In this sermon, the speaker reflects on his personal journey of preparing a sermon on the theme of worship. He shares that he began preparing this sermon in 1951 while lying in a hospital bed, feeling sick and downcast. During this time, he discovered that even though he couldn't preach or pray, he could still worship God. He emphasizes the importance of worship in the life of a believer and suggests that it is often overlooked in churches. The speaker also mentions a book by a prominent figure who claimed to have never witnessed true worship in churches in America or England.

In 1926, which is quite a while back, in our little church in England we had a visit from a distinguished American preacher and to my dismay he didn't preach, but his son preached. The son was about 21 years of age then, I guess. His name was Paul Rees and his father was dear old Seth Rees, the founder, one of the founders of the Pilgrim Holiness Church, and in a conference not too long ago somebody asked Paul Rees, how long does it take you to prepare a sermon? It was a minister's conference and Paul said, it takes me 15 hours. I need five hours a day, three days in the week to prepare a sermon. Well, I think that's pretty good on the law of averages. This sermon that I want to preach tonight is not a sermon, it's a talk, it's a meditation on what I think is the greatest theme in the Bible and it is not prayer. Paul Rees said he needed 15 hours to prepare a sermon. I started preparing this sermon in 1951. I started preparing it on a hospital bed where everything had been shattered, my program, my life, my body. One night when I was particularly sick and I guess maybe a little downcast, I reached for my Bible, my testament which was hidden in some, between some 7-up bottles. My sweet wife had gone home, she had stayed with me for sometimes a stretch of 36 hours when I was on the critical list. I reached my Bible, my testament up and I opened it like that and I read these words, thou gavest me no water, thou gavest me no oil, thou gavest me no kiss. People say you're getting old. I'm not old, I'm antique. And I've been preaching now for about 55 years. I've been privileged to go around the world a couple of times and speak at some wonderful conferences. I've listened to many preachers. I remember one when someone said to me, well you've got a job now man, you're in a competition, some of the greatest preachers in the country, some of the great preachers. And they were all great preachers. After three days they all grated on me. I didn't think, I used to think the reason you get to a big conference is because you have something to say. Now I know the reason you get to a big conference is because you've nothing to say. If you had something to say they'd never invite you. You'd rock the boat, you'd upset the ship. And so if you want to get to the top, have nothing to say and say it well. And you've got it made. So in that hospital I realized that there's a theme, a message, and again I have three sources and confirmations for this message. One again was on a hospital bed when I realized that while I could not preach and I could not maybe concentrate much in prayer, there was one thing I could do as adequately on my back as on my knees and that was worship. In a conference we had down in Florida just about three years ago, it was one that was organized by Peter, Dr. Peter Lord, many of you know him. We went down into the swamps and I had the privilege of speaking to these preachers for about four days. And when I mentioned this, just the subject, I didn't preach on it. Afterwards the pastor of the First Baptist Church in a large city in Florida said to me, will you preach for me on your way home? Are you preaching Sunday? I said no. Well, preach for me Sunday and Saturday night eat dinner with us in our home. So we went. He's a big handsome man. He's a very learned man. He had a, I believe, an earned PhD. He could read the Bible in Hebrew and the New Testament in Greek. And he was very open about what his ministry was. He said, I have a big church, I have a successful church, I have a rich church. But he said, you know, Brother Ray, there's one thing I don't know a thing about. And that is the theme you mentioned the other night. And as Bunyan would say, his eyes filled with tears. And he said, I do not know how to worship. And because I do not know how to worship, my church does not know how to worship. The third case was one night when I walked into the office of Dr. Tozer. And I met many famous men, many great men. I never met a man with the depth of spirituality that Dr. Tozer had. And I spent many hours with him, just the two of us, praying, talking, so forth, so on. But this particular time, he said, Len, latch the door, let your hair down. And then he said, you see this piece of rug down here? I said, yes, sir. He said, I bought it in Kresge for 69 cents. That was in 1951, of course, prices were different. It was about four feet long and about 30 inches wide. It was made up of loose bits, you know, they used to weave them together. There's nothing attractive. It wasn't a costly person rug, 69 cents. And he said these words, I've never forgotten, and I've challenged lots of people with them. He pointed down, he said, Len, you see that rug? I said, yes, sir. And these were his exact words. He said, I've come in this office many mornings, picked up the phone, called my secretary in the other office and said, please go home. I can't dictate letters, I can't interview anybody. And then he said this, Len, I've got down on that rug on my belly at eight o'clock in the morning, just to worship. I stayed there till eleven o'clock or twelve or one o'clock, from eight in the morning. I've worshipped God for four hours or even five hours, and I've never said a word of prayer. I've never said a word of praise. I've just worshipped him. Now, do you know anything about that? I want to talk to you about it tonight. Three great exercises in the life of the believer. In the church, we have taught people to witness. We have taught people to work. We