Our Daily Bread: Lead Like the ShepherdPrøve

From Broken to Beautiful We ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. -2 Corinthians 4:7 I stood in line at the market, noting all the other exhausted moms around me. For the past few weeks, I’d been pondering an invitation to apply for a leadership role in an international ministry for moms. At first, I had laughed at the thought. I’d never even been pregnant. Our kids came through adoption. Besides that, I’d grown up in a dysfunctional family. Surely, I wasn’t qualified. As I prayed, however, God reminded me that every mom struggles with inadequacy. Then I sensed Him nudging me to offer up my broken deficits, allowing Him to transform them into His offering of beauty. Through God’s redemptive work, my brokenness could make me a better leader. God understands the sense of disqualification that comes from brokenness. Writing to the church in Corinth, the apostle Paul rearranges our thinking about who’s responsible for transforming lives. “We don’t go around preaching about ourselves. We preach that Jesus Christ is Lord, and we ourselves are your servants for Jesus’ sake,” he said (2 Corinthians 4:5). He noted, “We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure” (v. 7). God reveals His light, hope, and power through the cracks of our brokenness and invites us to steward His redemptive work in our lives into the lives of others—including those we lead. Elisa Morgan What tempts you to believe you’re disqualified from God’s service? How has He redeemed your negative experiences? Dear God, please take my broken deficits and make them an offering of beauty to reveal Your power and purposes.