The Parable of the Teacup
I’m just getting ready to host a Women’s Ministry evening with some ladies from my church. As I have been tidying up my house and preparing some treats, I picked up one of my china tea cups thinking we might go fancy shmancy tonight. I think china tea cups have gone by the way of the dinosaur, don’t you think? We’re mug users now. Clunky comfortable mugs! Ceramic mugs with huge handles that we are not afraid of breaking or replacing! Let’s face it, china teacups are pretty and dainty but they can’t be put in a dishwasher like the great big clunky ceramic mugs can. China teacups are delicate and fragile and need much more care when we use them. But still, there is something intrinsically beautiful in the daintiness and the pattern of a teacup isn’t there?
I have this young college and career friend who got a very interesting tattoo. Not that I’m a fan of tattoos in general, but as she explained why she got a small teacup tattooed onto her hip, I couldn’t help but be intrigued. “The teacup,” she said, “symbolizes “womanhood”…delicate and fragile but also strong and durable.” She wanted to remember throughout her lifetime that she not only wanted to be treated with respect and sensitivity because of her natural feminine nature, but to remember that she had strength and durability to overcome any trials and hardship that may come her way.
After I talked to her I remembered someone sending me an email when I was going through breast cancer in 2001 entitled “The Parable of the Teacup“.
There was a couple who used to go to shop in beautiful antique stores. One day the woman saw a beautiful china teacup. She picked it up to admire it and was startled when the teacup suddenly spoke to her.
“I see that you admire my fine china quality and rich design.” Notice the intricacy of my pattern, the gentle curve of my handle. I am indeed a treasure but you may not fully understand how I came to be this beautiful teacup.” It said. “I wasn’t always a teacup, in fact there was a time when I was just a red clay ball. My master took me and rolled me and patted me over and over and I yelled out, ‘Let me alone.’ But he only smiled, ‘Not yet.’
“Then I was placed on a spinning wheel,” the teacup said, “and suddenly I was spun around and around and around. ‘Stop it! I’m getting dizzy!’ I screamed. But the master only nodded and said, ‘Not yet.’
“Then he put me in the oven. I’d never felt such heat! I wondered why he wanted to burn me. I yelled! I knocked at the door! I could see him through the opening and I could read his lips as he shook his head, ‘Not yet.’
“Finally the door opened, and he put me on the shelf and I began to cool. ‘Ahhh, that’s better,’ I said. Then he brushed me and painted me all over. The fumes were horrible. I thought I would gag. ‘Stop it! Stop it!’ I cried. He only nodded, ‘Not yet.’
“Then suddenly he put me back into the oven, not like the first one. This was twice as hot and I knew I would suffocate. I begged. I pleaded. I screamed. I cried. All the time I could see him through the opening saying, ‘Not yet’.
“Then when I thought I knew there wasn’t any hope. I thought I would never make it. I was ready to give up, the door opened and he took me out and placed me on the shelf. One hour later, he held me in his strong hand and he smiled as he handed me a mirror and said, ‘Look at yourself!’ and I did, and I said, ‘That’s not me, that couldn’t be me! It’s beautiful. I’m beautiful!”
“My master held me delicately as he explained, “I know it hurt you to be rolled and patted, but if I just left you as a red clay ball you would have dried up. I know it made you dizzy to spin around on the wheel, but if I had stopped, you would have crumbled. I know it hurt you and it was hot and disagreeable in the oven, but if I hadn’t put you there, you would have cracked. I know the fumes were bad when I brushed and painted you all over, but if I hadn’t done that, you never would have hardened. You would not have had any colour in your life, and if I hadn’t put you back in that second oven you would not have survived for very long because the hardness would not have held. Now you are a finished product. You are what I had in mind when I first began with you.”
“Then the master heated a cup of boiling water and put some tea leaves in me, and as he poured boiling water into me, the splendid aroma wafted up to him and he smiled, and I could tell he was well pleased with me.”
I Peter 5:7 “Casting all your care upon Him; for He careth for you.”
He is the Potter, I am the clay.
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