My Alabaster Jar

While He was in Bethany [as a guest] at the home of Simon the leper, and reclining at the table, a woman came with an alabaster vial of very costly and precious perfume of pure nard; and she broke the vial and poured the perfume over His head. Mark 14:3 AMP

The gift, the offering from weary, battered hands. World imposed labels emblazoned across her skin, sinful, broken, worthless, dirty, used up, trash.

But there were some who were indignantly remarking to one another, “Why has this perfume been wasted? For this perfume might have been sold for more than three hundred denarii [a laborer’s wages for almost a year], and the money given to the poor.” And they scolded her. Mark 14: 4-5 AMP

Derision, she'd come; with her most valuable possession - costly perfume -, once the narrow neck was broken there would be no going back. All would be laid bare, open- no going back, no stopping it back up, this was her all. Her sacrifice and those near were angry, angry she had taken her alabaster - a precious stone, filled with expensive perfume- and surrendered it to her King.

But she wasn't there for them, to show them she was trying to change or impress them- she was there to surrender to her Lord, to leave everything at his feet. To pour out her all, like so many women in scripture she was used up, the sweet smell covering the jar's broken neck, the brokenness in her heart. But with the breaking of that jar, she was coming face to face with her hurt, her broken cracked places and surrendering them to Him.

There is a practice called Kintsukuro (golden repair) or Kintsugi (golden joinery), it is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum. It treats the breaks, and cracks and repair as part of the pottery's history. Making the broken piece whole again, revealing its worn places in a unique and beautiful way rather than disguise it as the same piece it was before it was broken.

Related Article: Standing Empty

We all have reached our breaking point, we try to cover those places -make them invisible, and unnoticeable. But God takes our broken lives, collecting all of the battered, worn and chipped pieces fitting them back together and filling the cracks with Himself turning the broken places into a beautiful story of His love.

Ultimate beautiful surrender, nothing held back, nothing hidden or disguised. Not restored, but recreated into something beautiful and unique. What is your alabaster jar? What are you holding back, that needs to be surrendered at His feet?

If from the 2015 edition:

"Scripture quotations taken from the Amplified® Bible (AMP),
Copyright © 2015 by The Lockman Foundation
Used by permission. www.Lockman.org"

If from the 1987 edition:

"Scripture quotations taken from the Amplified® Bible (AMPC),
Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation
Used by permission. www.Lockman.org"