Ellen Chauvin | Soaked & Sprouting

Soaked in God's Word, Sprouting Seeds of Faith

  • Home
  • Welcome!
  • About Ellen
  • The Good News
  • My Story
  • Blog
  • Contact

Tears in a Bottle

April 12, 2023 by Ellen Leave a Comment

 You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book. Psalm 56:8 NLT

This is not the life she dreamed for herself. She imagined life with a loving husband by her side. A man who knew her intimately and wanted to share life with her. A husband who would provide for her.

Instead, she lay in bed night after night, never knowing love or compassion. The men who lay with her were nameless.  And faceless. She focused on forgetting their looks, rather than remembering. After all, who wants to remember someone who doesn’t know your name? Oh, they called her things. But never her name. She was know as “sinful” and “immoral.” The men in her life paid her only for what they could get from her. There was no love. No intimacy. No sharing. No life.

Slow tears dripped from the corners of her eyes. They would have dropped to the floor, gone forever, if not for her tear bottle. 

The practice of collecting tears in a bottle has been around since about 1,000 BC. In times of grief and sorrow, ancient tear bottles were to catch and preserve tears of the owner. Archaeologists in Israel have discovered excavated tear bottles. 

Phoenician style Hebron glass from Jericho, Israel.

Scripture mentions tears used to wash the feet of Jesus:

And a woman in the town who was a sinner found out that Jesus was reclining at the table in the Pharisee’s house. She brought an alabaster jar of perfume and stood behind him at his feet, weeping, and began to wash his feet with her tears. She wiped his feet with her hair, kissing them and anointing them with the perfume. Luke 7:37-38 CSB⁠1

Can a person cry enough tears to wash someone’s feet?  Maybe. If there was a way to collect all the tears. 

Perhaps the sinful woman carried her tear bottle as well as the alabaster jar of costly perfume. She must have cried a river of tears over her sin and the choices she made. Some scholars believe her tears came from the bottle she carried. 

In ancient times, Jewish females were given an alabaster jar of perfume by their parents. Tradition has it that each year a bit more of the costly perfumed oil was added to the jar. The expensive perfume would have served as a dowry or inheritance. 

Alabaster window. Galilee region, Israel

Carrying her tears and perfumed oil, the sinful woman went to hear Jesus speak. She wept in repentance at His words. She poured out her tears in the bottle as an act emptying herself of her old life and starting over. Jesus fulfilled her greatest need. His forgiveness washed her clean. In thankfulness, she anointed His feet with perfumed oil from the alabaster jar. Her new life begins with the fragrant aroma of faith in Jesus to forgive her of her sins. 

-What can we “pour out” of our lives today, to live a life pleasing to Jesus? 

-How can our lives be a fragrant aroma of Christ to others?

Father God, As we empty ourselves of our old way of life, I pray that our new life in Christ will be a sweet aroma to You. In Jesus name and by His power in us, Amen.

Do you know Jesus?

anImage_11.tiff

1 Our tour guide in Israel connected tear bottles with this scripture

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)

Restoration

March 23, 2023 by Ellen Leave a Comment

This saying graces the top of my desk. I can see it when I study God’s Word and when I write:

“If you stay on the surface, you’ll never find treasure.”

It reminds me that I need to dig deep into scripture and find all God’s treasures. I love a good “aha” Bible story – one that tells the story and also mines the depths of God’s Word. These stories bring richer meaning to a passage. It says and means that? Aha! Now I understand better.

Yep, I love those kinds of stories. Unless I can’t confirm their truth.

On our recent visit to the Holy Land, we saw the church that commemorates the restoration of Peter. Here, on the shores of the Sea of Galilee, Jesus asked Peter “Do you love Me?”⁠1 

Restoration of Peter Church. Statue depicting Jesus restoring Peter.

When Jesus spoke the word “love” He was using (in the original Greek) the word agape, meaning  “To esteem, love, indicating a direction of the will and finding one’s joy in something or someone.”⁠2

 Peter answered “Yes, I love You,” with the word phileo, which means “friend. To love a person or to have affection for someone.”⁠3 It is a love that means friendship.

Our guide told this story of Peter’s restoration:

Twice Jesus asked Peter “Do you agape” Me?” Twice Peter answered “Yes, Lord, I phileo You!” When Jesus asked the third time, He used the word phileo for love, and Peter answered with “Yes, Lord, I agape You!”

The guide suggested Peter still felt great shame and grief over his denial of Christ. He didn’t feel worthy of Christ’s agape love, so he answered with “phileo” love. When Jesus questions him for the third time, Peter realizes he is being welcomed back into fellowship. He answered with a resounding “Yes! I agape You!” Peter felt great shame at what he had done, but now he wanted ALL of Jesus. All the forgiveness, love, restoration, everything. He wanted Jesus!

What a beautiful story. I couldn’t wait to check it out for myself! At home, I immediately started digging for treasure. Only, I didn’t find it quite the way our guide told it. Here is what I found:

The first two times Jesus asked and Peter answered as listed above. But the third time the conversation went this way:

“Peter, do you phileo Me?”

“Yes Lord, You know all things. You know that I phileo You!”

Huh? Not quite how the guide explained it. My research found that these two words are interchangeable. Synonyms, if you will. There was no great difference in Peter’s use of words.

But, what if…

What if the change was not in Peter’s verbiage, but in his heart? Jesus, who knows all things (John 21:17), saw the change. Jesus knew Peter had repented, and Jesus had forgiven him (Luke 24:34; 1 Cor. 15:5). Peter denied Christ in public, now he had to acknowledge Christ in public. 

Mosaic on building at the site of Caiphus’ courtyard, where Peter denied Christ. Christ is forgiving Peter in this depiction.

That day, Jesus gave Peter a full, public restoration. Divine restoration can mean being restored to a much better version of the original (I’m still digging for treasure on this, but it does ring true). Think of the restored life of Job. God blessed Job in his latter days more than in the beginning (Job 42:12). 

I often think of my own life: accepting Jesus as my Savior when I was a child, but as a teen and young adult, living like He did not exist. He has restored me to Himself, and blessed me beyond measure. Because I repented and returned to Him, there is no condemnation, only love. 

Think of Peter. Impetuous. Hot-headed. Oh, and yes, he denied His Savior not once, but three times. THREE! And Jesus, who loves him with an unconditional, agape love, opened His arms and welcomed Peter home.

What about you? Is there something in your life that separates you from fellowship with Jesus? Shame? Doubt? Love of this world?

Turn from it, and say “Yes, Lord, I agape You!”

Let your heart be all in, not following the things of this earth, but only following Jesus.

anImage_5.tiff

1 John 21:15-17

2 Spiros Zodhiates, The Complete Word Study Dictionary: New Testament (Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 2000)

3 Spiros Zodhiates, The Complete Word Study Dictionary: New Testament (Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 2000).

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
Next Page »

Connect with Ellen

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • RSS

Welcome!

Torrential rains had been pelting us for weeks. With the rains came weeds growing tall in the flower beds. But I noticed other new growth, too. It wasn’t colorful flowers. It was teeny, tiny little oak trees! Squirrels had been working hard, burying food for later. The rains had soaked and softened … Read More...

Jesus, Where are You?

Enter your email address below to receive this 5-day devotional study of Mary Magdalene and the empty tomb - in your inbox!

Recent Posts:

  • Tears in a Bottle
  • Restoration
  • Healing in His Wings

Categories:

Archives:

Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2023 Ellen Chauvin | Design & Development by MRM