Hope In a Clay Jar

We all have beliefs about ourselves that are nothing but outright lies from the enemy. The lie that I came to believe after wrestling with deep depression and anxiety for four years was “I don’t have what it takes.” My struggle led me to believe that I wasn’t good enough. I thought that I was too broken and didn’t have what it took to be a good husband, I didn’t have what it took to be a good dad, and I didn’t have what it took to be a good pastor. I saw my brokenness as factual proof that I no longer had what it took to be successful in these areas. I don’t remember the exact moment that it happened, but at some point in my journey I realized that my belief was a lie from the enemy. It was a lie that I had been believing for far too long, and by God’s grace I could do something about it.

The first step for me was to identify the lie that I had come to believe. Once I was able to identify the lie, I knew that the only way to refute it was with truth… with what God says. This is the only way we can change our thinking. We can’t simply stop believing a lie, we must replace the lie with the truth. We have to retrain our minds to believe what God says. I would be lying if I said that my mind doesn’t wander from time to time back to the lie that "I don’t have what it takes,” but I found great hope in a clay jar, and here is what I now know to be the truth. This is what I remind myself when my mind begins to ruminate on the lie. Paul writes these words in his second letter to the church in Corinth.

2 Corinthians 4:7 (ESV)

But we have treasure in jars of clay to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not us.

“Jars of clay” was a common metaphor used to describe human weakness. Ancient clay pottery was prone to breaking, and here Paul is saying that our weakness is one of our greatest assets… something that we should treasure. Our weakness makes it clear that any power that we have is from God, not from ourselves. In his first letter to the Corinthians Paul says that power is made perfect in weakness and that when we are weak we are strong. In the same letter he writes that God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong. In the words of the British missionary, Hudson Taylor, it seems clear that “All God’s giants have been weak people.” Author John Bloom says it this way, “Weak, low, despised and unlikely are essential qualities God looks for in his servants, and he chooses these qualities with great intentionality.” Do you need more proof? Look at the people God chose to use.

Abraham was incredibly old. Joseph was abused and sold into slavery. Job lost everything. Moses had a speech impairment. Rahab was a prostitute. David was an adulterer and murderer. Jonah struggled with fear and ran from God. Naomi was a widow. Paul was a previous persecutor of Christians. We could go on, but God seems to be making it very clear that, more than our strengths, our weaknesses are the very things that God uses to build His kingdom. Our weakness may be our greatest asset.

Is there a lie that the enemy has made you believe to be a weakness? Identify it. Refute it with the truth. And live a zoen, abundant kind of life.