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The most Christian kitchen tool is a colander. This may sound like a strange selection. What about a butter knife for spreading the love of Jesus? Why not a potato peeler as a reminder of how Jesus peels away our sins? One could make an argument that a can opener can be used in loving service to the neighbor by making them a meal. But a colander?!?
Nevertheless, a colander provides a beautiful illustration for how Christians are to receive the love and mercy of Jesus. A colander – sometimes called a pasta strainer – is a bowl with holes in it. Unlike a regular bowl, colanders are made to leak. Things are meant to pass through a colander.
Like water spilling out of a colander, the humble confidence that we have in Christ Jesus should spill out of us. God does not intend for us to be impenetrable vessels of his grace and mercy, goodness and assurance. The humble confidence that we have in Christ Jesus fills us up to overflowing. This is clearly a blessing to us! Yet, the humble confidence that we have in Jesus should also leak out of us and into the world. As we receive the humble confidence of Jesus, we also share this humble confidence with others for their benefit and blessing.
What does it look like to leak out humble confidence wherever you go? It does not mean leaving puddles behind with every step you take. Rather, leaking out the humble confidence of Jesus involves both our words and our actions. When you speak a word of encouragement or kindness to someone else, you are leaking out humble confidence like we hear in 1 Thessalonians 5:11, “Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.”
When you go out of your way to speak up for a vulnerable person or you take time to hurt with someone who is hurting, you are letting the humble confidence of Jesus leak out of you like we hear in Micah 6:8, “He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”
When we try to horde the confidence that we have in Christ, it ceases to be humble confidence. Living like a watertight vessel of God’s gifts turns humble confidence into self-serving confidence. Jesus pours his humble confidence into us so that we can be colanders, not containers. Coming from Christ himself, we receive and remit his humble confidence. We are transformed by Jesus when we receive his humble confidence through faith in him and in the waters of baptism. And we are used by God to transform the world when we share this humble confidence with the world through our words and actions. Be a colander and leak the humble confidence of Jesus everywhere you go!
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