"Leave her alone."

---

 

What about giving to Jesus instead of just receiving from him?

“Beautiful or Waste?”

 

Someone said:

“Life is a gift of God to man and what we do with it is our gift to God.”

Joshua said, “As for me and my house we will serve the Lord our God.”

 

Once upon a time I observed a Gardner turning over the brown soil and planting roses. It was done with great care fertilizing them, watering them and pruning them every now and then until the buds come out and open to beautiful, attractive and delicate petals.

 

Beauty is designed to invite the passerby to stop and come close enough to smell the fragrance. (There was a bench next to those roses that I loved to sit on).

 

In the same way God has made man as the crown of his creation and carefully raising him to fullness, to one day come for a visit and rejoice in him.  Rejoice by doing something beautiful like the woman did when she broke an alabaster jar full of a very expensive perfume over the body of Jesus. Matthew 26:6-13.

 

The beauty of a rose is a very short-lived experience as short and fleeting as the beauty of a young woman. But the perfume of a rose can be captured for a while longer in a jar as “pretty” becomes “beauty” as the petals become perfume.

 

A pretty woman’s beauty blossoms later in life when “pretty” stops concealing the beauty of “character” that makes a woman a true “lady in a class of her own.”

Many smell the fragrance of life in those in whom “Jesus is the hope of glory.”

 

The true service to God is not in the effort of good works, the length or frequency of service nor is it the good deeds for the poor. Though these are all commendable they are not for God’s consumption.

 

God does not need what you can give him money wise, nor is he in need of your help, or your outward adoration, nor is he in need of your talents and knowledge.

 

God wants and loves you. He wants you to love him back. He loves you!!

 

In human relationships people love people for their own selfish reasons, only God loves people for their own good. In other words, “We have the tendency to love people for the same reason that we love a pig and that is for the bacon and sausage and not necessarily because he is a pig. “If anyone can convince a pig that he is loved apart from the bacon and sausage I would love to meet that person because he would convince anyone of anything.

 

Let me be a little whimsical with all due respect.

Francisco Santillana had a farm and his fiftieth birthday was around the corner so the animals decided to celebrate his birthday since he was such a good farmer to all the animals.

 

The goose said, “What about if we serve him breakfast in bed?”

The chicken said, “That is a great idea, how about I provide plenty of eggs, the cow provides some milk, the goat provides some cheese and the pig provides some bacon and sausage?” What do you think? They asked the pig.

The pig answered, “that is a nice gesture on your part, but for me that would be a total commitment.”

 

I do not need to explain that anyone can give out of the surplus of what they have but to give the only thing that you really have and that you really are is real giving. We do not start giving to God until we give of what we are.

It is us who God wants and loves. It is us for whom he came down and died so we might live. It is for us that he was willing to pay the ransom. It is us who he so loved that he gave his one and only son that whosoever believes in him might not perish but has everlasting life.

 

The woman who anointed Jesus by breaking her alabaster jar of perfume on his head was severely criticized by the disciples of Jesus as a waste of money that should have been given to the poor. “The disciples were indignant.”

 

Jesus said, “Leave her alone, she has done something beautiful for me.”

Those who do not know to give it all for Jesus including themselves will never understand those who give of themselves to Jesus.

 

I remember clearly when a great piano player died of aids in Washington DC.  My pastor said, “What a waste, what a waste.” It is indeed a “Waste” when one dies in self-indulgence. But if you die for Jesus, you might not have the approval of men but their indignation.

 

Listen to what Jesus said about the woman with the perfume: “I tell you the truth, wherever the Gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.”

 

Perhaps you are one who has caused others to be indignant and they have treated you as one who does not care for the poor and are a wasteful person. Never mind the opinion of men if you seek to serve God in spirit and truth. God seeks for such a worshiper. What matters is what Jesus thinks of you.

 

This was your Sunday cook on duty.

 

Gerry Gutierrez

 

PS. They say that diamonds are a women’s best friend, two thousand years ago it was perfume in an alabaster jar…. worth a year’s salary. “Her utmost for his highest.” Beautiful to the nostrils of Jesus is the love of his girls like he in love blew into Eve's nostrils the pure fragrance of light, life and love and later blew the Holy Spirit in her second birth. 

Pictures are "The multiplication of the Gutierrezs" It all started like a game and now... look,"