“But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.” (2 Corinthians 4:7, NIV)
I arrived at home one day to the lovely scent of one of my wife’s favorite perfumes. My wife wasn’t at home at the time, so I figured that I had just missed her by a matter of minutes.
When she returned some time later, she told me that she had accidentally knocked the glass perfume bottle to the bathroom’s tile floor, thereby “liberating” its contents.
As Paul reminds us in today’s scripture, we are like that perfume bottle: Fragile, but filled with the spirit of God. The perfume bottle’s purpose is to serve as a container of the fragrant treasure that, by its nature, changes the character of its environment whenever it is “liberated” — whether by careful design or by “accident.”
As we continue through the Lenten season, remember that we are dust; clay; ashes; a tent. But also remember that the spirit of almighty God from within us, and through us, changes the character of whatever environment, or circumstance, we encounter. Our fragile frame reminds us that the power is of God, not of ourselves. – Luther