have not taught people to worship. Again, I remind you that Buck Singh, one of the greatest living men today, told me that while he'd been in America and England many times, he had never been in a church in America where anybody knew how to worship, or in England. And when I asked him about that, he said, I said, if I come to your church on the Lord's Day, what happens? And without batting an eye, he said, well, Brother Raymond, in our service, the first three hours, what? The first three hours, we give to praise and adoration and thanksgiving and worship. The second three hours, we give to prayer and supplication and intercession. And the third three hours, we give to a breaking of bread and one has a song, another has a hymn, another has a spiritual song. And I said, Brother Singh, you don't mean to say that every Lord's Day, you take nine hours in the service? Oh, no, no, I didn't mean to convey that. Well, I said, I'm not asking you about conferences, I mean the ordinary Lord's Day. Right, right, he said. Some Lord's Day, the glory comes down, whether at 12 hours, 13 hours, 14 hours. What do you do with a man like that? Isn't it embarrassing? Hmm? Dr. Salter said, Len, I won't live to see this, but I think you will. And he said, I believe that we're going to live to see the day when men will come from other nations to tell us what Christianity is all about. And he, like many others in that group, they have learned to worship God in spirit and in truth and in a very beauty of holiness. Prayer is preoccupation with our needs. Praise is preoccupation with our blessings. Worship is preoccupation with God himself. One hymn writer put it this way, my goal is God himself, not joy, not peace, not even blessing, but it's thee my God. You know, as you progress in the Christian life, you'll realize this, that if this book is right, the world outside is crazy. And if the world outside is right, we're insane. But I'll stay by the book. And if you stay by the book, you realize more and more that God's ways are not our ways and his thoughts are not our thoughts. I would imagine that when God was going to describe to us how he made the world, he would have taken an awful lot of time and chapters over it. You know, there's only one chapter in the Bible that tells us how God made the world. It has 31 verses in it. But when God wanted to describe the tabernacle and the course and all the rest of it, you know, he took seven chapters with 243 verses in it. Now, wouldn't you think it would be more interesting if God just spelled it out, you know, how he made the world and how he mixed the stuff to put the stars together and they don't fall. And if he'd taken 243 verses to describe the world, that would be interesting. But he didn't. He took one chapter to tell us all about creation. And he takes seven chapters to tell us about the tabernacle. And the first thing he says about the tabernacle, the first thing that he makes any dimensions of, is not the courtyard. The first thing that he gives dimensions of is in the 25th chapter of Exodus, in which he says this, thou shalt make a mercy seat of pure gold, two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof. And in verse 22 he said, and there will I meet with thee, and will commune with thee, pardon me, from above the mercy seat. So the first thing on God's mind was he wanted men to meet him in worship. Now we've just stressed about everything else except worship. You can go in a shop today and get 50 different books on 50 different ways to get the baptism of the Spirit. And you can go and get another one on 50 different ways to deal with demons. You know, I don't think the devil cares a hill of beans how many demons you chase as long as you leave him alone. You can go bald, you can go cross-eyed chasing demons. That won't worry the devil. But if you tread on his territory, and this is one of the unrealized areas in the Christian life, the world goes to hellfire tonight because the church has lost holy ghost power, and above all we've lost passion in prayer, and we don't know too much about resisting the power of the devil. God has already said through Jesus Christ, I give you in the church power over all the power of the enemy, not some of it, all of it. And again, the answer to America's dilemma tonight is not in the White House, it's in God's house. That is if we set our house in order. My, that 25th chapter is very wonderful, but let me go back a minute and suggest something for you preachers to chew on. In the 24th chapter, and verse 9 it says this, then went up Moses, Aaron, Nadab, Abihu, and 70 elders of Israel, now that's not very dramatic, but listen to this verse, and they saw the God of Israel. Did you come here tonight to meet God or hear a sermon about him? Tell me the last time you went to the house of God expecting deity to invade that place so you couldn't hide any sin, so you'd be so overwhelmed, you'd forget all about business and every other blessed thing that you have, and you wanted to meet him and worship him. They're the most stupid Christians almighty God's ever had to deal with. Where did you learn it, in your Greek class or your Hebrew class, that God only comes to church 11 o'clock Sunday morning, leaves at 12, comes back at 7 Sunday night till 8, and then you don't meet him till Wednesday night? That's about as ignorant as you can be. Since when has deity been on call? You see, when revival comes you can be sure of a number of things. Number one is, the lights for the sanctuary won't go out for months. They never have in a true revival. Number two, the borough doctor told her again, that when real revival comes, the moral climate of the community is changed. You don't get that by mischief, massive crusade, even if it costs a million bucks. Revival never costs a penny. You can never put a crown on the head of the man who is the key in revival. I'd like to stop there, but I won't. But I'll tell you again, I've got a little old man in England that writes to me about every two weeks. He's 95 years of age. And he was the right-hand man of Eben