I read an amazing little spy story recently: Just after the end of WWII, as the Cold War was starting to heat up, the British ambassador in Washington needed to get some urgent piece of communication back to London. He didn’t want to use the phone lines, because he suspected they might be bugged. There was this diplomatic box that traveled every day back and forth between London and DC, but the information he had was so sensitive and critical that he didn’t want to put it in a place that the Soviets might target for some kind of theft. He wanted to send his information in a format that the Soviets would never be looking for. And eventually, he settled on his plan: He would put his highly classified, top-secret material in a plain envelope and send it through ordinary mail. (And it worked!)
I think of that incredibly risky venture when I read 2 Corinthians 4, where the Apostle Paul tells the Corinthians not to let the unremarkable nature of the gospel “envelope” cause them to miss the importance of the contents. He writes, “But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us” (v. 7 ESV). We might think of clay jars as beautiful heirlooms. But in those (pre-plastic) days, clay jars were considered cheap containers. If you had something nice, you’d put it into a stone, bronze, silver, or even gold pot. Clay jars were more likely to be used as toilets than as storage containers. So if you were a thief breaking into a house and you saw a clay pot, you’d probably avoid it.
Why does Paul resort to such a crude image? It’s because he’s answering an important, troubling, and persistent question. Some of Paul’s critics had said: “Hey, Corinthians: Paul’s troubles are proof that God’s power is not really on him. If God was really with him,” they said, “he would prosper.”
You’ve probably had a similar thought at some point: If God was really pleased with some person, if he was really honored by that ministry, things would go better for them. Look at how difficult things are for them; they aren’t #blessed. Maybe you’ve even had that thought about yourself—if God’s favor really was upon me, things would be going a lot better. It feels reasonable, but it’s dead wrong. In fact, it’s one of the oldest deceptions in the book. It’s the substance of what Job’s friends had said to him: “Job, if God was really pleased with you, you wouldn’t be having all these problems.”
“To the contrary,” Paul says, “my sufferings are a confirmation, not a rebuttal, of God’s hand of blessing on me.” Then he ties this claim into the very nature of the gospel itself. God saved us, Paul said, not through prosperity, but through suffering. The greatest act of God involved an unjust cross and unfair suffering. For Jesus, the way to glory led through the cross. His humility led to his exaltation; his weakness led to triumph. For Jesus, the way up was the way down. That’s how it works for his followers too, Paul says: The way up is the way down.
Martin Luther said that a lot of confusion in the Christian life comes from substituting what he called “the theology of glory” for the “theology of the cross”:
- The theology of glory expects to find God in strength. The theology of the cross knows he is found in weakness.
- The theology of glory says: “God’s favor is proven by visible success.” The theology of the cross says: “His favor is hidden in apparent failure.”
- The theology of glory looks for God in the spectacular. The theology of the cross finds him in submission.
- The theology of glory presents the Christian life primarily as a ladder to climb. The theology of the cross presents it as a cross to die on.
Paul wrote 2 Corinthians 4 as an explanation of the theology of the cross, centered around the mundane image of a “jar of clay.” Disposable, cheap, even disgusting. And yet, in God’s great irony, filled with a treasure beyond our wildest dreams.
Imagine that two ladies walk into a room. One is holding a plastic Walmart bag while the other holds a Gucci Lady Diana bag (which retails for $4,660). Which bag probably contains important items? Which lady has status? You’d probably guess that the Gucci bag had the more important items. But what if I told you there was a diamond ring in the plastic bag? That’s not what you’d expect in such a cheap container. But that’s how God operates. He delights to put his power into vessels that are overlooked, underrated, and otherwise dismissed.
In short, he delights to put his power into us. Because the weaker we are, the more we show “that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.”
Books by J.D. Greear
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