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In The Garden Daily Devotional
Series: A Walk Through Matthew
"Sweet Forgiveness"
Pastor Wayne Clabaugh
SCRIPTURE TEXT: "Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and
there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against
thee; Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy
way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come
and offer thy gift." Matthew 5:23, 24 (KJV)
Stumbling into the room, her heart heavy with sorrow
came a sinner woman. We know she was a sinner because
the Bible says so in Luke 7:37.
"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," (KJV)
This precious soul found her way to the feet of Jesus
who was lying upon a couch which was the custom of the
people of the time. There between the couches and the
walls of the room, was a space for servants to wait and
serve, and thus we get the statement to "stand at the
feet" or "servants in waiting". Here now is such a one.
Does it not bring to mind that dear old chorus we used
to sing so much,
Meet my need Lord,
Meet my need Lord,
Meet my need Just now;
I am waiting, and Thou art coming
to meet my need just now.
So ashamed and disillusioned by what the world had to
offer, so afraid to come before Christ and look him in
the face... she kneels at his feet weeping for her sins:
melted down with the love of Christ for her soul.
As she
began to wash His feet with her tears: tears now falling
in such abundance that her body trembled with
convulsive-like gestures, she took her long beautiful
hair, the crown of her head, that which was her very
ornament of comeliness, and she now uses it to wipe her Lord's
feet.
As she knelt at the very thresh-hold of
forgiveness and reconciliation, her mind wandered to the
terribleness of her sin, and she would weep some more.
Wiping the road dust from Jesus' feet, she bent low and
anoints his feet with affectionate kisses. Oh that each
tender peck of her lips could tell the story that made
her weep so. No one in the room knew - but Jesus knew.
Unabashed, by her lavish passionate display on her
Master, she takes out an alabaster box of costly
ointment, and now having washed His feet, she begins to
anoint His feet with oil, as the fragrance of this
precious ointment fills the room. It was the fragrance
of forgiveness, and once forgotten joy. It was the
fragrance of hope, and health, and a life once doomed
for the pit of hell - now released like a bird from the
dungeons of Rome. It was an altar that was set in time
as an appointment with destiny, and she dare not be
late.
Oh Friend... you and I have such sins that cover our
hopeless and meager existence that we call our lives.
You and I have such a destiny that calls out to each one
of us in the same fashion. You and I have someone who
“stands in waiting” to be released from their prisons of
regret and sorrow, and cannot be completely free until
we have come to the feet of Jesus, and bring our every
burden, and lay it there.
Oh the Joy that follows. Oh the peace that accompanies
our journey. Oh the fragrance that fills the air with
His holiness as we walk in forgiveness. Not in
forgiveness of our own making - for we could never
attain it. Not in the hope of our own - for we have long
since left that in the by-ways of failure and
discouragement. But In Christ alone, where
“…there is a fountain filled with blood drawn from
Immanuel's veins. And sinners plunged beneath that flood
- lose all their guilty stains”. (William Booth)
Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there
rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee;
Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way;
first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and
offer thy gift." Matthew 5:23, 24 (KJV)
Father: Help me to forgive - that I might be
forgiven.
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