A man was exploring caves by the seashore. In one of the caves he found a canvas bag with a bunch of hardened clay balls. It was like someone had rolled clay balls and left them out in the sun to bake.They didn't look like much, but they intrigued the man, so he took the bag out of the cave with him. As he strolled along the beach, he would throw the clay balls one at a time out into the ocean as far as he could.
He thought little about it, until he dropped one of the clay balls and it cracked open on a rock. Inside was a beautiful, precious stone!
Excited, the man started breaking open the remaining clay balls. Each contained a similar treasure. He found thousands of dollars worth of jewels in the 20 or so clay balls he had left. Then it struck him.
He had been on the beach a long time. He had thrown maybe 50 or 60 of the clay balls with their hidden treasure into the ocean waves.
Instead of thousands of dollars in treasure, he could have taken home tens of thousands, but he had just thrown it away!
It's like that with people. We look at someone, maybe even ourselves, and we see the external clay vessel. It doesn't look like much from the outside. It isn't always beautiful or sparkling, so we discount it.
We see that person as less important than someone more beautiful or stylish or well known or wealthy. But we have not taken the time to find the treasure hidden inside that person.
There is a treasure in each one of us. If we take the time to get to know that person, and if we ask God to show us that person the way He
sees them, then the clay begins to peel away and the brilliant gem begins to shine forth.
May we not come to the end of our lives and find out that we have thrown away a fortune in friendships because the gems were hidden in bits of clay. May we see the people in our world as God sees them.
I am so blessed by the gems of friendship I have with each of you. Thank you for looking beyond my clay vessel.
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Elmo was in the news of this blog when he decided to runaway from home for 3 weeks.
He is very well now, thanks for all your concern.
Posts
everytime i come to robin's blog.. i read something very inspirational! thanks for all these nice posts.
ReplyDeleteThank God Elmo is home :) Don't we all, as humans, have the tendency to judge a book by its cover? That's simply because we are not God. We can't see the heart of a person. We don't know a person's true character unless we take time to get to know him or her. We can't even read one another's thoughts.
ReplyDeleteI believe it's one of the ills of human nature to take things as they are (from the surface), and not as they should be...it has to do with our humility and pride.
ReplyDeleteMatthew 7:7-8 - "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened."
Well... it's true, but sometimes is also in the contrary... people who you thought are nice and can be trusted.. at the end, they are the one who dissapointed you and make you feeling hurt badly.
ReplyDeletea round of applause...
ReplyDeleteanother fruitful browsing trip to Robin's Empire.
it's a very meaningful story! :P
Yet another wise and meaningful anecdote from master Robin!
ReplyDeleteElmo sure looks content! He doesn't look like he needs precious stones to be happy.
Is it possible to dye Elmo's fur red so it's the same color as Sesame Street's Elmo? :)
ReplyDeleteGreat story, Robin. Thank you for the reminder.
ReplyDeleteAre these recent pictures of Elmo? His fur is all ruffled up - looks different from the 'before' days. Is he still the same Elmo from those days? Same temperament, etc? I guess all cats are nonchalant mostly, aren't they? Thanks for the update.
Good story and good reminder to knock that clay head of yours sometimes! keke ;)
ReplyDeleteLooks like u need to feed Elmo some of d delicious 'lap cheong' too! Maybe he's dreaming of 'em with his eyes closed in the last shot? No? :)
How much treasure do we throw away in our lives?
ReplyDeleteIn the Bible there is a reference in the book of Daniel to "feet of clay" (actually partly of clay).
ReplyDeleteTo that I can now add your story of a guy who had balls of clay, with the family jewels inside. Hmmm..
I'll have to ponder this.
Elmo looks healthy and content now. No more roaming, Elmo.
PandaB, LOL!
ReplyDeleteLOL... haha
ReplyDelete