Frankincense--the Tears of Christmas

Yesterday as I was researching uses for frankincense essential oil, thinking of someone who is struggling with severe physical issues, I learned that frankincense is a resin – "hardened sap from trees. In both cases, [both frankincense and myrrh] trees are slashed and allowed to 'bleed.' The sap that comes from the trees hardens and forms beads or 'tears.'" Then these are used to produce oils and products that are so potent in healing.

https://www.diynatural.com/frankincense-and-myrrh/

Without the Boswellian tree being slashed, without the sap dripping down and forming tears,

 there would have been no frankincense as a gift from the wise men for the Christ child,

and there would be no healing oils for our illnesses, pain, and brokenness.

I was feeling low this evening, just some personal heartaches that won't stop aching, and I thought of the frankincense.

Sometimes God allows our hearts to be slashed, 

plans and ambitions to be upset,

our comfort zones and little boxes torn to pieces,

before we can become useful as any kind of healing agent in the lives of other people. 

The frankincense used to be just sap flowing comfortably along inside the tree,

and often we sit in our comfort zones at home, at school, at church,

and we think we are alive and well and doing fine and helping others all we can.

But it isn't till the tree is slashed, and we are ripped out of the four walls of our comfort zones

 that we find ourselves not just looking for ways to minister,

in ways that are out of the box, because, bluntly put, we are no longer inside the box,

but in fact unboxed ways to minister are coming to us.

We are broken and slashed and in tears, but opportunities come to us, even if it is only one moment or one hour or one day at a time.

Someone without a family finds family for Christmas.

Someone without hope finds hope.

Someone who never darkens the door of a church sits around the table in a Christian home where the father of the house talks to Jesus before the meal. 

Someone in a dark tunnel finds a ray of light.  

Frankincense--the tears of Christmas.