Neal Pollard
With the recent discovery of kimberlite on the east coast of Antarctica around Mount Meredith in the Prince Charles Mountains, there is considerable talk that much more may lay beneath the ice and cold at the south pole. Kimberlite is a type of rock known to contain diamonds, named for Kimberly, South Africa, which lays not far to the north. It is a rare rock, and the discovery of it in Kimberly led to a 19th-century diamond rush.
Despite the promise and prospect of diamonds in Antarctica, there will not likely be an onslaught of prospectors there. There is the forbidding cold, isolation, and winter darkness, the meticulous restrictions forged by environmentalists, and how difficult it is to travel there. For now, it is an interesting discovery. Whether or not there will be diamond mining there in the future, time will tell (Alister Doyle, Reuters, 12/18/13).
Is it possible that an even bigger treasure is buried, not beneath ice or international treaties, but rather mounds of fear, indifference, and the like? Paul says “we have this treasure in earthen vessels” (2 Co. 4:7). The treasure is the message of salvation through Christ (cf. 2 Co. 4:2-6) and we are the earthen vessels. God gets this treasure to the world through us. But, far too many of us are burying this treasure like one man did in the parable of the talents (Mat. 25:25). In a similar parable in Luke, a man hides his mina in a handkerchief (19:20). In both parables, the application is the same. God does not want us to keep this treasure hidden and inaccessible.
The soul-saving message of grace should not be buried. We should not keep it in isolation, be cold or forbidding in any way. God wants every person to have access to this treasure (1 Ti. 2:4), and He is counting on us to share it!
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