2 Corinthians 4:7 - ....Fragile clay jars containing this great treasure.....

I was intrigued this morning when I saw a Facebook post  that read like this: (taken from a hindu source).

"People are taught from childhood that they are weak and sinners. Teach each them that they are all glorious children of immortality, even those who are the weakest in manifestation. Let positive, strong, helpful thought enter into their brains from very childhood. Lay yourselves open to these thoughts, and not to weakening and paralyzing ones."

Hindu philosophy proliferates the thought that everything is part of God (pantheism) and hence everything is by nature "good". And the outflow of this thought is that of positive thinking as assembled in the above dictum by a well known hindu philosopher. Strangely many prosperity gospel preachers have also embrace the idea of "positive thinking" based on one's own will and assertions and achievements. 

In fact Hinduism and all other related ideologies proliferate this idea that man is basically good. 

My morning mediation from the Bible gave a differnt perspective of the human nature. I was reading the text from 2 Corinthians 4:7 -  “We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.”

The Apostle Paul used a politically acceptable phrase here "fragile clay jars" to describe the human flaws. 

But the prophet Jeremiah was not so kind and did not hold back his words. He demolished every high-mindedness of the human nature when he wrote in Jeremiah 17:9 - “The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?

Our Lord Jesus added another crescendo to Jeremiah's description. Mark 7:21-23 - For from within, out of a person’s heart, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, lustful desires, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness. All these vile things come from within; they are what defile you.”

This is the reality of the human nature. Man wants independance and that was the problem in the Garden of Eden, when the ego and NOT God, took the seat in the heart of man's conscience.   And the rest is history.

And if you are objective about it, you will conclude that the Bible gives the true description of the human heart, no matter how many positive labels you may add to your cerebrum. 

But the good news of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is, that when we repent of our sins (true repentance) and acknowledge Jesus as Lord and Master of our lives, the Holy Spirit comes and dwells in this earthen vessel (our hearts) as the Apostle Paul alludes in the above text. This union results in the transformation of the entire being. Paul speaks of a "great power". The power to overcome sin, the ability to excel, the resultant "fruit of the spirit". All these are NOT by our own strength but by God who dwells in us. The outcome is a "great power" from us, sinful human being. 

And no matter how bad we could have been, no matter how much of weakness we may have had, the Holy Spirit now give us the strength and the power to live a life that brings glory and honour to God. 

Paul says in Philippians 4:13 - For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.

Paul goes on to explain why this is the case. It's because:

 Galatians 2:20 - I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Christ lives in me. I am sanctified daily as I walk in the leading of the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:16-18). I am able to bring my thoughts into subjection (2 Corinthians 10:3-5) and I know "greater is He who is in me, than he that is in the world" (1 John 4:4). And because of this "great power' within me, I can live a victorious and a fulfilling life for God. 

Christ offers the true proposition of the human condition: In you there is nothing good, BUT with GOD, nothing is impossible. Choose the Lord Jesus Christ and choose life in abundance.