Have you ever noticed what happens when you break a glass? First there is the ear-splitting sound it makes as it shatters. Then there are the fragments that scatter all over the place so that you’re afraid to move for fear of hurting yourself. So, you stand there frozen for a moment (especially if you’re barefoot) trying to decide how to get out of the mess. It reminds me of the Mother Goose nursery rhyme Humpty Dumpty, who sat on a wall and had a great fall. Apparently, the best of the king’s egg repair team couldn’t figure out what to do. So, there he lay in broken pieces. Sometimes our lives are no different. We find ourselves broken by the unexpected, shattered by situations we have no control over and there we are, frozen in our tracks. We are afraid, we can’t move, we are surrounded by the broken pieces of our lives. In Matthew 6, Jesus is in the town of Bethany having dinner in the home of Simon the leper. Then this woman comes in holding an alabaster jar and she pours its expensive contents on the head of Jesus. In John 12 the woman is identified as Mary, the sister of Lazarus and Martha, and she wipes the feet of Jesus with her hair. John also says, “the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume” (12:3). What she does is an act of worship. Perhaps it is out of gratitude for something Jesus has done for her. Perhaps she recognizes who he is, that he is Savior and he is Lord. Perhaps from her own brokenness, she pours out her worship to the only one who can pick up the broken pieces of her life. I believe she shows how to handle our broken pieces. No matter what is going on in our lives, we worship. When we worship in our brokenness, we offer God the praise that God is always worthy of. When we worship, we acknowledge that even in our broken place, Christ alone is Savior and Lord. Our worship becomes a fragrant sweet-smelling offering to the Lord, filling us with peace, giving us the courage to face whatever lies ahead. We pick up the broken pieces of our lives by laying them at the feet of Jesus. We offer our Savior and Lord our broken pieces trusting and believing that he will put us back together again.

See you in worship
Pastor Lucretia