Broken

As the pastor of a small, but growing church, I am constantly revaluating my walk with the Lord. Like Paul said to Timothy, I want to be able to preach the gospel "in season and out". I want to be as close to Jesus as I can. Sometimes I crave intimacy with His so badly, I can taste it!

As I draw close to Him if I am not careful I can get to feeling pretty good about myslef and my life. I can began to feel as if I'm not all that bad, and that I am a reall asset to "team Jesus".

Thankfully, it usually right about that time that I my sin smacks me upside the head and helps me to realign my thinking!

I am a sinner. A sinner saved by grace.

As I tell people all the time, my identity is not as a sinner. My identity is as a child of God, a blood bought believer in Christ Jesus.

But my nature is still that of a sinner. My flesh wants to sin. As much as I crave to be close to Jesus, my flesh craves sin. When it comes to my sinful desires I sometimes think I hear Gollum whispering, "My precious, I wants it!" and then I realize that the voice is not that of Gollum, it is mine.

These thoughts and more were going through my mind when I was readin in Mark the 14th chapteer today. I read this verse about the woman who poured the costly perfume on Jesus. In verse 3 it reads, "While he was in Bethany, reclining at the table inthe home of a man known as Simon the leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on his head."

The verse goes on about how the disciples thought what the woman did was a waste, and the Jesus rebukes them. This time though, I reflected on one little word in this verse.

Broke.

In order for the perfume to annoint Jesus, the jar had to be broken. The perfume was still the same in or out of the jar. In order to be usefull though, the jar had to be broken.

I started crying.

I realized I needed to be broken again.

I realized I had grown complacent, a little hard, a little smug, a lot distracted, and way too lazy in my Christian life.

And so tonight, all alone in my bedroom, I became broken.

I cried out to be renewed and revived.

I recall years ago when my oldest daughter Victoria had a toy that she really loved. I don't even remember what the toy was, but somehow it got broken. It was broken beyond repair and so I told her that I had to throw it away. She began to cry and to beg me not to throw it away. I tried to tell her that it would not work, and that she might even get hurt trying to play with it the way it was. With tears running down her face she told me, "Give it to Papa. Papa can fix anything!" Now, her Papa could fix almost anything, but even this toy was beyond what he could do, and so I had to tell her so and throw the toy away.

I tell that story because in reality it is about you and I. It is about everyone.

We are all broken. Broken beyond repair. Good for nothing but the garbage pail.

But then Jesus comes along, and we trust in, rely on, and cling to Him for salvation, for grace, for mercy, for peace. By being born again, we then are children of the Father, joint heirs with Christ.

And when our lives get broken again, we can take it to our Abba, Father, Daddy, Papa. He REALLY CAN FIX ANYTHING!

You see this is the beautiful thing about where I found myself tonight. Jesus broke me, but then Papa fixed me. He healed me. He set my feet back on the right path, and renewed my heart.

And He'll do the same for you, but before you can be "fixed", you have to admit you are broken.

And if like me, you have been broken before, and now you feel far away for the Lord, your heart is hardened to the plight of the lost, the poor, the people who will go to bed tonight and wake up in hell tomorrow, ask the Lord to break you...it's ok...Papa can fix anything.

Ok, so there's that.
Pastor Dave