The Broken Case
The emperor in a faraway land had a magnificent vase that was his pride and joy. But one day someone accidently knocked over the vase. It fell to the floor and shattered into a thousand pieces.
The fragments of the vase were gathered up and the best potters in the land were called on to put the base together again. Bu no one was able to do it. The emperor was not pleased and so they lost their heads. Then he heard about the one potter in the land he hadn’t talked to. He was an old monk who lived in a monastery off in the mountains.
The broken fragments of the vase were brought to the old monk. He carefully tried to piece the fragments back together but to no avail. But then the old monk had an idea. So he tried something different.
When he was done accompanied by his young apprentice the old monk journeyed to the emperor’s place and presented to him the vase. The beauty of the vase was magnificent and this time the emperor was pleased, very pleased.
Then one day, a few weeks later back at the monastery, the young apprentice was looking for something when he came upon the fragments of the vase. He ran to his master. “Look, here are the fragments of the vase you weren’t able to put together.
So, how were you able to make a vase as beautiful as the original one?” The old master smiled and said, “Whatever you do if you do the work with a loving heart, you’ll always be able to make something beautiful.”
Our heart is like a fragile vase. What shatters the vase more than anything is selfishness. And when selfishness with our wealth takes hold of us it so preoccupies us that we no longer notice the beggar at our table.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with material wealth. The parable mentions how when the poor man dies, he goes to the bosom of Abraham. Now it so happens that Abraham himself was a wealthy man. But unlike rich man in the parable, he didn’t let his wealth close his heart to the beggar at his table.
In this parable Jesus invites the Pharisees to not let selfishness with our wealth cause us to not notice the beggar at their table. And so for us Jesus invites us to not let selfishness with our wealth cause us to not notice the beggar at our table.
So, whatever you do, do it from a loving heart. And even though selfishness can sometimes shatter the fragile vase of our hearts God the master potter can knit those shattered pieces together. And we’ll know it when we start noticing the beggar at our table, the one that we hadn’t noticed before.