We don’t know her name only her love. When Jesus was in Bethany at the house of Simon the leper, a woman came to Him with an alabaster flask of costly fragrant oil and poured it on His head.  Set free from torment and now living with new hope, she came to pay her debt the best she could. But some disciples including Judas asked why the fragrant oil was “wasted?” GK Apoleia” Literally “ruined to perdition.” 

300 denarii was close to a year’s wage. That is extravagant worship. You can’t accurately ladle out worship, so she poured it out.  Worship is wasteful; it is always excessive, even over the top. You can only pour it out unmeasured. Extravagant worship always exposes the hard, pragmatic, selfish or merely natural mindset

Judas also asked why her passion and devotion were not used to help the poor. But worship is not about being helpful or alleviating need. Meeting a need is a good thing to do at any time but it is not worship.  Worship is given to the One who has no need - we worship because it is we who have the need to worship.

Tellingly, when Jesus was describing Judas later, as the “son of perdition”, he used the exact same word "wasted", meaning “ruined to perdition.”  When a man calls wasted a thing that God esteems, God who wishes to esteem every man's life, may call it wasted.

Friends, the extravagance of our worship and how we rejoice in extravagant worship by others, is a good indicator of our heart and our future.

 Worship is the gyroscope of the soul. Worship is a sign of right order in the universe. When men and women worship God they begin to find out what they are born for and the benefits that God plans for them. Worship is all about God, but it benefits us. 

Worship lifts a man out of obscurity. Of course, God knows every person and loves them, but people don’t really appear on His “radar” until they begin to worship Him. Worship will lift a man to his place in history.  Gideon worshipped God and discovered he was a mighty man of valor. Moses was unknown till he bowed at the flaming shrub and Isaiah was just the son of a rich man until he saw the Lord high and lifted up. When people worship, they become what they were intended to be.

Worshipping Jesus is the only way to get the best from our life and our day. When Jesus was visiting His friends in Bethany, Martha was busy in the kitchen but Mary sat at His feet.  When Martha later complained to Jesus that Mary wasn’t helping her, Jesus said that Mary had chosen the best part. On an average day, there are tasks to complete and people to relate to, but they can never become the best they could be, till we have done the best part of the whole day, which is to worship Him.  Without the best part of the day in place, all other parts are ill-placed and unaligned. We may have a wrong perspective, or life’s priorities may become distorted like Martha’s. She believed that love was best shown by industry, not intimacy even in inactivity.

Being “unproductive” is not a virtue in the world or even in the kingdom of God but imperative in the very presence of Jesus. Our importance and what we can do for Him, is zero compared with what He can do for us as we worship.

Friend, to become the person, the father or friend, we were intended to be, and even to have the day God intended, choose to be a worshipper.

No one ever benefited much from arriving at their destination. Nobody learns anything on graduation day but in the 4 years it took to get there.  The Bible declares “Blessed is the man whose… heart is set on pilgrimage.  As they pass through the Valley of Baca, they make it a spring…  They go from strength to strength; each one appears before God." Psalm 84:5-7 

Whatever your destination is in life, it’s the journey that God uses to grow you.  Like you, I have had difficult days.  Friends have left town, and staff have quit. Parents have passed on, and children have been in car accidents. I have been through burn-out and had children away from God.  It wasn’t a desperate search for sermons that have helped me know Him and grow stronger but the weeks I walked the streets, with a desperate cry for answers to heart-breaking challenges.

It is not going through valleys that grow us, but it is making our “Valley of Baca” into a spring, as we dig deep into the Holy Spirit’s life and power. Strength doesn’t come in a manual but in the midst of mystery (sometimes misery) as we draw from His grace and the assurance of His love.  The Psalm says as we do this, we appear before God. You may not see Him yet. You might still feel lost in a crowd of troubles; at a loss to understand how things have worked out the way they have.  But when a child is lost in a crowd, it doesn't matter if the child can’t see the father, for they are safe the moment the father sees the child.

