The Perfect Vase: An Illustration for Our Creation

Let’s imagine that God made a vase. This vase was without flaw or defect. He placed it in a garden and watched it. Later an outside force trespassed in the garden and put pressure on the vase until it broke. The vase is no longer flawless, its perfection has been tainted yet its creation and the hands that made it were indeed perfect. When God made us we were made perfect by perfect hands. Made sinless with sinless hands. Later an outside force (The Devil) put pressure on us and we became sinful and entered a state of brokenness.

You may ask, if the vase was made so flawless would its flawlessness not extend to its ability to withstand any amount of pressure?

That is true, in that way we are not like a flawless vase. We are eternal beings made not in the image of a vase but the image of God. We were made with the ability to withstand any pressure, the ability to reject sin fully in all its forms, but the eternal beings of God’s creation and image were also able to reject their image and their maker. To cling to our divine nature or deviate from it. We can either withstand infinite pressure or yield to it.

To retain the ability to deviate from our perfect design is not the same as being made imperfect.

The nuances of this I am sure could fill books and yet still be out of reach of a perfect understanding. A sinful broken being could never fully grasp what it means to be perfectly whole.