Navigating Life's Trials: The Treasure Within Our Fragile Vessels

Actually turn in your Bibles tonight to second Corinthians.

Second Corinthians, chapter 5.

Foreign.

In verse number one, the Bible says, for we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, house not made with hands eternal in the heavens.

For in this we groan earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven.

If so be that being clothed, we shall not be found naked.

For we that are in this tabernacle do groan being burdened not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up in life of life.

Now he that hath wrought us for the self same thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of the spirit.

Therefore we are always confident, knowing that whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord.

For we walk by faith, not by sight.

We are confident, I say, and rather willing.

Willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord wherefore we labor that whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him.

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that everyone may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done, whether good or bad.

Tonight the message is simple.

Don't get too concerned with your clay pot.

Let's pray and we'll.

We'll start.

Our Heavenly Father, thank you so much, Lord, for the grace that you give to us.

Thank you for the encouragement of your word as we go through life's trials and the daily grind of life, Lord, the overwhelming aspects of it, Lord, that just threatening to cause us to run and hide and tear, Lord, and I just pray that you would help us tonight to see out of your word in the life of Paul and the life of other Christians, Lord, and look at our own life and how we are to as people of a heavenly city of a heavenly calling, Lord, to have our mind set on the things above, Lord, rather than the things here on this earth.

We ask that you would help us tonight to understand your word better.

In Jesus name we pray.

Amen.

Don't get too concerned with your clay pot.

In second Corinthians here, Paul, he begins talking about something that is monumental to this life.

Living in the.

The Christian walk.

We have those slides up for, for that, for that sermon.

I think it's at the bottom.

I'm gonna click through it.

Give us a visual, visual representation of that.

It should be loaded in there at the bottom on the left.

Unless they clicked off of the list.

Well, while they're figuring that out, maybe or maybe not.

We'll get something tonight.

Whenever Paul speaks about this, he had already spoken about this tabernacle that we dwell in.

And he says here in this very first verse.

For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved.

Now what is he talking about there?

He's talking about our body.

He's talking about this tabernacle.

He's talking about how we one day have a mansion in heaven.

And a lot of people think that whenever you get to heaven, you're going to get this big house and it's just going to be grand and gorgeous.

It's going to be a mansion.

I really don't think it's going to be a house.

I think it's going to be a body and it's going to be like a mansion, especially compared to.

To this raggedy thing that we are walking around in.

It is a mansion in comparison.

Now, this present body, as many of us know, is fragile.

I can't tell you how many times I've cut myself this past week alone trying to get the.

The simplest little things and just the.

The pain that ensues when you're just trying to do stuff around the house.

I've hit myself with hammers, I've smashed my fingers.

I ran into boxes.

Just this is.

I'm bleeding all over the place.

The body is extremely fragile.

Now this sermon itself came out of a different trial that I went through a couple of years ago and that I was encouraged in.

And this was some.

A passage that really stuck with me.

And I think that it's going to stick with all of us in a special way, especially depending on how fragile you are or how old you become, you start to feel that fragile ness of life.

The present body is fragile, but the next we'll get it up there eventually.

The present body is fragile, but the big thing about it is it is not final.

This isn't all there is is what I wrote.

The new one is far better.

Now look here at what he says.

For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle.

Now that's not an if of hey, it might might happen or it might not happen.

The.

The word here that is used, the grammatical use of it is a potential action, action that is to occur.

This is going to happen.

It's not a matter of if it could happen.

We're not really sure.

It's in the sense of it's could be today and could be tomorrow, or it could be next week, but it is going to come.

So if when this body is dissolved, destroyed, demolished, taken down, we have this treasure in an earthen vessel and that's where we get that clay pot.

Whenever, whenever I was diagnosed with Ms. And all the stuff that happened with that, my former pastor, what he told me was Ethan trying to encourage me.

Don't get too concerned with your clay pot.

It's just a clay pot.

That's all your body is.

That's all it is.

To the, to, to this lot.

