Follow The RabbiBeispiel

Today, I want to tell you my favorite story from the Bible. 

It's the one about a woman who breaks open a bottle of expensive perfume so she can anoint Jesus. She doesn’t just open the bottle—she breaks it! It doesn’t take long for some of the people who see this to start accusing her of “wasting” something of great value, but Jesus tells the people that the woman actually has done “something beautiful” for him. I like this story because when I was growing up, I believed I was like that bottle of perfume—broken and wasted. 

You see, from the age of six, I was sexually abused, which caused me to spend a lot of my childhood feeling rejected and alone. I hid it well most of the time … but I grew feeling lonely, scared, and worthless—that my life was wasted. 

But as I learned about God, and learned to listen for His voice in my life, I began to understand that like the perfume, my life was of actually great value. And while I may have felt broken, God was in the process of turning my story into “something beautiful”, just like the bottle of perfume in the story. And the more I’ve leaned into my faith over the years, the more I have experienced Jesus turning the broken pieces of my childhood into a mosaic of His grace. 

Perhaps today, you need to know that if he can do that in my life, he can do it in yours too. 

For reflection:

"I have heard your prayer and seen your tears. I will heal you" — 2 Kings 20:5