As believers in Christ, we were created to be vessels of mercy unto honor to contain Christ as the God of glory; in our earthen vessel we have a priceless treasure, Christ Himself, and we’re being transformed into His image from glory to glory. Hallelujah!
On one hand we need to realize God’s sovereignty and see that He is sovereign in everything, and He is the sovereign Potter who made us vessels.
However, we also need to realize that we are vessels of mercy – it is all of His mercy, not our endeavour, our willing, or our running, but His mercy.
God has mercy on whomever he wills to have mercy, and He has compassion on whomever He wills.
We thank and praise the Lord that He has made us vessels of mercy – in His mercy He has reached us, He brought us into the right position to receive His grace, and now we are sons of God, vessels containing a priceless treasure – the glorious Christ! Hallelujah!
As we come to the throne of grace, that is, as we come to contact God in our spirit, we receive mercy and find grace for timely help; this will cause us to receive the mercy and grace that will meet our timely need.
When we see that it is all of God’s mercy, when we realize that it’s not of our merit or ability but because of God’s mercy, and we are simply vessels open to Him.
There must be at least one time in our life when we see God’s mercy and definitely touch His mercy; when this happens, we realize that our ability and our capacity amount to nothing unless God has mercy on us.
When we all see God’s sovereign mercy and realize it, it will no longer be a feeling but a fact; this fact is that everything depends on God’s mercy.
We will then come forward with boldness to the throne of grace so that we may receive mercy and find grace for timely help; when we come to touch God and worship Him for His mercy, we will feed on Him, we will be supplied, and we can advance with the Lord in our Christian life.
How we thank and praise the Lord that God created us as vessels of mercy unto honor and glory so that we may contain Christ as the God of honor and as the treasure of glory.
Through regeneration we have received Christ as the treasure in our earthen vessel, and because we have Him, we are vessels of mercy unto honor and glory. Hallelujah!
God Created us, Formed us, and even Made us for His Glory: we are Vessels of Mercy unto Honor and Glory
Praise and thank the Lord for creating us to be vessels of mercy unto glory to contain Christ as the God of glory!
Glory is nothing else but God Himself expressed and manifested (see Jer. 2:11; Acts 7:2; Eph. 1:17; 1 Cor. 2:8; 1 Pet. 4:14; Col. 2:9; Psa. 24:7-10); for us to be vessels unto glory is for us to express and manifest God.
When the Lord was on earth, in John 17:4 He told the Father, I have glorified You on earth, finishing the work which You have given Me to do.
This means that, while the Lord was living on earth, He manifested and expressed the Father.
The work that God wants us to do is not this or that; it is to glorify God.
We may have a concept of what it means to do a work for God, but the Lord said in John 6, The work of God is for you to eat the bread that came out of heaven, to believe into Me and receive Me as the content.
When we do this, when we take Christ in and have Him as our content, God will be expressed – this is the work that God wants us to do, and this is the work that the Lord as a God-man has fulfilled in serving God the Father.
The release of the glory of Christ’s divinity (Luke 12:49-50) was His being glorified by the Father with the divine glory (John 12:23-24) in His resurrection (Acts 3:13) through His death.
In Christ’s glorification, He – as the last Adam – became the life-giving Spirit for His divine dispensing (see John 7:39; Luke 24:26, 46; 1 Cor. 15:45b; 2 Cor. 3:6).
Now as such a life-giving Spirit, He wants to fill us up as vessels of mercy unto honor and glory, so that we may be filled with Christ as the God of glory!
As vessels of mercy unto honor and glory, we have been prepared by God unto glory through glorification, which is the last step of God’s full salvation (Rom. 8:21, 23, 29-30; Phil. 3:21).
Those whom He predestinated, these He also called, justified, and glorified! According to His sovereign authority, God created us, formed us, and even made us for His glory.
In Isa. 43:7 we are told that God created, formed, and even made us for His glory. Furthermore, in Gen 1:1 we see that God created, in 1:26 He made man, and in 2:7 He formed man of the red clay, the earth.
To create something is to cause something to come into being which has never been there before; it never existed, and then it was created.
To make something is to use some existing materials to make them into something.
To form something is to fashion it in the way that a potter makes his pottery.
When it comes to God’s creation of man, we see that God created man, He made man, and He formed man – He created, formed, and even made us for His glory!
What an attention He paid to creating, making, and forming man to be His container, His vessel!
Hallelujah, we are predestinated by His sovereignty to be His containers for His glorious expression and manifestation.
This is the climax of our usefulness to God and the goal of God’s selection according to His sovereignty; this is the highest service we can render to God.
The highest service that we human beings can render to God is to express Him for His glory (1 Cor. 6:20; 10:31; Rom. 6:4).
The highest service we can render to God is to be His container; we shouldn’t primarily think about the things we want to do for God in our service to Him but rather, we should open our whole being to Him to be an open vessel!
When we open to the Lord and allow Him to fill us, He as the God of honor and glory fills our vessel and is expressed through us; this is God being glorified through us.
God’s glory is wrought into the church, and He is expressed in the church; hence, to God is the glory in the church! Amen!
God is glorified in the church as we all, the constituents of the church, are open vessels to God to allow Him to fill us and saturate us with Himself as the God of glory; the result is that we express God!
If we as a vessel allow Christ to make His home in our heart, the result is that unto God is glory in the church!
