Thoughts of the day 1/13

Lots of thoughts today:

1. We are said to be jars of clay, meaning that our inherent value is insignificant in comparison to the value of what we hold. It can be said that we hold many things of incomparable value: the gospel, God's love, grace, wisdom, etc. But what I find is that, I, as a jar, am full of ...crap. And because of this, the value of what I'm holding is lowered, the contents tainted and compromised.

Because of this, even though God pours his perfect love into me, others only get to see a tainted, lesser version of it. Same with his grace, and even the gospel message.

So, I just wish to be a clean jar. ^^

2. Was just reading about how Alcoholics Anonymous groups function so well because there is no room for ranking there. Businessmen, teenagers, mothers, high school dropouts, professors, all of these people come with the problem of alcoholism. Everyone is equal in a sense and genuinely welcoming. Kinda like my gothic friends at home. They look scary and they all have problems, but there's a gentleness and a welcoming to those with problems that the church often lacks. It didn't matter that I was an Asian nerd compared the to rest of them, they still welcomed me. Shouldn't church be like that? A conglomeration of people who just have problems, the problem of sin?

3. Ever think about how some examples seem to work so well? Like how silver has to be refined by fire to get rid of the dross, to purify it? and how that example works so well to describe God's process? I get the feeling that God planned it like that. Like, he made silver's purification process work like that, in order to show us tangibly what it looks like. Same thing with purification and snow, etc. I feel like he made all those examples in order to show us more of himself.

"Man is born broken. He lives by mending. The grace of God is glue."
Eugene O'Neill