Key Thought

Today's Prayer

Loving God and Almighty Father in heaven, please use me as a conduit of your love, mercy, and grace. I want to have a heart that is generous with others even if those around me cannot understand that generosity. Thank you for being so generous with me. May I never hoard your blessings, but always be quick to share them in ways that bring you joy. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen.

Today's Verses in Context

It was now only two days before the Passover and the Festival of Unleavened Bread. The leading priests and teachers of the law were trying to find a way to arrest Jesus without the people seeing it. Then they could kill him. They said, "But we cannot arrest Jesus during the festival. We don't want the people to become angry and cause a riot." Jesus was in Bethany. He was eating in the house of Simon the leper. While Jesus was there a woman came to him. The woman had an alabaster jar filled with very expensive perfume. This perfume was made of pure nard. The woman opened the jar and poured the perfume on Jesus' head. Some of the followers there saw this. They became upset and complained to each other. They said, "Why waste that perfume? That perfume was worth a full year's work. It could be sold and the money could be given to poor people." And they criticized the woman strongly. Jesus said, "Don't bother the woman. Why are you troubling her? She did a very good thing for me. You will always have poor people with you. You can help them any time you want. But you will not always have me. This woman did the only thing she could do for me. She poured perfume on my body. She did this before I die to prepare me for burial. I tell you the truth. The Good News will be told to people in all the world. And in every place where the Good News is told, the story of what this woman did will also be told. The thing she has done will be told and people will remember her." Then one of the twelve apostles went to talk to the leading priests. This was the follower named Judas Iscariot. Judas wanted to give Jesus to them. The leading priests were very happy about this. They promised to pay Judas for doing this. So Judas waited for the best time to give Jesus to them.

Related Scripture Readings

Give this command to the people who are rich with the things this world has. Tell them not to be proud. Tell those rich people to hope in God, not their money. Money cannot be trusted. But God takes care of us richly. He gives us everything to enjoy. Tell the rich people to do good. Tell them to be rich in doing good things. And tell them to be happy to give and ready to share. By doing that they will be saving a treasure for themselves {in heaven}. That treasure will be a strong foundation —their future life can be built on that treasure. Then they will be able to have the life that is true life.

And now, brothers and sisters, we want you to know about the grace (kindness) that God gave the churches (groups of believers) in Macedonia. Those believers have been tested by great troubles. And they are very poor people. But they gave much because of their great joy. I can tell you that they gave as much as they were able. Those believers gave even more than they could afford. They did this freely. No person told them to do this. But they asked us again and again—they begged us to let them share in this service for God's people.

You know the grace (kindness) of our Lord Jesus Christ. You know that Christ was rich {with God}, but for you he became poor. Christ did this so that you could become rich by his becoming poor.