Roberts in the Welsh revival. He knows every heartbeat of that man. He can tell you all about what happened. He can tell you about Mrs. Penn Lewis. He can tell you about William Booth. That man lived in the throb of revival. And many times the meetings went on, for days and days and days, in the presence of God. But notice again, please, in this twenty-fourth chapter and verse ten, they saw the God of Israel, and there was under his feet, as it were, a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were, the body of heaven in his clearness, and the nobles and the children of Israel. On the nobles and children of Israel he laid not his hands. Also they saw God and he drank. Now I suggest you get your teeth into that and preach on that in the next few weeks. I'm not going to do it right here. They sat down with God and ate and drank. This same sublime deity says that, you know, the God that the heaven of heavens cannot contain, his robe is the light, his canopy is space, the clouds are the dust of his feet. Dear Lord, it's a wonder we don't crawl in the house of God, if that's his majesty and presence. One thing I do like about the Hamadins, the only thing, they're in bad shape right now, but at least they leave their shoes even at the door. They won't bring the dust of the world into the sanctuary. They're afraid they'll defile it. We've been any old junkie. Oh, let's think of the tabernacle for a minute. Wasn't very attractive, was it? Some badger skins on it. Have you ever thought of the contrast between the tabernacle in the wilderness and that multi-billion dollar thing that Solomon built? Mind you, there's a contrast there, but they both had the glory of God. And that was a little stable, not the thing you got on your Christmas card, that pretty thing that will pass every sanitary test of the government. It was a stable. It had wall-to-wall dung, and it stunk of urine, and it had cobwebs for curtains, and it had the threat of the beast as a heating system. There was every vile thing in it. Why? Because I take it it was typical of the human heart in which Jesus was going to camp, which too was full of corruption and needed cleansing. All right, the tabernacle. You've got an outer court, you've got the holy of holies, you've got the holy place of all. And of course you could stay here for months, which I don't suppose you want to do, but it's a very amazing study. You see, in the outer court there were priests. Do you know in Israel a man could not be a soldier until he was twenty? But you could be a soldier when you were twenty because you don't need brains to kill for. You could not be a priest until you were twenty-five. You could not be a high priest until you were thirty. Now don't ask me, ask these Nazarene theologians and others that are here tonight why. But have you realized, again, a man could be a soldier at twenty, a priest at twenty-five, he could not be a high priest until he was thirty. Now, there were some people that ministered in the outer court. They ministered to each other. And in the outer court there was daylight. In the holy place there was a seven-branch candlestick. On your right, showbread on the left, table of incense before you. Before you went into the holy of holies, thinking of it that way now, this is the court into which you come. Here there's sunlight. In the holy place there's candlelight. In the holy of holies there is no light. Not unless the light of the world comes in, God himself. Not unless the Shekinah glory comes. And then his blinding presence, his residence is between the great wings of the cherubim on the mercy seat. Does it ever strike you with a sense of awe that when you kneel down and pray you're talking to the one who can hear the, who heard the prayer of Elijah on Mount Carmel? Does it ever stagger you that the man who camped the first submarine ride, John, or in the belly of hell I cried when the Lord heard me? Does that ever amaze you that you talk to the same God that Moses talked to on the mount? Huh? Or have you lost all the wonder of it? I mean, is your praying giving God a shopping list? I said repeatedly, if we'd spent as much time training people to pray as we've got with choirs, even your colleges. Don't you send a team around the country? Our choir is coming. Could we come to your church just for one night? Maybe that's all he could stand of it anyhow. But they go for one night, they move to another time. But you send prayer teams like that? Sure you don't pray, say prayer teams. The professors can't pray half of them. Never mind the kids in school. The devil can put up with the singing. Well, most of it. I don't think he can put up with some of the singing. But anyhow, the singing of these days, where if you sing off key, you're accepted. Say, can you even remember a time when you went to the house of God and you tiptoed out because the shekinah glory of God filled the temple? It used to be like that in some of your old Nazarene camp meetings, I'll tell you that. And it used to be like that when Abe Earl was preaching for the Baptists. And it used to be a bit like that when they had meetings after the Azusa Street visitation in night. We were in a meeting by three dark night, and an old lady came with tears running down her face. She said, Mr. Regner, this has taken me back 50 years. Taken you back 50 years? Yeah, the early days of Pentecost, when we went to church at two o'clock in the afternoon and didn't come out till ten at night. And there was no breaking for a drink of coffee or something else. The glory of the Lord filled the temple. You never knew what was going to happen. We were in a church not too long ago when the man said to me, he said, you know, Brother Regner, we're not like other churches. I said, well, that's good. What's the difference? Well, because I didn't think I'd find it, you see. So I said, what's the difference? And he said, we let the Spirit have his way in our church. I said, well, why did you mimeograph all his orders last Wednesday? That's all you boys do, isn't it? Wednesday you say to the secretary, remember