2 Corinthians 4: God's Power in Jars of Clay

Introduction

“Have you ever seen the God of power at work in your life?” That is the question Susie asks at Trent Vineyard (Nottingham) in week two of a new series on Paul's second letter to the Corinthians. The title of the message says it in four words: the God of power.

The message was preached on a Sunday evening and shown on video at the following service. It rests on a single verse: “But we have this treasure in clay vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God and not from ourselves” (2 Corinthians 4:7).

Susie unfolds it with three simple questions: what is the treasure? What are the clay jars? And what does this surpassing power look like? Her answer: God shows his power in spectacular breakthroughs, but also in ordinary life and in the middle of pain.

Message Outline

1. The God of Power, on the Mountaintop and in the Valley

This summer, at the national youth festival Dreaming the Impossible, thousands of young people met Jesus. One girl with cerebral palsy had never been able to straighten her leg fully or stand upright. While her friends were praying, they saw her leg rotate, and she stood straight for the first time.
Susie admits: “Did that really happen?” She contacted the leaders, then received an email from the parents. At the physiotherapist, thorough tests showed that both hips had regained proper movement, her strength had increased, and the angle of her foot had gone from minus 5 to zero. She no longer needs sessions.
But God's power is also seen in ordinary moments and in the valleys where the breakthrough does not come. Friends told her that his power “fills me with peace,” “helps me keep going,” “reminds me that he is constant.”
One friend wrote her a long message. Four weeks earlier, he and his wife had stood in a hospital room in front of their one-month-old baby, unconscious and no longer breathing, surrounded by a resuscitation team. It was sepsis, and emergency surgery was about to save his life. One question overwhelmed them: “Where is God's power in moments like this?”
Yet he testifies: “In that moment of darkness, anguish, waiting and anxiety, we experienced the power of God as beautifully as any miracle we have ever seen.” He quotes Paul's prayer that the church be strengthened with power through God's Spirit in the inner person (Ephesians 3:16). Their son came home, but the road goes on: several operations are still ahead. His conclusion: “God's power is present in the valley as much as on the mountaintop.”

2. Paul, Under Attack, Talks About Who God Is

Paul is writing to a church he founded a few years earlier. There is tension: teachers are undermining his teaching and challenging his authority.
Rather than only defending himself, Paul expresses his love for the Corinthians and keeps coming back to who God is. The previous week, the series covered the God of comfort. This time, it is the God of power.
The passage read is 2 Corinthians 4:5-12: “We are pressed on every side, yet not crushed; perplexed, yet not to despair; pursued, yet not forsaken; struck down, yet not destroyed.”
Susie sees a lot of poetry in it, and above all a text “full of truth, hope and life.”

3. The Treasure Is the Gospel

Verse 5 says it: we preach “Christ Jesus as Lord.” Jesus is Lord, he died, he rose again: the good news is the treasure. In it we find hope, an eternal relationship with Jesus and the promise that all things will be restored. “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17).
This treasure is also what brought Paul trouble. A graffito from Rome, around the year 200, mocks a Christian who worships a crucified man with a donkey's head. A crucified Lord looked like a paradox, a Lord without power. “But we preach Christ crucified; a stumbling block to Jews, and foolishness to Greeks” (1 Corinthians 1:23).
For the disciples of Jesus, everything is upside down: Christ crucified is the greatest treasure. A brother from the church, who came from Iran, began reading the Bible after joining the football group. Back in his home country, members of his family hit him with an iron bar and stripped him of everything. In the ambulance, wounded and disowned, he gave his life to Jesus. He says: “It was worth it.”
About twenty years ago, Susie worked in a travel agency, at the currency exchange desk. One day she had to carry £10,000 in cash to the bank with a colleague. “I felt strangely powerful.” Because she knew the value of what she was carrying, she held the bag close and never took her eyes off it.
During a worship time with the leadership team, the worship leader sang: “Beautiful Saviour, you take my breath away.” Then he added: “Really?” The question made people laugh, then it convicted Susie. She turned back to God in repentance: “I never want to become too familiar with the gospel, because it is not ordinary.”
“You are not carrying £10,000. You are carrying the gospel.” If you have followed Jesus for a long time but he no longer takes your breath away, this is the moment to recalibrate. And if you are wondering whether this treasure is true, it is worth looking into, for example by taking an Alpha course.

4. The Clay Jars Are Us

Susie tried pottery once. No patience, clay everywhere, and then a pot came out of the kiln all cracked: “It will never be in my house.” The jars of ancient times looked like that: plain, cracked, easy to replace. But they could hold things of immense value.
Paul does not lower our worth: Jesus died for us. But compared with the treasure of the gospel, we are ordinary, cracked and weak.
The whole Bible shows it. Moses cannot speak well. David, a boy with a sling, brings down Goliath. Jesus feeds 5,000 people with a few loaves. “‘Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says Yahweh of Armies” (Zechariah 4:6).
Compared with rivals trained in public speaking, listening to Paul was “like listening to two mates chatting in the pub” rather than a brilliant lecture. He worked with his hands, traveled on foot and depended on gifts. He admits it: “I was with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling,” so that your faith would stand “in the power of God” (1 Corinthians 2:3-5).
This is not an excuse to say “I'm just a pot, I'll do what I want.” Scripture calls us to throw off sin and become more and more like Jesus. But we do not have to gather our strength to perform or impress. The kingdom does not follow the world's measures of success: not grades, not looks, not possessions.
At the festival, a girl arrived weighed down with shame, convinced she was worthless and could never be used by God because of her past. On the second day, God filled her with the Holy Spirit and used her for the healing of a youth pastor's foot. On the third day, for the knee of a member of her group who had been ill all her life. “He can use anyone, whatever their past.”

