What Makes Me Valuable
But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the excellence of the power may be of God, not of us. 2 Corinthians 4:7
Excellence of the Power – God deliberately makes your physical existence out of Tupperware.
“What? Are you telling me that all those aches and pains, all that struggle and toil, all the effort it takes to climb life’s ladder is deliberate? Why would God make my life so hard?”
Yes, God deliberately constructed your physical being and the way that you live in this world out of common, ordinary stuff, subject to all the forces that work against the dirt you came from. He does this to save you from a very subtle and pervasive mistake. God gives you the gift of common breakdowns so that you will not think that life is about what you make of yourself. God designs you so that you cannot be self-sufficient. God sets up the world so that you are always on the edge of failure. Your daily difficulties are reminders that you are not king of the universe.
That’s good news. Why? Because as soon as you realize that you are only Tupperware, you can stop concentrating your efforts on control of this world and focus your efforts on letting God use you to display His power. In fact, if you realize you’re Tupperware, then life becomes the process of opening the lid so that what comes out will be God’s stuff, not yours.
Here’s the kitchen test: if the explanation of any excellence in my life does not require me to appeal to God’s handiwork, then I have failed in my role as a container. Paul tells me that the “excellence of the power” (he hyperbole tes dynameos) must come from God, not me. Look at the Greek words. Do you see our English words “hyperbole” and “dynamic?” The first word originally meant, “to throw beyond.” This is extraordinary power; power that goes beyond human expectation. The second word is about capacity. God’s capacity to go beyond is the treasure inside your Tupperware container. Its source is not you. It’s not some divine spark within you. It’s the dynamism of the living God, resident in your Tupperware temple, waiting for you to take the lid off so that it can be poured out into the world.
The truth is that you are only any good when you are empty. You must be empty to let God fill you and you have to be emptied to let God use you. Filled life is not the plan. God wants “empty.” Then the treasure of His extraordinary power can be poured in and out.
Today’s culture of “fulfillment” pushes us in the wrong direction. God doesn’t intend our lives to be closed containers, stuffed to the brim with what we need to satisfy our longings, spiritual or otherwise. God intends us to live emptied lives. That’s where the power is.