this, we're starting with hymns, so on and so forth. The Holy Ghost couldn't get in on your program if he tried. That's why he's left you, and he didn't even know many of you go through the motions. Now, this is real rude preaching, but it's good. We've lost the glory. We've lost the majesty. The men could minister in the outer court. They ministered to each other in the outer court. They ministered to somebody else in the inner court. But when they went into the holy place, they ministered to God. Again, prayer is occupation with my needs. Prayers is occupation with my blessings. But worship is occupation with God himself, seeing his majesty, seeing his glory. Well, of course, we take a lot of time, but let me tell you, I'm going to leap into three sections here tonight, that's all. In the 30th chapter of Exodus, you have in the section from verse 23, a description of the ointment that should be used, the anointing oil that should be used for the various vessels in the sanctuary. I'm not going to bother with that, but will you read it when you go home? And then read the next part of the chapter, because there's another oil that is used for the anointing of the priest. It's not the anointing of things which are inanimate. Verse 30 says, Thou shalt anoint Aaron and his sons, and consecrate them, that they may minister unto me. You get that? They're not going to minister to the people, they're going to minister to God. So you don't bring the same things, the oil that you're going to put on the vessels in the sanctuary. This is a holy anointing oil. Ooh, it's a study all in itself. I'd like to spend all night on it, but I won't. I'll just pass it up. But it tells you, this holy anointing oil, they're going to what? Verse 31, Thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel, saying, This shall be a holy anointing oil unto me throughout your generations. Now notice this very carefully, will you, in the next verse. Verse 32, Upon man's flesh it shall not come. God will never sanctify flesh. God will never anoint flesh. Do you remember the psalm 133, where it says you take the holy anointing oil and put it on the head of Aaron, and the oil ran down his face. It doesn't say that, it says it ran down his beard, from his beard to his dress, from his dress to the floor. What? Because holy anointing oil never touches the flesh. I hear people say, if that young man ever got sanctified, or that young man got the baptism, he's such a nice personality. And you know, he can speak and everything. Thank him, God isn't depending on that. You wouldn't really say that Bird Robinson was a jazzy personality, would you? And he's a pretty bad lisp. Boy, when he got anointed he could preach. I'd rather hear a man say ABC with the anointing than hear the most eloquent man in the world that had no anointing anyhow. Upon man's flesh it shall not be poured, neither shall ye make any other like it. Oh, come on, come on. I like this. This sets me up on fire or something. You see, because it says you can't make any imitation of the anointing of God. Or you can gesticulate, you can learn all the art of being a pulpit orator, you know where to put on the press, and how to be dramatic, and all the histrionics, and all the rest of it. And when he'd gone, somebody going out, somebody says, boy, he was sounding brass, he was like an old tin can tonight. And you thought you had done Wesley resurrected. Upon man's flesh it shall not be poured, neither shall ye make any other like it, after the composition of it. It is holy, and it shall be holy unto you. And whosoever compoundeth anything like it, or whosoever putteth anything of this on a stranger, shall be cut off from his will. Now go through the chapter and read it when you go home, will you, how this holy ointment was compounded. It's got some strange words. It says there's a thing called sakti, and onyker, and galvanum, and sweet spices with pure frankincense. Eh, that's interesting. You go down, and I'll tell you what, it's a very, very thrilling thing how they compounded all these things. Some were living, some were dead. One juice you had to get in the morning before the sun came up. The other you got in the midnight, because it only flows in the midnight. And sometimes your anointing will be best when you've been through midnight experiences, and experiences that pay your part. Because God doesn't merely sanctify us for the anointing. You see, the greatest need in the country tonight is for men who want the anointing of God to pray, like some people want it just to preach. Man, if we had as many traveling preachers as we had traveling preachers, we'd upset the world. These boys are always going to Israel. I wish they'd go to the cross. All right, we've jumped from there to a beautiful illustration of this in the gospel aspect, and then we'll finish up in Revelation. Luke chapter 7, there's a story, you know it well enough, let me skip over it. It's a story of a man who was going to make a feast. And I figure that he had some problems. He got a piece of paper, a parchment, and he wrote the names of all the guests that were coming. You know, the socialites, the millionaires, the manufacturers, the mayor of the town, everybody. Put all the names down. The greatest man in the world was coming to eat at his house. A man called Jesus. The new sensation. Again, I remind you, Christianity was not served up to the world on a silver platter. Christianity was born in a slave state. Christianity was born in a sophisticated, totalitarian world. You preachers think you have it hard, bless your darling hearts. Would you like to have been John the Baptist if there hadn't been a good preacher around for 400 years? And he was the only man in the world with the truth. 400 years of stillness and no prophetic voice. 