAYER

Okay, we are in 2 Corinthians chapter 4, so if you’re not there with me already, I’d love for you to have a copy of scripture open in your hands so you can Highlight. Underline. Leave notes in the margins. Interact with the word. Besides that, I know we have all the children with us this month – use this as a time to help them navigate the Word. Help them find chapters, verses, and all of that.

We are in 2 Corinthians chapter 4, and today, our main verse we’re working from is verse 7: Now we have this treasure in clay jars, so that this extraordinary power may be from God and not from us.

So let’s start with identifying this treasure. What exactly is in the clay jars? Paul phrases it like this, “now we have this treasure in clay jars” as if he’s already told you what the treasure is. He talks about it like we should already know what he’s talking about. That’s because the treasure Paul is talking about is found just one verse [ 005 ] earlier in verse 6 For God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of God’s glory in the face of Jesus Christ. That’s the treasure. It’s the Holy Spirit’s revelation, or opening of our spiritual eyes, to see the glory of God in everything Jesus has done. That’s the treasure.

For one, I would guess, 60-something woman I noticed at a Cafe in Iowa City this week, her greatest treasure was making sure she got the last open table for herself. You know how it is when someone is waiting for a parking space to clear, got the blinker on, and someone comes flying in and steals the spot – that’s what this lady did with the last open table. I watched her push past a much older woman who was already waiting, and throw herself into one of the chairs. And then she sat there with this big annoying smile on her face, so proud of herself, while her husband stood in line to order, admiring her lovingly for her bravery.

But what doubly made her actions seem so shallow and selfish was that for the 90 minutes prior to watching her do that, I had been there chatting with a great friend who has somewhat recently experienced the Holy Spirit shining the light of Jesus into his heart, awakening him to a deeper and more real faith, bringing more and more of a knowledge of scripture, and seeing God for who he is, and my friend was just bursting with joy as we talked about it, and he just wants to tell everyone what he’s found!

That’s the treasure of verse 6 and 7! And what brought my friend so much joy is that he recognizes this treasure comes by way of a personal invitation, personal interaction from God! It’s not earned, or deserved – It is, as chapter 4 verse 1 says, a gift of mercy that God gives to whomever he chooses to give it to. It’s not so much that we found the treasure, as much as the Treasure has found us!

That’s really good news if you feel like you threw away your 20s, 30s, 40s, chasing some other treasure. That’s great news if you’re in your 80s and think you’ve wasted your life. It’s great news if you’re terminally ill and don’t feel like you bring much to the table anymore.

This gift of God’s presence – his joy, his light, his life – is not based on how well you’ve lived your life to this point, it’s not even based on the fact that you would never stoop so low as to push an older woman out of the way so you can take her table: it is an act of God’s mercy; an invitation to life!

So when a person says during their baptism testimony that on such and such a date, “I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior” or we sing that old song, “I have decided to follow Jesus” – yes, that’s true, you are responsible to make that decision – but your decision is a response to what God has already done in your heart.

Look back at verse 6 – He first must shine the light of the knowledge of God’s glory in your heart, opening your eyes to the weight and value and worth and honor of God, opening your eyes to his holiness and perfection and justice and his grace and there’s only one place that all of those things collide where we can see it clearly – again look at the verse – it’s seen in the face of Jesus Christ!

You might think, wow that’s strange – in the face of Jesus? Not his blood, or his cross, or the empty tomb of Jesus? Why his face? What does that mean? Paul’s point is that, first of all, Jesus is alive. You’re not seeing God’s glory in the face of a corpse. He’s alive. And secondly, just like the people in the front rows today can see certain little facial expressions of mine that the people in the back cannot, the closer you get to Jesus, the more of God’s glory you experience. [ 007 ] Colossians 2 tells us that “…the entire fullness of God’s nature dwells bodily in Christ” (Col 2:9), and “in him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col 2:3).

So, like my friend at the Cafe, the moment you realize you have found a treasure, the closer to it you want to be. And the closer you get to the treasure, the more of it you see! The closer you get to Jesus, the more of the treasure of God’s glory you begin to see.

It makes the temporary pleasure of snatching an empty table just seem so lame, doesn’t it? And to prove my point, that woman at the Cafe ended up seeing a different table open up just a few minutes later, and made a mad dash over to it, proving that the treasures of the world never actually satisfy.