We live in a clay pot.

It's not a shiny vessel of gold.

It's not per se.

A thing that is going, is decorated, that's going to last forever.

You know, whenever we talk about what a wedding band should, should be made out of, we want it to be made out of precious gems and something sort of precious metal that will last.

The body that we dwell in is not permanent vessel, it is sown in dishonor.

It is going to be resurrected in something glorious in that mansion.

So don't get too concerned with your clay pot.

We have a spiritual body not made with hands like Jesus being prepared for us.

In Mark chapter 14, Jesus speaks of this, says destroy this temple that is made with hands and within three days I will build another not made with hands.

What was he speaking of?

He was obviously speaking of that new resurrected body.

In first John chapter three.

We get a great hope, beloved.

Now are we the sons of God.

And it does not yet appear what we shall be.

But we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.

And so when Paul speaks of that resurrection body, it is a spiritual body, he doesn't mean an unreal body or a non physical body.

He is talking about the same kind of body that our risen Lord had.

Whenever he appeared before the disciples in the upper room, whenever he ate, whenever he had the honeycomb, the fish, he asked for something to eat and drink.

I mean there was is a physical body, but it is a glorified body raised by the power of God, no longer ruled by weakness, decay, sickness, sin and death.

There are people that are born in so many different ways with a body that is sometimes at birth immediately handicapped, not able to walk from birth.

There was people who was healed in, in the Bible.

How, what, what sin did this man do or what sin did his parents do that he was born lame?

The people asked, said nothing, he didn't do that.

It was just to work the work of God.

But this man was definitely born this way.

One man was born blind.

So many people are born handicapped or become handicapped or you get to a point in your life whenever the body just doesn't work anymore.

And that can happen.

And when you're 7 years old, that can happen.

In your 30s, that can happen whenever you're 60 and 8.

We never know when our body may give out.

Whenever I got.

Well, we didn't get the diagnosis that I had in us.

It just started a whole bunch of stuff happening.

I couldn't walk anymore.

Okay, that was a moment of failing.

That was a moment of thinking, okay, what in the world's going on?

There's those moments whenever you can't really fathom what God is doing, but you were trying to figure out what is going on with this body.

Romans, chapter 8, verse 23.

What we are waiting for is the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.

We are waiting for that adoption.

And so my first encouragement to us tonight is, don't be so concerned with the clay pot, because we can worship that clay pot.

We can get all in a bind over what it is.

And what we really forget is what God has made us to do and what that vessel our body is meant for.

The present body is not final.

That is a hope that is looking unto the redemption of our body.

And in the first letter in Corinth to Corinth, Paul discusses the great difference between these two bodies.

He talks about that in First Corinthians, chapter 15.

This body that is sown, imperishable, it is raised imperishable.

It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory, is sown in weakness, it is raised in power, is sown in a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.

But make no mistake, the clay pot is not the whole story.

What we are looking at is not the clay pot, but rather the treasure in that pot that we have been entrusted with.

What is that treasure?

Give me some feedback.

What is that treasure?

The soul.

Yes.

What have you been entrusted with?

Soul?

As a Christian, what have you been entrusted with?

The Holy Spirit.

To deliver the gospel to other people so that they can have the Holy Spirit, so that they can know Christ and see that treasure that we have in earthen vessels, as Paul talks through there in chapter four of 2 Corinthians was what Paul really wanted them to focus on.

Go there.

That one chapter over in second Corinthians, chapter four, what does he say?

I am in first Corinthians that's responded.

He says, for we are carrying about in our bodies the Dying of the Lord Jesus, being made a sacrifice for Jesus's sake.

He says that we have the treasure in this earthen vessel.

He said, we're troubled on every side, yet not distressed, perplexed, speaking about the life of a Christian and this weak, weak tabernacle.

And it's interesting the way that this is interpreted.

It's a tent, you know, when you think about building a house, you don't think about building a tent.

And that's what this house is like.

It is like building a tent.

