The Value of The Cup

I went into a bookstore the other day and bought a cup of coffee. Of course, not just any coffee. I was specifically getting ready to partake of the divine Starbucks. This bookstore had the signs out front proclaiming that their café proudly served Starbucks brand coffee. I’m what you might call a mild addict. Yes I admit it, I really like coffee. I even consider it a need in the hours before six pm.
So I go in to this café/bookstore and order my latte. They take my money and then they hand me a cup that says, “7-11”. I looked at it oddly and then glared up at the young girl behind the counter and said, “You’re kidding right?” She smiled and said, “No sir. We are out of our Starbucks cups and lids so we got these from a local supplier, but the coffee is still genuine Starbucks.”
I didn’t want to look like a self-righteous premadonna that was all about image, so I smiled and threw her my best, “cool,” and headed for the door.
It tasted different. I know it shouldn’t have, but it did. As I sipped my steamy hot beverage the taste just seemed wrong. It was not the same experience I was used to having and frankly I didn’t like it. I threw it away.
One of my friends worked at that same café and I asked her about that day. She laughed and said that it was a rough day. That many people refused to purchase the coffee once they found out it was going in a non-Starbucks cup. She swore that the stuff inside was the same, the only difference was the container.
I thought to myself how containers really do matter to us. We can act like they don’t, but they do. We judge so many things by their appearance when the real value is the stuff inside. I wasn’t buying a cup, but a cup of coffee. How often do we pre-judge if someone is a Christian or not based on their container. We put so much stock in the outer label and totally negate and ignore the inner worth.
If someone is dressed nice, has properly combed hair, and no tattoos then he is more likely to be a Christian than someone who is wearing ripped jeans, has a face full of metal (I’m not talking about braces), and a plethora of tattoos. We instinctively think that if our containers are not the same, the good stuff inside cannot be the same either. We look at our lives, and compare it to others. We decide, based purely on the container, if they are as good as us or if we are as good as them. In actuality neither is correct. Value never comes from the container but what’s inside the container.
A treasure chest is valuable because of the treasure inside. An oyster is just a slimy muscle in a shell unless there is a pearl inside. And we have value because of what’s inside us. It’s time to stop looking solely at the container and begin sampling the goodness of others based on the goodness that is within them. The goodness of Christ comes in many different containers. Some are black, some are white, some look like they’ve been colored on with crayons, and others may look like they fell face first into a tackle box, but those are just containers. Again, we are only looking at the outside, and when we are stuck on only looking on the outside, we might be throwing away the best cup of coffee we have ever had.