Cracked pottery

Are you sure you're only....[insert age here]? I'm pretty sure this is the most common question I am ever asked. All I can say is "yes, I'm sure...unless my birth certificate was forged."......which with my parents....who knows.... Just kidding. I know it's real. :)

My life has made me seem older than I actually am. In some ways, when I look back, I'm like wow...how did I end up here? In a good sense. All I can think is...only by the Grace of an all knowing-all powerful God am I where I am today. I still have A LOT of things that I'm working on. After all, like everyone else, I'm a work-in-progress...if I were a completed work, I wouldn't be here anymore.

The things I've gone through, do I wish they wouldn't have happened? Not in the least. Unlike a lot of people, when I look at all the tough stuff I've been through, I realize that it was only to make me stronger, to help me learn who my Father is, who I am through Him. Without the hardships, without the uncertainty (which I hate), without the instability (which I also hate), I wouldn't have seen the need to reach out to the Creator. I wouldn't have known what it is like to have to rely soley on Him and His promises. In the end, that's all that matters. You and Him and your relationship with Him is all that matters.

Do I completely understand who I am in Him? Not yet, but by the time He takes me to be with Him, I want to know who I am in Him and who I can be by living as He did and searching His Word for the answer to the question, Who am I in You, Lord.

But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you.     ~2 Corinthians 4:7-12 

This passage is one that I've been taught for a long time. Each and every one of us can relate to this passage at one time or another. We are only made perfect through His sacrifice. As it says in here, we carry Christ's sacrifice with us. The trick is to live as though we believe that He is capable of forgiving. How many times can we ask for forgiveness of something, only to keep kicking ourselves over it?

One of the great things about this passage is to show us that we weren't meant to be perfectly molded, perfectly shaped. We should be rejoicing over our imperfections, not trying to hide them. We were made to have cracks. We were made to be imperfect so that our exposed weak points are where God can shine through the brightest!

Matthew 3:7-10

"But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not think you can say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire."

My question is this: how many times do we rely on where we came from, who we know, and the things we learn to sustain us in our faith and assurance for where we are going? I know for me personally, it's far too often. I get distracted in things that essentially good, yet once I get distracted by them, they take my focus off of where it should be. The only One that deserves it.

How often do we rely on our stature to be enough proof of our faith, when it should be our deeds and actions that do the talking? Thank God for his never-failing love and grace. Without it, I would be worse off than I actually am. Thank God that He looks at the place where no one else does...the heart.