400 years of midnight blackness in poverty, then like Haley's comics streaking through the sky. Here is a man sent from God, incandescent with the Holy Ghost. Dear God, I wish he'd give us just about a hundred John the Baptists for America in the next six months. And a hundred for England, and a hundred for Russia, and a hundred for every country in the world. Man, we'd turn the world upside down. But they got rid of John. He was stupid. He preached against kings as well as commoners. Dear old Dr. Parker in London said somewhere about, I don't know, 1895 or somewhere around there, he said, listen preacher, if you decided to preach repentance, pledge your head to God, you might only last six months like John the Baptist. John Wesley said in his preaching he offered men Christ. We don't offer sinners Christ. We offer them forgiveness, peace of mind, a home in heaven, a mansion on Main Street, a five-decker crown, free ticket to the marriage supper of the Lamb. We don't offer them Christ. He offered men Christ. All right. This man is going to have the greatest preacher since John the Baptist, a man called Jesus, a miracle worker. Can you imagine his excitement? Jesus accepted the invitation. And so what he did, he got the right folk on a list, and then after the folk he decided on the food, and after the food the flowers, and everything was in order. He went to bed that night saying, you know, tomorrow is going to be the greatest day of my life, a day I'll never want to forget. It became a day he never wanted to remember. Everything went wrong. Tomorrow people will leave my house saying this is the greatest banquet there's ever been for the last 50 years, and they'll talk about my generosity, and all they did was talk about his stupidity. He made it big that day, in everything that was fully. And he's there busy, busy, busy, busy, and he greets every guest in all the oriental style. He kisses them on either cheek, and he takes them to a slave who washes their feet, and he's so excited. Here's somebody coming in the latest Cadillac. It was drawn with two big black horses, and somebody else sweeping down the street, and his servant says, Master, Master. He says, hurry up. What's the matter? Have you burned the roast or something? He said, no. You know that certain woman. Now look, why bring her up? Well, Master, it's not a case of bringing her up. She's in the kitchen here. And the man you call Jesus is there. You don't mean that. Yeah, he's there. After all, Jesus came into the world through the back door, didn't he, with a suspicion of being illegitimate? I think it was Isaac Watts that wrote, For him my heart and voice I raise, One stands with it says, A servant's form he wore, And in his body bore our dreadful curse on Calvary. Isn't it wonderful Jesus never strutted, never showed off? His majesty was his meekness. His greatness was his humility. Can you see this man looking round the door? Goodness, goodness, he says, if he'd been a prophet as I thought, he'd certainly know who she is, for she is a sinner. And Jesus says, time and a minute, I want to talk to you. There was a certain man who had two debtors. One owed him 500 pence, the other owed him 50, and he forgave them both. Which of them would love him most? Well, I suppose it has to be the man that has the biggest debt. Forgiven loves the man. Exactly the point. Do you know why I love this precious woman? Number one, she wasn't on the visiting list. She wasn't on the guest list. You see, what she did was unprecedented, but not unpremeditated. She could have lost her head going to a stag party. A woman of her reputation going with all the elites, Pharisees and others, that man, she's asking for murder. I'll tell you why I love the woman. Number one, she went when she had no right to go. Number two, she was the only one that went to the party that took a gift. They all went to get something. How often do you bring a gift to the house of God? I don't mean your dollar, which has been keeping the kingdom together for the last few years. I mean, what else do you bring besides a stinking dollar or two? She was the only one that brought a gift. I know why she came to worship him, because number one, she brought a gift, and number two, she never said anything to him. Can you imagine? Dr. Charles was a brilliant man like him. He was brilliant. Lying there worshiping hour after hour after hour, two hours, three hours, four hours, five hours, and he said, Len, I never say a word of prayer. I never say a word of praise. It's all adoration, contemplation, meditation. I'm overwhelmed with his majesty and his beauty and his glory. Sometimes I stammer out. You can find all the, nearly all the hymns that inspired him. They're written in a book called the Christian's, thank you dear, Christian's Book of Mystical Verse, cost you two dollars in softback, it's a marvelous book. He said, Len, I gaze upon his holiness and I say to him how beautiful, how beautiful the sight of thee must be. Thine endless wisdom, boundless power, and awful purity. Oh Jesus, Jesus, dearest Lord, forgive me if I say for very loud thy sacred name a thousand times a day. Burn, burn within me, love of God, burn fiercely night and day, till all the dross of earthly love is burned and burned away. No earthly father loves like thee, no mother e'er so mild bears and forbears as thou with me, thy simplering child. Oh sometimes I sing, loved with everlasting love, led by grace, that love to know, spirit breathing from above, thou hast taught me it is so, all this full and perfect peace, all this transport, all divine, in a love which cannot cease, I am in it. When did you last make love to Jesus? You'll wear yourself out knocking on doors. You could win a thousand people to Jesus Christ every day, and I mean this. God help me, I'll answer at the judgment. You could win a thousand souls to Jesus Christ every day and leave Jesus Christ disappointed. Why? Because you didn't minister to him. You ministered to them, even if it was spiritual, but you left him, you starved him. Doesn't it say there in Malachi that we rob God? You say I've taught my people to type. If I were a gambling man, I'd bet a thousand to one you haven't. You taught them to tithe their money. But that's not what the scripture says. It says bring all the tithes. So you would have to tithe your time. And a tithe of