So the treasure that’s inside of every true believer is this light of the gospel that God has shown in our hearts through the Holy Spirit. A true believer, a true Christian, is someone who has had the Holy Spirit open their eyes to see everything Jesus has done, bringing them to life and restoring them to a right relationship with God, and credits and praises and glorifies him for giving them this incredible treasure.

And Paul says we have this treasure, this incredibly valuable gift, in [ 010 ] clay jars.

But saying we are clay jars is not the same as saying we are worthless, cheap, or unimportant. In fact, after speaking everything else into existence with his word at Creation, God very personally stooped down in the dust, and [ 011 ] like a master potter working with a lump of clay, designed humanity with his own hands, shaping us in his image, and then breathed his own breath into our lungs, making each one of us exactly the way he wanted us to be, and gave us the responsibility of carrying his image to the rest of creation as we partner with him to advance his rule and reign in the world.

And Genesis 3 says we said NO THANKS. Not interested. You do your thing up there, and we’ll do our thing down here. You stay out of our hair, and we’ll stay out of yours, unless of course we need something from you. But you do your thing, and we’ll do ours.

And as a consequence of that rebellion, the clay jars became breakable. Fragile. Death enters the scene. The clay jars became brittle and easily shattered. Our relationship to God was broken, and we now by default want nothing to do with him. Our relationships with other humans are broken, and now, by default, our lives are centered around self, even to the point of devaluing other jars.

We forget that it’s not the function or the shape of your clay jar that gives you worth and purpose. It’s not the colors or lack of colors. It’s not because you’re a tall or short jar. It’s not because you’ve got a little more girth than the other jars sitting next to you. Your worth and value and purpose, your dignity comes from the Person who formed you. (15 min)

For that reason, things like abortion, abuse, abandonment, racism, pornography – these things all devalue the work of the Master Potter. They say, the needs, wants, and desires of my clay jar are more important than your worth as a human being made in God’s image. I know this is a hot one right now, but even at the core of the LGBTQ ideology, the intention is to undermine the truth of Genesis 2 – that we are intricately designed with love by a Master Potter who is good in everything he does. The lie of that ideology is that he got the jar wrong, and you have to fix it.

And let me just say, if you’re in that space right now, listen to me – that hole you feel deep in your chest, that you’re not the way you should be, has nothing to do with your gender. It’s not gender confusion – It’s treasure confusion.

If pornography or explicit content is a struggle for you right now, it’s not because you’re a pervert or because you’re just a normal person – it’s a treasure problem. If you’ve become an abuser – you have a treasure problem. Someone with racist tendencies – treasure problem. All of those things devalue other clay jars, and at its core, it’s because we have allowed some aspect of self – whether it’s control or pleasure or pride – to be the treasure in our jars.

None of those things are beyond forgiveness or outside the reach of God’s mercy. But as the people of God, called to holiness, there is no place for us to scoot over and make excuses or exceptions or allow space in our lives for the very things the Son of God died to set us free from.

There is hope and healing and an unlimited abundance of grace available for every one of those treasure problems, and if you’re in a place where you need help, please reach out and we will do our best to connect you to someone who can walk with you

In sin’s brokenness, it’s not only other people we devalue – we also devalue ourselves. Eating disorders. Alcoholism. Again – treasure problems. We push our limits, eat and drink things that are trash for us, operate with little sleep, then end up sick, or just breaking down. [ 012 ]

Our son got married on July 5th in our backyard, and we had family staying with us – so we were busy getting things ready as well as taking care of them, working late watering flowers and cleaning things up, then up early to make breakfast for everyone, spending no intentional time with Jesus, just go, go, go full bore – and don’t get me wrong, it was all really, really fun, we enjoyed it, it was one of the most fun days of my life, I would do it all again – but when everyone was gone, the yard cleaned up, and everything back in its place – I crashed pretty hard.

Thursday of that week, it culminated in a massive anxiety attack that ran through most of last weekend, and I was just trying to not die. I’ve told you many times that I have battled anxiety, but this was the first anxiety attack I’ve had in a very long time. I think I was just exhausted from two weeks of go-go-go, a lot of things on my mind, and that’s how it showed up in me.