5. Explosive Power, Sustaining Power

It is deliberate: God puts the treasure in imperfect pots so that, when someone is healed, when a miracle happens or when you hold on through hardship, no one can deny that the power comes from him. That is why he can use all of us.
In 1 Corinthians 2:4, Paul speaks of a “demonstration of the Spirit and of power.” The Greek word is dunamis, which gives us the word “dynamite”: explosive power. Susie says she hungers for it: “Don't you want to see more of this?” We need to keep praying for it.
While preparing the message, the penny dropped: in 2 Corinthians 4:7, it is the same word, dunamis. But here Paul is not describing an easy life. He is pressed, in distress, persecuted, struck down. He even speaks of death at work in his body.
This is where the image of the jar is vital. A fragile pot that is struck should shatter. If Paul can say “not crushed, not destroyed,” it is because God's power is at work in him. The life of Jesus shows itself every day through the cracks of his weakness.
This power is not one-dimensional. Sometimes God lifts us out of the trial. Other times he strengthens us through it. The gospel does not promise that everything will be fine with Jesus, but we do not have to be crushed or abandoned.

6. When the Breakthrough Does Not Come

For two years, Susie has been going through very difficult personal circumstances, beyond her control. At first she thought it would all pass, that one prayer would be enough. The breakthrough she longed for did not come.
She says it frankly: there were many moments when she felt overwhelmed, fearful, anxious, when everything seemed hopeless.
But, more and more in recent months, she has known an inexplicable peace, a supernatural hope and the resilience to keep going. Nothing spectacular: while worshiping in her car, while walking, in front of a film, or while making spaghetti bolognese as anxiety was rising. She simply whispered: “God, I need your power. I need your help right now.”
This strength also came from Scripture (“Don't you be afraid, for I am with you,” “I will in no way leave you, neither will I in any way forsake you”) and from the fellowship of the church, on Sundays and in a small group.
Sundar Singh, born in 1889 into a well-off Sikh family in northern India, lost his mother as a teenager. Angry with God, he publicly burned a Gospel. Then he cried out: “God, reveal yourself.” Jesus revealed himself to him in a vision. After he was baptized, his family disowned him and tried to poison him.
He refused a rich, colonial Christianity and traveled barefoot in India and Tibet: “Like my Lord, I want neither house nor possessions.” Beaten, imprisoned, left for dead among corpses, he spoke of Jesus to tens of thousands of people. He died at 40, and was called “the apostle with bleeding feet.” In his weakness, God's power prevailed.

7. So We Do Not Lose Heart

The chapter ends like this: “Therefore we don't faint, but though our outward person is decaying, yet our inward person is renewed day by day” (2 Corinthians 4:16).
“Our light affliction, which is for the moment”? Susie smiles: you would like to tell Paul that our trials are not light. But Paul does not minimize pain. In the light of the treasure of the gospel and eternal hope, what belongs to this earth is passing.
A quotation from A. W. Tozer, recalled the previous week: “The God we see should shape the life we lead.” So we fix our eyes “not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen” (2 Corinthians 4:18).
You may feel weak, plain, unable to go on, battered by life. That does not stop God from working in you and through you. Jesus and the gospel are the treasure, we are the clay jars, and the power comes from God: he brings the breakthrough, he meets us in the ordinary and he sustains us in pain.

Key Takeaways

The treasure is the gospel: Jesus who died, rose again and is coming back. It is never ordinary, so never get used to it.
You are a clay jar: ordinary, cracked, but chosen to carry a treasure of infinite value.
God deliberately puts his power in fragile lives, so that no one can credit the jar.
The same power, dunamis, works in spectacular healings and in the strength to hold on when the breakthrough does not come.
We do not lose heart: our inner person is renewed day by day, and our eyes are fixed on what is eternal.

Personal Application

When did the gospel last “take your breath away”? Has it become too familiar to you?
How would you guard this treasure if you truly grasped its value, the way you would clutch a bag with £10,000 in it?
Do you feel too impressive or too insignificant to be used by God? What does the image of the clay jar change about that view?
In what situation are you waiting for a breakthrough that does not come? Can you whisper today: “God, I need your power”?
Which “things which are not seen” can you choose to look at this week so that you do not lose heart?

Verses Cited

Frequently Asked Questions

What does “this treasure in clay vessels” mean in 2 Corinthians 4:7?

For Susie, the treasure is the gospel: Jesus Christ is Lord, he died, he rose again, and he will return to restore all things. The clay jars are us: ordinary, cracked pots that are easy to replace. God places this treasure in fragile lives so that the power flowing from it is clearly his.

Why does God choose weak people to show his power?

It is deliberate: when someone is healed or when a believer holds on through the worst trial, no one can credit the jar. Moses, David and the loaves shared with 5,000 people show it: “‘Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says Yahweh of Armies” (Zechariah 4:6). This is not an excuse to stay in sin, but a release from the pressure to perform.

Where is God's power when healing or a breakthrough does not come?

The Greek word dunamis describes both the power of breakthroughs and the power that sustains in hardship. Paul is pressed on every side but not crushed. Sometimes God lifts us out of the trial, sometimes he strengthens us through it. His presence and power are as real in the valley as on the mountaintop.