From the penny jar to fine copper.

Ezra 8: 24 Then I separated twelve of the chief of the priests, Sherebiah, Hashabiah, and ten of their brethren with them, 25 And weighed unto them the silver, and the gold, and the vessels, even the offering of the house of our God, which the king, and his counsellors, and his lords, and all Israel there present, had offered: 26 I even weighed unto their hand six hundred and fifty talents of silver, and silver vessels an hundred talents, and of gold an hundred talents; 27 Also twenty basons of gold, of a thousand drams; and two vessels of fine copper, precious as gold. 28 And I said unto them, Ye are holy unto the Lord; the vessels are holy also; and the silver and the gold are a freewill offering unto the Lord God of your fathers.

This morning, Ezra 8:27 jumped out at me. Ezra has been given permission to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem. Among the list of gifts and offerings, Ezra writes, "and two vessels of fine copper, precious as gold."

What? The stuff of pennies and electronics can be as precious as gold? 

What we have translated "fine" is from the Hebrew tsahab nchosheth. Tsahab is a root meaning "to glitter, i.e. to be golden in color / fine." Nchosheth is copper or something made of copper (or brass).

Remember the penny jar? As kids, some of us would raid the penny jar to buy ice cream from the ice cream truck. But then, there were those mysterious greenish discs at the bottom of the jar. You didn't touch them. Oxidized and defaced, those pennies at the bottom of the jar were meant to be thrown away - or hidden inside the middle of a penny roll when you collected 50 of them.

Then we learned the vinegar trick. It didn't always work. You put pennies in a glass of vinegar. Some came out shiny, but some turned black. Some were filmy but almost returned to their glorious copper tone.

In 7th grade science, we did experiments with a mystery substance called "blue stone." We had to figure out its composition. In one experiment, we diluted the crystals to make a deep blue liquid. We hung a nail in the solution. The nail came out covered in copper! It was shiny and the most gorgeous copper I'd ever seen. In my heart, I didn't believe that the lovely blue could actually contain the metal we saw every day. I remember my disbelief. I remember the gleam of the suddenly shiny nail. How could it be? But there it was before me.

To this 12 year old girl, gold had NOTHING on pure copper. 

As we are all human beings tainted by the horrors of today's world, I want to offer hope and encouragement. We may find ourselves sitting in a jar on a shelf, feeling unused and forgotten. We may feel like there is no hope for how low we've sunk, that there is no hope for the corrosion of our souls.

Take heart. Under that green, corroded, nasty surface of each of us is fine copper, precious as gold. Malachi 3 says:

Malachi 3:1 Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of hosts. 2 But who may abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner's fire, and like fullers' soap: 3 And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness.

You are precious as gold. The LORD whom ye seek wants to purify you for His purpose. Think about it.

Shalom!