You know why? Because I’m a clay jar with a treasure problem! The treasure of my heart that week was to have my family say, “man, with everything Rodney and Jodi had going on, they still had time to make breakfast, do this and do that – they are unbelievable.” The treasure of self. I can do it all.

Clay jars are designed with limits. With weakness. With an expiration date. We were made in the image of God, but we are nothing like him. Psalm 121 says the One who watches over Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps, but he purposely designed you and me to be flat out unconscious, sound asleep, for 1/3 of our lives. And when we push that limit for too long, the jar is going to crack! When we treasure the careful managing and controlling of every part of our days and neatly avoid every risk…that’s a treasure problem, and it’s a weight too heavy for a clay jar. It’s going to fracture!

But isn’t there something awkward about all of that? I guarantee there’s something that rises up in some of you – because it certainly rises up in me – that says, if you are weak, dude, something is wrong! The message of the world is you are strong. You got this. Stop crying, wash your face, put your big girl pants on or man up. Don’t be a weakling. And it even dances its way into the church with slogans that feel spiritual, like, don’t be a sheep, be a lion. You got a lion in you – let it roar.

And yet Paul doesn’t say “and we have this treasure in lions or gun safes.” Scripture calls us sheep for good reason; clay jars for good reason – because that’s the design! It’s on purpose! In [ 013 ] 2 Corinthians 12:9, as Paul was struggling with some illness or something that he just couldn’t pray away, God’s answer to his prayer was, “You don’t need me to change your situation or make you stronger – My grace is good enough for you right now, because my power is perfected in weakness.” So Paul said okay, if that’s the case… if Christ’s power is on display when I‘m weak, “Therefore, I will most gladly boast all the more about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may reside in me.”

That takes us to stop number three, which is the WHY. It’s the purpose of putting treasure in clay jars: SO THAT Christ’s power may reside in me. Are you familiar with the word “hyperbole”? It’s very similar to the word “exaggeration.” It means excess. Abundance. More than enough.

That’s the word in [ 014 ] verse 7: We have this treasure in clay jars, SO THAT (here’s the why) so that this hyperbole power (that’s actually word that’s used here) this extraordinary exaggerated, abundant, more than necessary, beyond measure power may be from God and not from us.

So if you’ve experienced spiritual transformation in your life, Paul says, it’s not because we were awesome preachers, or the band played the right song, or the lights were just right. It’s because the Triune God of the Bible,

who is not frail but upholds the universe by the word of his power,

who is not dying or aging, but holds eternity in his hands,

who does not need counsel or Google or AI, but is himself the Wonderful Counselor who knows all things, sees all things, understands all things

who is not a smoldering wick of a candle, but is a Consuming Fire

Who is not tempted by sin or enticed by other treasures, but is Holy, Holy, Holy

Who became a clay jar so that he could be a sympathetic high priest

It’s because he has moved on you in power to bring you from death to life, to wash you of your sins, clothe you with the righteousness of Christ, and begin the lifelong process of preparing you for heaven.

So listen to me – If you are the kind of church-goer who says things like, ah man, it was a guest preacher today. Or, ah, the music this morning just really didn’t do anything for me like such and such a band does, man I wish the guys here would preach like this certain preacher, or podcast, or conference teacher, or author does – When we act like, now that guy is the one who knows how to bring the heat!, THAT church has got things figured out; THAT ministry, THAT leader, THAT band – we are exposing our hearts, that we are often more impressed by broken, anxious, emotionally and physically fragile – sometimes very childish and disobedient – clay jars, than we are by the treasure itself.

That power to transform a life has not, cannot, will not come from a preacher or a worship team or a ministry. When you sit down over coffee or a phone call to talk with a friend about the gospel, the power to transform their life does not, in fact cannot, come from us. That’s the point Paul is trying to make. That transformational power comes only by the Spirit of the Living God – the power does not come from clay jars.

But the responsibility to carry the treasure does. We were not designed as Christians to be the kind of clay jars that sit in a cave our whole lives, hanging onto the treasure, hoping no one chucks a rock into our cave and finds us. Verse 15, says we were designed to be the kind of clay jar that benefits others. The kind that Jesus uses to carry water to the thirsty and food to the hungry, so they can thank God for meeting their needs.