Friends, our Father sees you, and He will strengthen and comfort you. Set your heart on a pilgrimage toward Him and keep digging for springs. Who we look for/at determines who we look like. Our journey is the blessing that enables us to arrive at our most important destination: Being like Him when we see Him.

 Samson had been fighting the Philistines and winning.  In one day of powerful victory and strength, he even took the gates of a city to the top of the hill but the Scriptures say, “afterwards he loved a woman.” Judges 16:4

No matter how many successes we have there is always an afterward.  A leader might take a great meeting or preach an awesome message but afterwards, there may come temptation or even a secret struggle with anger, lust or insecurity.  The greatest test of integrity is not when you have revival every night but often when nothing is going on; when it’s prayer night and you know only a handful will be there. The test is not when your marriage is in full bloom and exciting but when you come home to a tired and grumpy wife.  The test is not when you’re at home surrounded by loving parents who fill up your emotional tank but when you’re living away from home and your emotional tank still cries out for love.

Sadly it is not our successes that define us but it is our “afterward.” It is always in the "afterwards" that our integrity is tested and when our true character is revealed.

 Behold, I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction. (Isa 48:10 ). In a firey time of testing God sees and chooses people who will not give up their birthright for a bowl of stew.

Friend, let’s watch out for the “afterwards.” Samson found out that the afterwards of sin took him further than he planned to go and cost him more than he wanted to pay. Jesus was tested in the wilderness. The Bible says afterwards He was hungry. Satan tempted Him with bread but gladly for us, Jesus knew that after a hard spiritual victory, never to pamper yourself with an easy pleasure.

Jesus and His disciples went to pray in the Garden of Gethsemane. The old olive trees were scarred and had seen a lot of history pass by.  Amid olive groves, there is usually an olive press. At harvest time the olives are shaken off the trees, and crushed in the press, to release their oil. (Mark 14). Every drop of oil is produced from a lot of shaking and a lot of pressure. The cost of olive oil is small, but not to the olive!

It seems that while the Holy Spirit is a gift, the increased release of His anointing “oil” in our lives, comes from being shaken, pressed and crushed.  We don't know the cost of someone's anointing.  Paul said he was “pressed beyond measure” and shared in Christ’s suffering.  Sometimes we want the same anointing as somebody else but forget that we can’t get it from the laying on of hands but from the laying on of the same “pressings”.

Friend, don’t look back, let up or back away.  It may cost a lot to keep a sweet spirit when all hell is against you. It may cost a lot to lose position, pre-eminence or popularity in the world. It may cost a lot to sacrifice without any immediate recognition or reward. It may cost a lot to be on your face when it seems others are only sleeping, but if you meet with our Father in the olive press, the anointing to accomplish His purpose will increase along with the sense of His presence and pleasure.

Lot followed God but not enough that anyone else could follow him. He had zero impact on the world; he was like a secret believer. If he had lived in the Soviet Union, there wouldn't have been enough evidence to convict him of being a Christian. He saw Sodom, moved closer to Sodom, then dwelt in Sodom and was eventually damaged by it.

Lot had a totally wrong idea of evil. He asked God not to send him to the mountains but to send him to a little city to avoid evil. He saw evil as physical not moral danger, but moral evil will hurt our family more than physical evil.  PC politicians, educators and even parents sometimes are clueless when it comes to what is evil.  They ban tree climbing lest children graze their knees but let the TV pour evil into their minds each night.  Teachers hand out condoms and tell them they are now having safe sex.

Abraham walked with God and was a blessing to all people.  People listened to him and he was called a prince with God, but when Lot spoke to his sons-in-law about God, they thought he was kidding. They could not take what he said seriously.  When it came to prayer, Abraham who didn't live in the city, had more impact than the man who had a family and business there. While many followed Abraham nobody followed Lot. Lot had become an addict of the world. He needed a buzz, a fix, he needed to fit into the world. He had not a lot to offer the city, for he was in need himself.