twenty-four hours is two hours and twenty-four minutes every day, and then you give him nothing on that, so you give him a minimum of three hours a day. I never found it difficult to spend three hours a night with Martha. Did you? Come on now, don't look so embarrassed. Maybe I haven't even told you how much I loved her for months, but I could spend three hours. I used to go over the mountains in a broken down old car and see Martha and enjoy an hour and go back and risk my life in the dark with a car that was blind in both eyes nearly, rheumatism in the wheels, and it had asthma in the motor, and the poor thing, it coughed and sneezed its way over the mountain. I got trapped one night in a snowstorm. And all I did was, because the mountain was like that, I sat down on my legs like this, and I slid three miles down the mountainside, left my car up there. Martha told me not to go, bless her, but I wanted to get back to a church, I passed it. Man, I nearly got frostbitten. I was hungry. And I kept thinking, it's all right for her. She's at home in the hospital, which she happened to be the matron of at night. Dear Martha, I'm glad she's not here now, man. But you know what? I never wrote her a letter to tell her how I sacrificed. You know, when you gave that girl that ring, that big ugly, that big ring, it was like a cauliflower or something, and you put it on her hand and you said, I want you to realize this, my dear. I've been saving for this ring for three years. Do you know what there is in that ring? About 4,500 hamburgers, about 200 bottles of coke, and you've no idea what's in that ring. So you better look after it. Don't do that. The poet says, love ever stands with open hands, and while it lives, it gives, and this is love's prerogative, to give and give and give. And this woman knew she was coming to Jesus. Oh, maybe if you'd seen her heart, it was going like that, and she slips in. And when she saw him, she looked at him. Now the custom was that she should wash his feet with water. She said, not on your life. I wouldn't wash his feet with water. I wash them with my tears. Maybe Charles Wesley got his inspiration there for his hymn when he said, oh, let me kiss thy bleeding feet and bathe and wash them with my tears. I think that's beautiful. She should have washed his feet with water. She washed his feet with tears. She should have dried his beautiful feet with a lovely soft towel. Do you know what she did? She pulled the pins out of her hair and let her hair down. Those long stresses, and took those blessed feet. My, I guess Jesus enjoyed that. I mean that. It was part of her humiliation. A woman's glory is her hair. So she lays her glory at his feet. Wherever you find Mary, you find him at Jesus' feet. Three times she's mentioned, she's always at his feet. You stand to sing, at least we should. We kneel to pray. You prostrate yourself to worship. We get to the book of the Revelation, it said they all fell at his feet. It said when John saw him on that morning of his resurrection, that they all fell at his feet. So she goes there and she washes his feet with the hair of her head. She washes his feet not with water, but with tears. She dries his feet not with a towel, but with the hair of her head. And then she took that precious ointment that the scripture says weighed a pound, just a little jar, a pound in weight. I'm glad it says that, it's very, very important. And then when she washed his feet and wiped his feet, she took that ointment and put it on his feet. And then she took the hair of her head again and she dried his feet. So what happened? You get the point? What she poured out on him came back on her. You know you can preach eloquently and be as dry as that oak stick that Gehazi carried around and tried to raise somebody with. I'll tell you one thing, if you develop a life of worship, you'll never be dry in your spirit. You'll never lack passion for soul. You'll never lack love for God. She poured the fragrance on him. She wiped his feet with the hair of her head, so the fragrance she poured on him came back on her. Frieda Hambriel wrote a beautiful poem some years ago, it goes like this, within the veil, you see that's the holiest of all, that's the place where the she kind of glory comes. None alive, some of us haven't been there for a long while. We go in with all our problems of the church and the problems of our life and the problem, listen, you leave everything in the outer court when you go into his holy presence. A man could not go in until he was 35 years of age. It's the destiny that we don't understand this method of worship till we become mature. A priest couldn't go in at 25, a soldier couldn't go in. Hey, what's the secret about that 30 business? I never found it, but I'll tell you something, John Baptist didn't minister till he was 30, Jesus didn't minister till he was 30, Paul was more than 30, Joshua was more than 30. You go back on all these characters, for some reason they're all more than 30 years of age. It's significant again of maturity. Frieda Hambree Allen says, within the veil did this beloved thy portion, within the secret of thy Lord to dwell, beholding him, until his face thy glory, his life thy love, thy lips his praise shall tell. Within the veil, for only as thou gazest upon the matchless beauty of his face, canst thou become a living revelation of his great heart of love, his untold grace. Here's the speaker of it, within the veil his fragrance poured upon thee, without the veil that fragrance shed abroad. Within the veil his hand shall tune the music which sounds on earth. I saw with him united can live on earth the resurrection life. All right, the woman took a risk, she took a gift, she took her love. Simon didn't like it. Seven days after a crowd of people were looking at that same man on a cross, those feet that she had in her hands were running with blood. I suggest you she was the only happy person at the cross. I'm sure she was saying under her breath, I'm glad I did it when I did it. I took in my most precious possession, a pound of ointment. Very