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"We have this treasure [the glory of God] in jars of clay to show
that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.”
~ The Apostle Paul (2 Corinthians 4:7)
There is a mini-volcano in my town of Ulysses, Kansas. It’s about 18 inches high. It doesn't belch black smoke and lava, but it does hold a candle at the top of it. This feat of nature stands under the ping pong table in my garage. A friend, Bill Brown, helped my kids build it out of plaster of paris for a school project. It looks almost real. Fortunately, it is not real, because I don't know what I would do if it started emitting smoke, gas and lava!
But something like this did happen with a fake volcano in Duluth, Minnesota. The Edgewater Hotel and Waterpark in Duluth has a 20-foot plastic volcano. That's a little bigger than the one under my ping pong table. It is still not as big as the real ones, but at 20 feet it requires even a tall man to look way up.
Imagine the surprise of the Waterpark guests and workers when suddenly the fake volcano began belching black smoke and shooting flames! This activity was not part of the regular show. Guests ran to the parking lot clad in bathing suits and bare feet.
Firefighters were called in to put out the fire. They also investigated the cause of this fake volcano acting temporarily like it was a real one. Apparently an internal speaker malfunctioned, causing the fire. It generated enough heat and flame that part of the volcano actually melted.
Guests certainly got their money's worth that day! Not only did they see a fake volcano act as if it was real, but the hotel treated them to free ice cream. (From Preaching Now, 4-3-07)
There are a lot of fake things in our world that belch, snort, get attention and look as if they are real. "Things" that look real to us are our possessions. When we run out of room in our closets we move our stuff to the garage. When the garage fills we move the stuff to the shed (Okay, I'm making a confession here). We may not look through that stuff for years at a time, but it is ours and it seems real and valuable, so we horde it.
It is difficult to distinguish the real from the fake. The fake often seems real and we are attached to it.
Paul says the real is what is inside us. The real is not our possessions, our savings, or our clothing. The real is what we carry around in our hearts and that permeates our whole being if we will let it. The REAL is the presence of God in our lives. Everything else is fake.
We have a hard time recognizing the real because "the god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they (we) cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." (2 Corinthians 4:4). The presence of God in our lives is real because it is from God and has permanence. Everything else in our lives deteriorates and ruins: our possessions, savings, food, houses, and even our very bodies. But the presence of God in our lives gives permanence so that "inwardly we are being renewed day by day." (2 Corinthians 4:16)
That is why we spend time in devotional readings. That is why we pray, worship, fellowship and encourage one another. That is why we spend moments in personal inventory, assessing our weaknesses and sins and confessing them to God and even a brother. Because, in all these activities we are feeding the real and the permanent: the Spirit of God who indwells us. We are feeding the treasure, the all-surpassing power of God that he is pleased to entrust to the fragile clay jars of our lives.
Meanwhile, the world still has fake volcanoes that occasionally belch smoke and flame. They look real. Through spiritual discernment, God enables us to distinguish the real from the fake so that we give most of our energy to feeding and caring for the holiness growing within us. That is real!
Warren Baldwin preaches in Ulysses, KS. He and his wife, Cheryl, have 3 children; Wes, a sophomore at Freed-Hardeman University; Jenny, a junior in high school; and Kristin, a seventh grader. The Baldwins enjoy sports and traveling together.
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