Friend, Lot shows us that it is possible to have a saved soul and a wasted life. Let’s live in a way that gives others something to follow.

We love the story of the prodigal son because we too were welcomed back with a robe and a ring. But sometimes we don’t feel like He is celebrating us each day" We know Jesus said He would be with us and that God’s unmerited favour is upon all His children, but we don’t feel it.

Once when I felt like this, I discovered the problem was in my imagination and not with God. Our imagination creates our feelings and affects our behaviour. The Bible says, "As a man thinks in his heart so is he."  The imagination creates its own reality, and even if something is not true it can still affect you. If you think you are a grasshopper in the face of giants and therefore can’t enter the Promised Land, you will be right.  Or even if God is favouring you but you don’t think He is, you will live in fear and insecurity- a crippled and stilted life. Our wrong thinking doesn’t change the fact that God is with us, but it changes our ability to feel it and enjoy our Father. But if we imagine the truth; that He is in us and walks with us and has His loving arms about us all day, we are confident and enjoy beautiful fellowship with Him.

God gave us our imagination to be a meeting place with Him, so the enemy of our soul tries to fill it with memories of inadequate fathers, wrong images, or seeing our lives as small and inconsequential.  In the end, the One who gave us the imagination as a sanctuary in which to meet God and walk together with Him, is squeezed out of His meeting place.

Friend, reclaim your imagination and fill it with true thoughts of our Father’s presence and favour toward you. Close your eyes and imagine Father favouring you, loving you, coming to you, embracing you and helping you.  For that is all true; anything else is a lie - imagine the truth and let faith arise.

David was to lead a nation. He was a man with passion and a promise, but there was little in his circumstances, that looked like he was being positioned for kingship. But God achieves His purposes, in ways that a man would not think.  God doesn’t develop a person’s reputation but their character so that their life is consistent with the message they are to carry. Our ability to represent Father in the world is determined by the degree that the message or the Word has become flesh in us. 

David’s overarching conviction was that God was his Shepherd and was leading him in life.  David knew that contradictions and opposition, couldn't decide his destiny.  David may not have understood everything, but he believed God would accomplish His plans in spite of everything. Through hardship, enemies, trouble and dishonour, God was working out His plan to make David more than a king. A timeless message of worship, honour and trust in God, to reach countless generations.

Friend, if we love God, he is ordering all the steps required to forge His message in us too. Don't look at other people and wish you had their steps, or envy their “blessed life” Your steps may be enjoyable or not, understood or not but the message God is forming in you, is perfect to touch all the people that He plans to reach through you. He is writing your story for His glory and people’s blessing, including you and yours!

One gemstone talked about a lot in the bible is the pearl which is strange because in the Old Testament, oysters were unclean animals and couldn’t be eaten by a Jew. In the New Testament they are honoured reminding us that through Christ, something precious can come out of the unclean.  Even the gates of the new city or the glorious church are likened to pearls.   “The twelve gates were twelve pearls: each individual gate was of one pearl”.  Rev 21:21

God designed oysters to make valuable pearls from sand or other irritations that get inside the sensitive tissues of the oyster.  The oyster releases a substance called nacre, (Nac-ray) that coats the irritant until the grit is covered over and becomes a smooth lovely pearl.

We are pearl makers too. God has given us a substance which when released over our irritants, can transform situations into something valuable. The nacre we release is called “blessing.” “Finally, ...be tenderhearted, be courteous; not returning evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary blessing, knowing that you were called to this, that you may inherit a blessing”. 1 Peter 3:8 We inherit blessing when we bless our “irritants”.

Friend, don’t “curse” your upbringing, the traffic, the boss, the neighbours or your spouse. As we bless people, circumstances and even our past, our Father can transform every troubled circumstance and relationship into a pearl of great value. Let’s be people that bless and receive blessings! Our attitude could become the very “Pearl Gate” someone needs to be able to enter the city of God.