Broken Vessels

Luke 7:36-39 New American Standard Version

And one of the Pharisees desired him that he would eat with him. And he went into the Pharisee’s house, and sat down to meat. 37 And, behold, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster box of ointment, 38 And stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment. 39 Now when the Pharisee which had bidden him saw it, he spake within himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is that toucheth him: for she is a sinner.

Many times in scripture Jesus used parables to make his revelation easy to understand, he also used symbols and types to refer to individuals indirectly, he will talk about sheep but he's talking about us, all of us are as sheep lead to the slaughter he calls us branches I am the vine and ye are the branches he shows Ezekiel a valley of dry bones but yet he is talking about the physical and spiritual restoration of the Jews. It's not that he cannot speak directly to us but it is the fact that those who he was speaking to in those days needed symbolism in order to understand what he was saying. When he decided to talk about those he would use to serve him he used the symbol of vessels, say I am a vessel, and more specifically earthen vessels, vessels that were made by a Potter's hands which leaves room for imperfection, leaves room for flaws and leaves rooms for holes and yet he says those who will serve me will be like these flawed vessels, why would he choose flawed vessels to symbolize those who will carry his glory, those who would preach the Gospel, those who would make his name great, and we will forever try to fathom why he would choose us, but he is very clear in how he desires to use these vessels.

- In Jeremiah These vessels were to carry his mysteries so that they would last many days.

AND

- These vessels were constructed to let the light of Christ shine through,

2 Corinthians says But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may

be of God and not of us. 8 We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but

not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed. I understand life

seems to be rough right now and you are trying to figure all of this out but can you tell someone

I'M NOT BEING BEATEN, I'M BEING MOLDED!!!

Paul said, "It was good for me that I was afflicted, so I can know more about God" The more I know about him, the more I know what he's molding me into.

"When he has tried me, THEN I shall come forth in my greatest form"

I'M BEING MOLDED!!!

Sometimes God takes extreme measures to get the best out of us.

We see Moses taking on the responsibility of going back to Egypt and God using him to deliver his people out of the hands of Pharaoh, so he gives him the assignment to go and confront Pharaoh and say God said let my people go only to find out God has hardened the heart of Pharaoh so that he won't consider letting the people of God go, what is it for God to give you an assignment and when you obey him he sends the opposition to stand up against your obedience, I call this God ordained adversity (work this) but because God does all things for our good we must trust the he has anointed Pharaoh to be stubborn so that Moses and the people of God can see just how great God really, the only reason your situation seems to be getting worse is because God is setting the scene for himself so no one can get the glory out of the circumstance, tell somebody he's setting the stage, so he tells Moses to tell Pharaoh to let my people go so that they can serve me in the wilderness, this word serve in this context in Hebrew means to work and to worship this is why some other translations say let my people go so that they may worship me in the wilderness, and the issue comes in when you try to open the mind of God and wonder why he did not just take them out of Egypt the first day but better yet takes them through these 10 plagues, why did he put them through so much just to get them to the wilderness to worship him, I thought my greatest worship would come out of the goodness of God but really my best worship comes from the faithfulness of God, the goodness of God would've gotten you out of that situation so you didn't have to suffer, but the faithfulness of God keeps you in the trouble longer than you want but he kept you the entire time, and that why you worship is not effective until you have endured the faithfulness of God, I can dance off of his goodness but I worship because of his faithfulness, tell somebody he's been faithful. It was no goodness of my own but it was his faithfulness, all i have needed he provided so i say great is thy faithfulness unto me, clap your hands for the faithfulness of God.

Not only is our worship drawn from God's faithfulness, it is a bi-product of our trust in God.

Abraham gets a word from the Lord that he and Sarah are going to have a son and they go through the process rushing and messing up, then they have this promised child and just when the child grows upGod requires Abraham to sacrifice his only son, this would be questionable to me because i believed God for something he put in me to believe and now that he has manifested his word, he's now asking me to give it back to him and i don;'t think thats fair but because i trust whatever God does evidently there is some good coming out of this and because Abraham is the father of faith, before he can accept this role he first must be tested with a doubtful situation but because he was innately a man of faith he speaks faith in a doubtful situation, they get to the mount and even though God has told him to sacrifice his son he tells the servants, stay here for me and the boy are going up to worship, no youre not youre going to kill your son, could it be that worship to him meant giving up something to God but believing God will be glorified? How many times have we tried to worship even though we haven't deleted that number, have we tried to worship but yet we haven't given up our rebellious ways, have we tried to worship while trying to live our truth and make ungodly connections based on our feelings, and you wonder it's not working, he says present your body a living sacrifice and you are trying to present a living being to God and nothing has died nothing has been sacrificed, but if you would ever lay yourself on the altar and let God tie you down, then you can really see what God can do through your worship, DON'T KILL HIM, NOW I KNOW YOU TRUST ME!!! He realizes Abraham honored him more than he honored his promise and God just wants to know, before I receive your worship, do you love me more than what I can do for you, do you love me more than what i can give, and at the moment you show him your love for him then he release you to worship him. And this is what we see here in our text today, this woman is willing to sacrifice an expensive oil just to serve or worship God, this is oil was called spikenard which was one of the most valuable oils during Jesus’ time on Earth but eventhough this oil was expensive it was poured into an alabaster box which comes from Egypt, which goes to show me that our values are reversed. We are in a time where outer beauty is the main focus, we spend more time in presentation than we do content, we prefer style over substance, we rather look good than be good and we have elevated people based on looks and when they get in position we find out they were all bark no bite, this is why your relationships must go beyond optics and get into how do we challenge each other to be better, this is why this woman’s oil was valuable because even though the vessel was made out of sin, the substance carried all the value, I may not be perfect and my sins are ever before me, but what’s on the inside is where my true value lies, tell somebody my value is on the inside of me, so want I’m bringng to God is not exterior its whats on the inside of me thats going to bring him glory, my worship has a look but the power is coming from the inside if me, tell someone let it come out! Out of your belly shall flow rivers of life giving worship, every dry place must come alive when I worship somebody shout Rivers!

Pick it up here

Here is this woman and she’s bringing her issues, she’s bringing her flaws, she’s bringing her struggle and instead of waiting until she’s all together like some of us she comes up behind Jesus which shows that worship is not about you being seen but it’s about your need for God, she comes behind him and the first vessel she breaks is herself, she begins to wet his feet with her tears and im wondering how many of us have tried to worship God still put together, or have you been through enough trouble for God to break you open, has your situation got bad enough to where you are broken because you realize evidently God is trying to get something out of me, yes he’s trying to get your best worship, he’s trying to get your full attention, he’s trying to get a sound of you, I know you wanna hear about the alabaster box, but you have nothing to offer God if you don’t first offer yourself, there is a sound God wants to hear out of you, its not the best sounding song, its not the riffs and runs but its the sound of broken vessels, can you open your mouth and release a broken sound!!

Altar Call: So ill pour out all my worship, over you. (let the fragrance arise)