Whereas we sometimes refer to it as this great and glorious temple.

It's a tent.

This was a pot.

In the power of the Gospel, that treasure in earthen vessels lies within that.

That.

That pot that's cracked, it has holes in it.

It's trying to shine forth the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ.

But the point is, the clay pot is not permanent.

It's fragile.

But what's coming will be glorious.

So whenever we start talking about that, okay, now we are thinking about, okay, this is temporary, and one day we're going to have that permanent, and we're going to live.

We're living for the permanent.

We need to have our mindset on the permanent, on the affection of things above.

There's almost this other side of it that some people sometimes get the impression of, so what?

What is it?

We're just waiting to die.

Is that the point of Christianity?

Is that what we are to look for is this a longing for death?

And the answer to that is no, the Christian does not long for death.

They long for Christ.

So we get this question, is this an unnatural desire?

Because Paul talks about death and desiring to go and be with Christ in many of instances, he desires it over in Philippians, remember in Philippians chapter one says, I'm in betwixt the two, having a desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better, rather than be in this cursed world, but rather be with him, or rather to be with you and to be able to teach you and exhort you into see fruit in your lives.

So the question is, do we wish to die?

Look there in verse two.

For in this we groan earnestly, desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven.

If so be that being clothed, we shall not be found naked, for we that are in this tabernacle do groan.

Some of us are groaning tonight being burdened, not that for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up in life.

So you see what Paul is saying here.

We.

We want to be found clothed in that glorious temple.

We don't desire to be unclothed in the sense of having no body and just being some spirit that is.

That is just free and reigning.

That's.

That's not what he's saying.

We're not desiring that emptiness.

We are desiring to be clothed with that imperishable, that mortality might be swallowed up of life.

This the natural desire of a Christian to desire Christ, longing for Christ.

And so that is the ultimate plan you've heard of.

People say everybody wants to go to heaven.

Ain't nobody wants to go right now.

Oftentimes that's what people joke about.

The idea, though, that we want to go to heaven.

The idea is not necessarily of going to a place, but rather going and being with a person.

A dentist had a patient in his room and started to talk to him about different things.

And somehow heaven got brought up and he began speaking to this guy and witnessing to him about heaven.

And this guy said, well, how do you even know that it's going to be good?

How do you even know what it's going to be like?

And he said, well, I don't.

I said, well, you're just hoping for nothing.

And the guy said, well, let me show you.

He went to the back office door and he tried to open the door.

And the door was kind of wedge a little bit, and he had to push on it.

Something was blocking it.

And then he opened that door, and finally whatever on the other side was blocking it moved and he opened it up and his dog ran from that room into the room, shot into the room as quick as he could and got right next to his master's feet.

And the guy said, you see, that dog has never been in this room while there's a patient.

But that dog doesn't really care about the room.

The dog knows that his master is in that room, and that's what he desires.

And it's the same thing for heaven.

I don't really care what heaven's going to be like.

I care that my savior's there.

That is the desire heaven can be.

Heaven can be just this old earth.

We know we're going to get a new earth one day and that it's going to be a perfect earth where there is no.

No sickness and famine and everything is going to be perfect.

And it's always going to be 73 degrees.

No, I don't know if it's going to be like that or not.

But what I do know is it doesn't matter if it is a place of paradise.

If it's a desert or if it's, you know, if it's negative 20, my wife would not agree to that.

But if my savior is there, it doesn't really matter because I want to be with my savior.

Is that is the desire that we are to have.

What is natural though?

You know, the natural inclination that you are bent to.

We've talked about that a little bit.

You know, every single year, certain birds have a built in instinct to migrate south for the winter.

We see cartoons that talk about that.

We know birds do that.

That's the reason why people in Florida can duck hunt.

Because ducks, they migrate south for the winter.

They fly down there trying to look for food.

Once they can't beat the ice in the winter anymore to get food, they fly south for food.

Many birds do that.

What is natural.

Humans have a natural desire not to die.

Did you know that?

