But "this-world orientation" and all that it implies in hanging on to our mortal life at all costs is threatened by the reality of daily life. We are "jars of clay". The jars of clay are the human body -- our temporal existence -- which is subject to decay and vulnerable to disease and injury -- fragile. Our earthly life is short, easily shattered and destroyed in a moment of time. Clay cracks and breaks when exposed to the elements or dropped on a hard surface. So when we encounter in our daily lives threats to our mortal existence, unless we have the spiritual resources to cope with them and to conquer them, our lives will be shattered. We need to know and to experience what St. Paul calls the "treasure" of the Gospel which God desires to give us. This treasure is "the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ" (v.6), In other words, what is valuable is that the unsearchable riches of Christ are to be found inside the heart, inside the mind, inside the spirit, in our souls and therefore neither finite nor mortal.

At the age of thirty-nine, theologian Todd Billings, father of two children, one and three years old, was diagnosed with incurable cancer. He writes, "We all know, in theory, that we are mortal, but in day-to-day life many of us don't live with the thought... I could have five years, ten years, or decades. Who knows? Not me. We belong to God -- the Alpha and the Omega, who holds time in his hands -- but we are not God. We are mortal, and we don't know when we will die....Even if I do live decades, the myeloma may still be chopping decades off of the life that I might have had without cancer. Of course, I never knew that I could or would live until my seventies or older; but often such an assumption is simply present in white, middle-class Western culture, and I had soaked it in." (J. Todd Billings, Rejoicing in Lament: Wrestling with Incurable Cancer & Life in Christ, 2015)

We Christians are a combination of matter and spirit; body and soul; jars of clay and the treasures of Christ, if we have allowed ourselves to be filled with the Spirit. Our fragile, mortal body suffers from all the vicissitudes of life. God "causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous" (Matthew 5:45). Nobody gets a free pass in life. We all have our share of suffering to bear. But the Christian has been given the resources and the reasons in the treasures of the Gospel to enable us to cope with and to conquer when the hard times come.

St. Paul gives us a twofold understanding that enables us to have courage to endure our suffering. We are given the treasures of the Gospel in jars of clay, first, to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are too weak, too fragile, to endure in our own strength, but God gives us his over-abundant supernatural power. This leads us to give thanks and praise to God for his mercy rather than claiming praise for ourselves. Our lives are not made of reinforced concrete, stainless steel, or silver or gold so that we can take the credit for our success in this world. Instead they are made up of common clay, earthenware, so that God may get the glory for whatever success we might have.

Second, he gives us an understanding that the resurrection life of Jesus may be revealed in our body. We are given the supernatural power of Christ that defies death and all that it brings. We have the power of the resurrection in our spirits that defeats the power of death. Without faith in a future resurrection Paul's present suffering would not only be intolerable but also meaningless. "We know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you in his presence" (2 Cor.4:13).

With this understanding Paul gives us the resources to overcome our hardships. He is honest about them. He is not in denial about the threats to his wellbeing. But he shows us that the hardships of life do not have to overwhelm us. He gives us four examples:

1. "Hard-pressed on every side, but not crushed" (NIV); "surrounded and battered by troubles, but not demoralized" (The Message). What does that mean for you? How can the all-surpassing power of the life of Christ in you prevent you from being demoralized or crushed by the circumstances of your life? You may be hard pressed by creditors or by your employers for no fault of your own, but you do not need to be crushed if your identity is in the life of Christ.

2. "Perplexed, but not in despair" (NIV); "we're not sure what to do, but we know that God knows what to do" (The Message). What does that mean for you? How can the all-surpassing power of the resurrection life of Christ in you conquer despair when you are not sure what to do? Can you trust that God will reveal to you what to do? You may be getting contradictory advice but you do not need to be confused if you are centered in Christ.

3. "Persecuted, but not abandoned" (NIV); "spiritually terrorized, but God hasn't left our side" (The Message). What does that mean to you? How can the all-surpassing resurrection power of Christ in you affirm that you are not abandoned, deserted or forsaken? You may be in an abusive relationship, or in a dysfunctional family but you should not feel that you are alone if Christ is with you. He will never forsake you.

4. "Struck down, but not destroyed" (NIV); "thrown down, but we haven't been broken" (The Message); "knocked down but not knocked out" (JBP). What does that means to you? How can the all-surpassing resurrection power of the life of Christ in you pick you up when you are knocked down? How can the treasures of Christ keep you from being broken by the circumstances of life? You may be at the end of your tether and feel a failure but failure isn't final in Christ. It may lead to the Cross but on the other side is a new beginning -- a resurrection.

5. "But not" is due to the treasure in the jar of clay -- the power of God in the Gospel. God's power within us transforms every dangerous situation. We enjoy the life of Jesus within us to give us courage and peace -- life in all its fullness. By the grace of God we have soul power

(Ted's blog on Todd Billing's book can be found at www.tedschroder.com