precious the word of God said. But if you've gone a few hours after, there were some men going up that hill with a hundred pounds of the same ointment. What's the good of giving a hundred pounds of ointment when he's dead? He got that ointment because they presented gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh at his birth. Here he gets the ointment just before his amazing passion. Here is a man saying look, I understand you're letting him have your tomb because you remember in the fifty-third of Isaiah it says he makes his death with the wicked, a thief on either side framed him. But he makes his death with the rich in his burial, he had one of the finest sepulchres that was around. And Joseph gave the tomb and Nicodemus thought well I've got to do as well as that so I've got a treasure, I've got a million dollars worth of myrrh. So what's the good of giving it to him he's dead. Some people say you know when I die I'm leaving relatives or I'm getting my money. Boy I'm leaving mine for the church. Well that's nice. But I'll tell you what if you leave the church ten million dollars of your denomination God won't give you ten cents for it at the judgment bar. How do you know? Well here's a rich man, he's got a solid gold casket to prove it and he's lying here and he looks great. He's got a diamond piping in and he's all dressed to go somewhere. And the preacher says we've got to remember now we can develop our scheme for the church he's left us ten million dollars. Isn't it wonderful? They'll say yes he's a great man he left us ten million dollars. This old bible of mine says the Lord love us what? Well have a look at him. Is he a cheerful giver? The only reason he's given it, death took it from him. If he was living he'd still have it. He didn't give it to the Lord he surrendered it at the gunpoint of death and you're going to give a million dollars I don't believe you get ten cents for it. Now this isn't Shakespeare this is a modern American who said do you're giving while you're living then you're knowing where it's going. It's as good as Shakespeare it's better for you pass it. Put it in the church bulletin next week but anyhow. You know how easy it is huh? One thing before I pass out of this. In the 26th chapter of Matthew the same story is told and there's one little difference there do you know what it says? He went to the house of Simon the leper. Well you can't go to the house of the leper it's forbidden by law. It was forbidden by the by the state law and it was forbidden by religious law. You see this man one day discovered leprosy he says to invite Sarah look I've got leprosy and she says please don't touch the towels. Please go go go go go. Tell the priest. And he goes to the priest and the priest scratches him off the roster and says you're no longer of our fellowship. And then he goes to the gate of the city and they cancel his name he's not a member of the city he's a leper. Well how in the world did he get in his home and make a feast? There's no cure for leprosy there is Jesus cured him. And this is a man who was cured of leprosy who got back into the state set up and got back in his home and got in a tantalum geese and got to kiss Jesus and wash his feet. So before you throw your hammer gun at him tell me when you did it loud. When you kneeled before him not to ask him for something not to thank him for it but adore him for his majesty and his glory. Doctor told me Dr. Sanford Westminster I talked with that man often prayed with him and he he was talking of quoting a man called I've forgotten his name now Count Zinz no it wasn't Zinzendorf Zydowski I think. And he used to say wait a minute I love a phrase I love a phrase of that man. He said you know Jesus loved me for nothing. Come on now what was it in you that God wanted you were lousy. I don't care if you lived on the clean side of the road so did I lived in a Methodist home. There's no drinking smoking dancing it was a pretty strict home and I thank God for it. But I got to get saved like everybody else. My daddy had been a drunk my daddy had mixed with societies, dukes, lords, ladies. He lived in the upper echelon where kings came to dine at the castle and everything else. Then he hit the drink thing and ended up in the gutter and Jesus saved him and my life was at the opposite end of the spectrum but I have to be saved. You know there's nothing in you that God should want it you're just a stinking old leper. You may be a rich leper you may be an intellectual leper you may be a very sophisticated leper you are a leper anyhow and you're outside the camp till Jesus came. I like that chorus that says he touched me. Oh he touched me. We worked for two years my sweetheart and I in the subculture of New York with David Wilkerson when he was just starting he wasn't very famous then. I went into the chapel one morning and they said oh Brother Raymond is going to preach this morning. A little boy stood up a little Puerto Rican. Oh he was excited. Oh Brother Raymond is going to talk to us this morning. Please stand. Everybody stand. Everybody sing. Sing our national anthem. Oh boys sing the national anthem before I drink. Oh good night that's not to sing and so they all stood up and they sang the national anthem. Amazing Grace. Man we hadn't got through the first stanza and every girl there was a prostitute. Beautiful looking girl and every girl's blouse was with tears. And the boys at this side were stammering and rubbing their faces and trying to sing. And at the end they said let's sing the last stanza again. Could we change it when we've been there ten million years? I said no. No you can't. We can't? No I said change it to when we've been there ten billion. It sounds a lot better. Ten thousand isn't enough. That won't be a weekend in heaven. When we've been there ten thousand years. When we've been there ten billion years. And the little fella said you know some of you had a hard way getting rid of drugs. I came in here he said so many years of a drug habit. So much of prison records. So many murders I've been everything