Hallelujah, we were created by God to be vessels of mercy unto glory to contain Christ as the God of glory! Thank You God for preparing us unto glory – You chose us, predestinated us, justified us, and You are glorifying us so that You may be expressed through us! Thank You for creating us, forming us, and even making us for Your glory according to Your sovereign authority. Hallelujah, we were predestinated by God’s sovereignty to be His containers for His glorious expression and manifestation! Amen! We open our vessel to You, Lord, and we allow You to make Your home in our heart and fill our entire vessel with Yourself so that You may be expressed and manifested through us until to God is the glory through the church!
Christ as the God of Glory is the Treasure in our Earthen Vessel; we can Behold Him and Reflect Him to Express Him!
According to 2 Cor. 4:7, we believers in Christ are earthen vessels who have a treasure in them, and the excellency of power is not out of us but of God.
The treasure in our earthen vessel is the Christ who dwells in us; we are containers of honor and glory, for Christ is the God of honor and the God of glory.
When others see us, however, they may not see the treasure yet, for we are not yet glorified; however, when the Lord Jesus comes back, others will be able to see that we, as vessels unto honor, are containers of such a glorious treasure!
More specifically, the treasure in our earthen vessel is “the face of Jesus Christ” on which the glory of God shines, as mentioned in 2 Cor. 4:6.
The treasure is the index of Jesus’ face; when we look into His face in our time with Him, we sense the precious treasure within us.
It is easy to know the doctrine that Christ is in us as the treasure in the earthen vessel, but it is not so easy for us to experience this and realize this.
We will never sense that we have a treasure within until we see the face of Jesus; when we see the face of Jesus Christ, when we behold Him face to face in our time with Him, we will realize the preciousness of the treasure within us.
Hallelujah, Christ as the God of glory is the treasure in our earthen vessel, and we can behold Him and reflect Him like a mirror, thus being transformed into the same image (2 Cor. 3:18)!
May we take time every day to spend with the Lord, behold His wonderful face, and enjoy Him.
May we learn to live in the Lord’s presence so that we may have, know, and realize the preciousness of Jesus.
When we live in His presence, we enjoy His indwelling; His indwelling becomes a living reality, not merely a saying.
May we all learn to forsake ourselves, take Him as our person by looking at the index of His eyes while enjoying His sweet presence!
May we live in His presence, touch Him, enjoy Him, speak with Him, allow Him to speak to us, and let Him infuse us with Himself; when we do this, we will have a sweet sense of the preciousness of the indwelling Jesus Christ.
And this will make us happy and shining! When we enjoy the indwelling Christ, when we pay attention to the One who lives within us, we behold Him face to face, and this causes us to reflect Him to others.
The treasure in the earthen vessel causes us to be transformed into the same image as the Lord, until the treasure shines through our earthen vessel and what we express is just Christ! Hallelujah!
As vessels of mercy unto honor and glory, we are in the process of God’s organic salvation, and the last step is glorification.
As vessels of mercy we have been prepared unto glory (Rom. 9:21), and when we are being glorified, we express Him in full (Rom. 8:30).
One day the Lord will glorify us – He will redeem (transfigure) our body (Phil. 3:21) and He will fully conform us to Himself!
Our fallen and corrupted body will be redeemed (Rom. 8:23) and will be transfigured into the body of Christ’s glory!
We will be conformed to the glorious image of Christ, the firstborn Son of God (Rom. 8:29), and we will be made wholly and absolutely like Him in our regenerated spirit, transformed soul, and transfigured body! Hallelujah!
Today when we turn our heart to the Lord, we are beholding the Lord Spirit as the presence of Christ in our spirit, and we are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord Spirit (2 Cor. 3:16-18; 2 Tim. 4:22).
May we learn to turn our heart to the Lord so that all the veils will be taken away and we would behold the Lord face to face!
The more we receive the Spirit, the more we behold the Lord by turning our heart to the Lord and by reading and praying His word.
When our heart is turned to Him, our face is unveiled, and we get infused through the word of God with the glory of God; this causes us to be conformed to the treasure, and Christ is shining out through us! Amen!
For us to behold the glory of the Lord is for us to see the Lord ourselves; for us to reflect the glory of the Lord is for us to enable others to see Him through us (Isa. 61:1, 5 – you will see the glory of the Lord and you will beam). Amen!
Lord Jesus, we love to spend time with You to enjoy You, live in Your presence, and enjoy Your indwelling. You are the most precious One to us. We love to be with You, speak with You, allow You to speak to us and infuse us with Yourself, and show us Your sweetness and preciousness. Thank You Lord for coming into us to be the treasure in the earthen vessel. We turn our heart to You; remove all the veils so that we may see You face to face. We want to behold You so that we may reflect You by enabling others to see You through us. Amen, Lord, transform us into the same image as You from glory to glory until our earthen vessel is conformed to the glorious treasure within!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Mark Raabe for this week, and portions from, The Conclusion of the New Testament, msgs. 10-11, 110 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization Study of Jeremiah and Lamentations, week 5, God as Our Sovereign Potter Making Us His Vessels, His Containers, to Contain Him.
- Hymns on this topic:
– Earthen vessel I was made, / Christ in me the treasure laid; / His container I must be, / As the content He in me. / In His image I was made, / Fit that Christ should all pervade; / Thus the vessel God did form / With the content uniform. (Hymns #548)
– As a glass, beholding / With uncovered face, / I can see His glory / And reflect His grace. / O that no more covering / May the Lord obscure, / That I may reflect Him / With a heart made pure. (Hymns #399)
– Just to behold Thy face, / For this my heart doth cry; / I deeply long to drink of Thee / My thirst to satisfy. / Thy glorious, radiant face / My heart delights to see; / Here I’d abide and ne’er depart, / Beholding constantly. (Hymns #812)
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