That is a very natural thing not to die.

Life clings to the final breath.

To want to live is natural.

The heart itself beats out of its own volition.

You do not make your heart beat.

The heart beats on its own.

You know, whenever doctors get that defibrillator, because guy's heart stop and he gets it, we're going to restart the heart.

That's not true at all.

I don't know how many of you were underneath that impression.

I was underneath that impression.

The heart starts whenever they, you know, clear.

That's not what's happening.

There is nothing that can start a heart.

The heart has to start on its own.

Defibrillators are only there to correct an irregular heartbeat, to get it onto a regular track.

It does not start the heart.

I was absolutely floored when I heard and learned that heart has to start on its own.

My.

I heard about this first, though, whenever my dad had open heart surgery and whenever we were speaking about different doctors performing heart surgery.

In heart surgery, they stop the heart in order to operate.

That's how they do it.

But the doctors, they seal everything up.

They close it.

They know, they remove their tools that are keeping the heart from beating.

And then they wait.

And that person's heart has to restart all on its own, out of its own volition.

That is natural.

That is the natural desire.

And if that person has no will to live, that person's heart does not start.

And so that's where you get some of those emotional theater movies live.

Come on, you know you want to live.

You know, it's that aspect.

But that's the natural, the desire to live.

Is something that the heart desires to do.

Paul would talk about departing and dying many times in his letters.

Sometimes he thought it was now, sometimes he thought it was later.

Sometimes he thought, I will continue on to be able to see you and produce, see more and more fruit.

The problem with fallen man and the fallen mindset that would pervade even Christians is not that man has no hunger for life.

The problem is that sin has twisted that hunger, twisted the desire to understand what it means to live.

What was man designed to do?

Well, he was made to hunger for God.

Man was designed for spiritual things.

Man was designed to crave spiritual things because God is a spirit and God and man is made in God's image.

And yet what do we see man doing in his flesh as he craves spirit?

Spiritual things, we see idolatry, we see demon worship, we see all manner of things that people love being spiritual.

That's the reason why the Catholic Church today is so prevalent, so attractive, if you will, because of the physical manifestations of religion, the physical manifestation of holy relics.

My faith being sight, touchable.

Spiritual people love to be spiritual.

People love to do that.

It's.

It's almost tangible.

You know, there's a.

There's a problem with someone who has a twisted appetite.

You ever heard of children that eat glue?

Yeah, or eat weird things.

It's a medical condition called pica, where.

Pica is where people crave and eat things that are not food.

Dirt, clay, paint chips, soap, glue.

Ever watch my strange addiction I had?

There was one lady on my strange addiction, she liked eating deodorant.

Just sing.

We.

Have you ever tasted deodorant just by accident, Just raise of hands.

How many of you, you know, you accidentally had a little bit, then you did something right?

What's.

Oh, it's horrible.

This lady eats deodorant.

Humanity has a deep natural hunger for spiritual life.

But sin twists it into unnatural cravings, idolatry, greed, lust.

Things that can never nourish our soul.

What is that song that Mick Jagger wrote?

Can't get no Satisfaction.

Dude that could have everything, couldn't get any satisfaction.

He decided to write a song about it, you know, Ripley's Believe it or Not.

Ripley.

He was not a good looking guy at all, but he was a man that had it all.

Ripley had so much money, so much fame and fortune.

He literally every single pride, every single.

The besetting sins of the flesh, the pride of life, lust of the eyes, the lust of the world.

He had it all.

He could do whatever he wanted to Go do.

He could have whatever he wanted.

He could buy whatever he desired.

He had it all.

But he lived his life in great dissatisfaction.

Why Filling the heart with things that don't belong.

The Christian does not long for death.

He longs for Christ.

Death is not the treasure Christ is.

Death is only the doorway that leads to Christ.

And that is what we have to remember.

That he as God gives us that desire for himself in us as a gap in our hearts.

And we cannot try to fill that gap with stuff of the world.

And this is where don't get concerned with your clay pot comes up.

