Mortality Swallowed Up By Life

Whilst God’s first Creation shone with an external lustre that caught the physical eye of man for the creature to fall in love with the works of His hands, yet now God says let there be light in our hearts that He might create in us His people a love for the firstborn among the New Creation. Before even we've set eyes on a new heavens and earth, we love Jesus whom we've not yet seen.

For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. (2Corinthians 4:6).

And though Adam was unconsciously formed of the dust to little appreciate the potters hand, yet we earthen vessels who hold the treasure of God's rich love are dizzyingly aware of the potters wheel as well as His graceful grasp.

'We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed' (2 Corinthians 4:8-9)
The light affliction of hard pressing works in us an eternal weight of glory to joy the heart far from crushing, like the temporary furnace that sets forever the beautiful designs of the One Who crafts us not merely for use but loving artistry. The Greek word for our being God's workmanship is 'poiema' and is more readily related to the exuberance of a poet than the utility of a craftsman. Being a work of art in progress can be perplexing as we look out from the wheel, but when we look up we are transformed from glory to glory into the likeness of our Lord even as we behold His face. No need for despair, for though the potter strike us down like a lump to be fashioned anew yet we are in the hands of the Creator having escaped the clutches of our destructive enemy.

Psalm 40:1-3 comes to mind when the accuser would call us a disorientated clump of clay and tempt us to jump off the potter's wheel. Just think where the clay has been taken from and where it is destined!

"I waited patiently for the LORD;
And He inclined to me,
And heard my cry.
He also brought me up out of a horrible pit,
Out of the miry clay,
And set my feet upon a rock,
And established my steps.
He has put a new song in my mouth -
Praise to our God;
Many will see it and fear,
And will trust in the LORD."

From Joseph's lonely pit of despair to solid establishment in the throng of nations blessed by his stewardship, all things are for our sakes that through the abundant grace the thanksgiving of many might redound to the glory of God!

In the hands of the Light of the world, mirey clay far from a pitiful pit of horror proves a creative force of beauty, as in John 9 when Jesus spits on the ground to form a clay to anoint the blind man's eyes.

Give us all fresh vision to see that the One Who holds all our tears in a bottle shall surely not waste a single trauma as He moistens the lump towards an ornament of His fathomless faithful care. For though we carry about in our earthly bodies the dying of our Lord Jesus it is that His Life might be manifest more so.

'For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life.' (2 Corinthians 5:4)