And because our sinful nature is still to preserve ourselves, God prepares us by letting our jars get cracked and worn and broken by suffering, to make sure that the water leaks out and the glory goes to him. I know so many people who have wondered how suffering could ever be part of God’s plan. There are entire ministries and preaching that boldly proclaims that suffering is never part of God’s will for his children. And it’s a boldface, demonic lie. When the apostle Peter told Jesus that suffering and death didn’t need to be part of the plan, Jesus called him Satan, and told him that his mind was not set on the things of God, but on the things of man.

You can see what Paul says in verse 8, [ 015 ] we are afflicted in every way – we have difficulties and distress and cracking of the jar in every way you can imagine – but you know what? We’re not hopeless. Suffering doesn’t make us hopeless. Are you kidding? He’s put his extraordinary power in us! He’s helping us. Strengthening us. Keeping us. We’re not hopeless.

We are perplexed. There are times we are at a complete loss where we have no idea how to make sense of what’s happening to us, we do not understand what God is doing, or why he’s not answering our prayers, or why he’s allowing stuff to happen to us – but you know what we’re not? We’re not in despair. We don’t have a single reason to doubt God. Why? Because he’s proven at the cross that sometimes suffering brings about the greatest good you could ever imagine. He’s proven himself at the cross of Christ – he’ll prove himself in our crosses as well.

[ 015-2 ] We are persecuted, harassed, and attacked, but I’ll tell you right now, we’ve never been forsaken, abandoned, or forgotten by God. Are you kidding? Every time we’re harassed for loving Jesus, we know God is equipping us, building our endurance, strengthening our faith – and best of all, he’s with us! He said he would never leave or forsake us!

Paul’s like, man, Our clay jars get knocked around and struck down like you wouldn’t believe while we’re on this earth, but his power is keeping us from being destroyed – he will never let us perish. Ahead to verse 11. We’re always being given over to death – always suffering something, but it’s so that Jesus’ life is seen in us. Paul’s hope in life wasn’t that God will take away suffering or affliction, but, [ 016 ] verse 14, that he raises the dead. For we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus will also raise us… On the other side of suffering and death is life! Our confidence comes from the God who specializes in resurrection. The One who trafficks in grace upon grace, verse 15, [ 017 ] and here is where that broken marriage has hope. Here’s where those parents praying for their wayward child have hope. Here’s where that addict has hope as they battle temptation. Here’s where the cancer or Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s patient has hope as their clay jar breaks down. Here’s where the persecuted pastor or church member in Iran or Afghanistan or North Korea has hope as they face prison, torture, and or death:

V16, Even though our outer person – our physical clay jars – are being destroyed, broken, cracked, fading, etc – our inner person is being renewed one day at a time [ 017-2 ] as the temporary afflictions we go through produce something eternal in us. That doesn’t mean we don’t pray for change. God invites us to bring every request to him.

So we pray for healing when people are sick, knowing that healing isn’t the treasure – being daily renewed by the power of the Spirit inside of you is.

We pray for marriages to be restored, knowing that having a perfect marriage isn’t the treasure – being purified by fire, and made ready for the marriage feast of the Lamb is.

We pray for God to meet our financial needs, knowing that financial security isn’t the treasure – the eternal weight of glory being produced in us as we trust God is.

We pray for God to grow our church and our ministries and move us to a new building, knowing that our own building isn’t the treasure – seeing grace extend, verse 15, to more and more people, so they give thanks to God and praise him for his power – that’s the treasure.

So let me encourage you church – don’t give up. Don’t lose heart. Don’t let the temporary suffering of this life sidetrack you from the treasure that is eternal. Verse 18 – don’t focus on what is seen and temporary; focus on what is unseen and eternal.

I asked the elder candidates and their wives to come up to the side here this morning to be available for prayer. If you have a treasure problem today and are sick of it. Done with it. Tired of the stranglehold it’s had on your life, this team will be eager to pray with you for healing and freedom and grace.

None of them have the power to transform you. None of their prayers are going to be brilliant enough to do the trick, or be the magic bullet. But as you respond in surrender and faith, to the ways God is already stirring your heart, the Spirit of God will meet you there in power, and do what none of us can do.

SOURCES

Richard L. Pratt Jr, I & II Corinthians, Holman New Testament Commentary, (Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 2000), 7:337.

Vaneetha Risner, https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/comforting-lies-about-suffering