We often will get concerned with the stuff that we have or the condition of our body.

And it gets our eyes and our focus off of Jesus.

First Corinthians, chapter 15 says, for this corruptible must put on incorruption.

That is the desire.

Death is the way to it.

Oh, there it goes.

It does work.

I will fix that by the time next week whenever I get that new USB reader.

We understand that death doesn't have the same hold on us as it did before salvation.

Now I'm gonna say something that I want you to take with a.

Just a.

Don't get overly thinking about this.

Whenever someone dies, we mourn with that person.

But we don't mourn as the world mourn.

And the question is why?

Does that mean that we're heartless?

No.

Whenever my uncle died this past year, past August, been almost a year now, we knew exactly where he went.

We knew his testimony, we knew his life, we knew what he believed, we knew he was following Christ.

There's great comfort in that.

To go.

There's a huge difference between someone who has died without Christ, someone who has died with Christ, and we don't mourn as those who have no hope.

The Bible says we don't mourn.

We still mourn.

We still grieve.

It is absolutely right for us to grieve because death is the enemy.

Death is the absolute enemy of us.

And the Bible says death will be the last enemy defeated one day.

There will not death.

That is what we will rejoice over.

But whenever it comes to understanding that death doesn't have a hold on us, there in First Corinthians, chapter 15, he says, Death is swallowed up in victory.

O death, where is thy sting?

O grave, where is thy victory?

The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law.

But thanks be to God, which give us victory through our Lord Jesus.

Be steadfast therefore, Christian, unmovable, abounding in the works of the Lord.

The Spirit of God is given to us for those moments of comfort.

The Spirit is God's guarantee that the resurrection is coming.

Look there in verse 5 of 2 Corinthians, chapter 5.

Now, he that hath wrought us for the self, same thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of the Spirit.

The earnest.

Such a good word.

It's.

It's mentioned multiple times throughout the letters of Paul in the.

In the New Testament to help us understand what we are given at the moment of salvation.

And that is, as you've already said a couple times, the Holy Spirit.

We are given the earnest of our salvation.

You know, we had to put down money to get the house that we purchased over here.

We had to put down in earnest.

What was that?

Earnest?

What did that mean?

Well, as you know, the earnest says, I'm putting money.

I'm putting down something.

I'm putting my money where my mouth is and I am going to come and collect.

It was a guarantee.

They would often do these seals of king would.

Would mark his seal, and it was the earnest that, this is mine and I'm going to come and collect it.

We are given the earnest of the Spirit.

We are given the down payment, the guarantee that we will be collected.

We have that guarantee.

You can't lose that guarantee.

You cannot forego that guarantee.

God will not let you forego that guarantee.

You are in his hand.

He has given that to us.

He's prepared us for this very thing.

The one who has done this is God.

And he has given that Spirit to us as the guarantee.

He did not merely promise resurrection, he placed his Spirit inside of us to guarantee that what he started, he will finish.

In Ephesians 1:13, it says, we are sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise.

Sealed in Romans, chapter 8:11.

The Spirit who raised Jesus will quicken your mortal bodies with the Spirit.

The Spirit.

What shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Nothing.

Why?

Because we are sealed with the Spirit until the day of redemption.

So the Spirit inside you is proof that God is not finished.

And he will perform it.

He will make you, as we read there in first Corinthians, steadfast, unmoved, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord.

So the Spirit is given to us to conform us to the image of Christ and to mold and make us into the image of Christ until the day where our faith is made final.

Number four.

We walk by faith, not by sight, because eternity is certain.

Our ambitions must be, therefore to please Christ so to the exhortation that Paul gives us there in first Corinthians, be unmovable, be steadfast, always abound in the work of the Lord.

That's an exhortation to us because eternity is certain.

Our ambitions then are therefore looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.

And he is trying to get us to set our affection on things above.

And he says here in verse number six, therefore we are always confident.

Confident, that's that guarantee.

Knowing that whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord.

