We are aware of the weakness of our flesh. We know many temptations. We find ourselves unable to give people the love and respect they deserve but rather use them for our own selfish ends. Lust and adultery are examples of this.
But I say to you,
everyone who looks at a woman with lust
has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
These temptations stem from our concupiscence and they can be hard to resist. Paul says that he does the very thing that he knows he shouldn't do in spite of himself. It almost seems like we are powerless to resist them. There is a good reason why God let's us experience our own weakness.
We hold this treasure in earthen vessels,
that the surpassing power may be of God and not from us.
God gives us the power and the desire to overcome temptations which we can't overcome by our own effort, and probably don't even really want to overcome until God inspires that desire within us. God allows us to be united to "the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our body."
Sometimes the dying of Jesus can seem kind of extreme.
If your right eye causes you to sin,
tear it out and throw it away.
It is better for you to lose one of your members
than to have your whole body thrown into Gehenna.
While we aren't usually maiming ourselves, the priority is clear. Heaven and eternity has to take precedence even over lesser goods, if sacrificing those goods is necessary to ensure our eternal security. We are unable to put the flesh in this distant second place apart from the power of the risen Christ and his Holy Spirit at work within us. We are unable to see beyond our immediate circumstances and the temptations that fill them. But by belief we begin to hope for more than the next temporary pleasure. We are earthen vessels, it's true. But we begin to let God fill us with the power of his resurrection.
we too believe and therefore speak,
knowing that the one who raised the Lord Jesus
will raise us also with Jesus
and place us with you in his presence.
'Earthen vessels' is a concept that has become too poetic. Singing about them, they seem beautiful and flawless. But really, we feel like vessels on the verge of breaking at any moment. We don't feel up to holding what we have to hold. But faith allows us to be filled in ways we can't even imagine.
I believed, even when I said,
"I am greatly afflicted";
I said in my alarm,
"No man is dependable."
So let us believe in the Risen One who wants to fill us today. Let's not turn him away because we see our own cracks and discolorations. We won't break or shatter. We'll be filled with the treasure he wants to give us.
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