We can always be confident that, yes, we have our body, but that just means we're away from God.

And then number two, we walk by faith, not by sight.

That is a way of life in all areas of our life.

And we are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body to be present with the Lord, than to therefore.

For we labor that whether present or absent.

And this is the exhortation we may be accepted of him.

Why we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that everyone may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.

Now, I. Grandpa, He was a good old Southern preacher, is what he was.

And he talked about the judgment of God, Judgment, seat of Christ.

And this is one aspect as Christians that we will sometimes forget and not keep in mind.

Now, understand, what does the judgment seat of Christ mean?

Will we be judged for our sin?

We got a good shaking hands.

Good, you're shaking your head.

No, no, we won't be judged for our sins as Christians.

That sin has been paid for.

That debt is gone.

We live by faith, though not by sight.

Therefore, one day there is a judgment, and it is a judgment.

It doesn't matter that you're.

You're accepted.

You still want to be judged, worthy.

We all desire to hear that.

Well done, thou good and faithful servant man.

When we think of our God and what he has done for us, whether or not to.

To please him should be our highest goal and desire.

And you think about Stephen and the.

The applause, the well done that Stephen received.

As far as we know, we don't know what other Christians have gotten it.

I'm sure there have been many, but we get to read about Stephen.

Stephen got a standing ovation for his preaching right before he died, when he was preaching to the Pharisees, right before they stoned him in Acts, chapter eight.

Right before that, he said, I see the Son of Man.

Now, where do we know the Son of Man is?

He is Sitting on the right hand of the Father on front sitting, Stephen said, behold, I see the Son of God standing on the right hand of the front.

The guy got a standing ovation.

That is should be our desire as Christians.

Why we're going to talk about in Sunday school, are you living for the acceptance of God or are you living from the acceptance of God?

We don't do things in this life for the acceptance of God.

We don't do it so that he will love us.

We do it because he does love us, because he is merciful, not so that he will give us mercy, but because he is giving us mercy.

Our earthly existence is a period of stewardship and where we are called to labor in this life, not for our own glory, not for our own material gain, not to become accepted by Christ, but because we are already accepted in Christ.

So therefore, whatever we do, we labor that we should be accepted of him.

We should be pleasing to him, is what that means.

We make it our aim to please him.

We make it our goal to please him.

It is our constant ambition to please God.

Not to get acceptance, but from that acceptance.

And that's a very distinct point that we have to understand about it.

So tonight, what the conclusion of it is is this.

Live as a steward who will soon stand before Christ and desire that great proclamation of, well done, thou good and faithful sir.

What are you a steward of, Paul?

He moves from comfort to responsibility.

Resurrection, hope does not make us lazy like some of some of the people that were in Thessalonians.

They just got on the top of their house and they said, well, God's going to come back, so we don't have to do anything.

It's not a period of laziness, of, well, we don't have to do anything because we're going to go to heaven one day.

It's, what are you doing because of the gift of salvation?

What are you doing because of that?

And that's what he says there in chapter, in verse, chapter four.

We have this treasure in earth and vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us.

We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed, perplexed, but not in despair.

Persecuted, but not forsaken, cast down, but not destroyed.

Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus Christ.

That the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.

For we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus sake.

That the life of Jesus might be made manifest our mortal flesh.

What are we doing with the stewardship that God has given.

What are we doing with this life?

It is just a clay pot but it is going can be worth something in glory.

This raggedy fragile vessel that we indwell can one day give us that.

Well done.

How good and faithless.

Let's pray.

Father thank you so much Lord for the grace that you give us to grow in Christ each day.

Lord thank you that you are the author and finisher our faith Lord, and that you desire to perfect us Lord, and that you don't leave us alone even though some days we would like to just be left alone wallow in our sin.

Lord, I pray that you would please by grace, by your mercy.

Don't let us do that or come after our hearts Lord, as you always do, or give us the mercy and grace to chasten us to get us closer into your arms.

Pray and ask these things in Jesus name.

Amen.