else. And he was excited you wonder. Lots of kids used to express it. I've been to hell and back. Some of you didn't know. Even now there's a hell. We've lost sight of that even. If your church believed in hell your prayer meeting would be packed every week. The rug would be wet with tears. Don't tell me the Mormons don't believe it. The Christians don't believe it. God's problem in America is not Mormonism or Russellism or some other. God's problem in America or England tonight is dead fundamentalism. All in capital letters. Oh every time I've heard that hymn sung since Amazing Grace it's been as flat as a pancake. We went to a church not long after to preach and there was a blonde at the front. She was having a job. Served the rite. She had a gorgeous stack of hair. It wasn't hers anyhow. And she kept waving her finger like this and if you sing Amazing Grace how sweet the sound. And I kept saying stupid woman sit down. You don't know a thing about Amazing Grace anyhow. I can remember going to meetings where meetings were explosive. You never knew what was going to happen. You'd be preaching and somebody'd say hey could I say a word. Man God's just such a man. And the old boy would go off. I remember people used to crawl down the aisle on their hands and knees to get saved before you got through your second pint if you had any. Dear Lord we're not only God's chosen people but his frozen people I think. We can't even move. Why does this woman do so much? Because she loved much. That's what Jesus said. That's not my verdict. It's Jesus' verdict. This is why she brings a gift. This is why she's so extravagant. This is why she takes her hair. This is why she brings a gift. Let's go to the book of Revelation. Read chapter five. Now how do you describe this book? Hmm. As I said this afternoon it was written by a man who was unlearned and ignorant. Please keep that in mind. It helped. That's what the world said of him. After he healed the man at the gate of the temple they said he's unlearned and ignorant. It's a great book for an ignoramus to write isn't it? Some PhDs I've done as well. Anyhow let's read it. Revelation is a book of what? Well I'll tell you in three simple words to me. It's a book of mystery. It's a book of majesty. It's a book of misery. Because it shows me the final doom of the wicked. All right chapter five verse one. I saw in the right hand of him that sat on the throne a book written within. And on the backside sealed with seven seals. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice. In case I forget to tell you that. You know that loud voice appears thirteen times in the Revelation. You see that stupid big ignorant world outside thinks it's got rid of Jesus. Well it's got a headache. It hasn't even met him yet. And there's going to be such a loud voice there in eternity that God says thirteen times over in the Revelation he's going to let everybody know right down to the last corridor in hell. But the game is over. Man I'd almost like to stay another week and preach one night on the judgment seat for about three hours. I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice who is worthy to open the book and loose the fields thereof. Now listen listen listen. I'm going to I'm going to put my own caption on this. I believe this is the most solemn moment in eternity. Not time, eternity. I suggest this takes place with the with the redeemed not sinners. They may be a bit later in the chapter but not just yet. Listen to this third verse Revelation 5. No man, listen, in heaven in the earth or under the earth was able to open the book neither to look thereon. And I wept much because no man was found worthy to open the book and to read the book neither to look thereon. And one of the elders saith unto me weep not behold the lion of the tribe of Judah hath prevailed to open the book. What's this book? Well I tried to do a bit of research amongst some of the most fundamental scholars of the ages. This document in the hand of the one on the throne is a legal document which really really can be described as the as the forfeited inheritance of the saints. If a man forfeited a piece of ground in the old testament and he couldn't pay for it, a document was made, a page was written and then it was for you and then another and another and another and it was put with somebody in safety. This is the forfeited inheritance of the saints. Everything depends on this. The final overthrown Satan, the Antichrist, everything. It seems to me this is the last official act of the son of God. He has redeemed us, he's died for us, he's risen from the dead. And now all heaven is breathless. Listen to it again please. No man. Moses I see you in the gallery. Can't you take the book out of the hand of him on the... Isaiah. Can you take the book out of the hand of him that sat on the throne? He said no no no I can't do that. Well surely the apostle Paul can do it. He had more experience. He'd already been up to heaven for a space of I don't know how long. He was caught up into the third heaven. This man is no stranger. Can he walk up to the man on the throne and take a look? No man was found worthy on the earth, under the earth, in the earth. But what are we to do? Lose our inheritance? John said I wept much. Why? Did he have a broken finger? No sir, he had a broken heart. You great scholars read it, read it. I guess the only time you'll find that word weeping is mentioned one brother in the scripture. We're moving up now to where? Palm Sunday. And the average preacher gets a good sermon on the triumphant entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. I don't say T E triumphant entry. It was not a triumphant entry. It was a tearful exit. And this is the only time the word is used. When Jesus went to all Jerusalem, you stupid, stupid Jerusalem. Isaiah walked those streets. Jeremiah walked those streets. The great men of God. And you rejected them. And now you reject the son of God. Well I ask you before God, how long do you think God's going to stand and let America break the laws every day? We're trying the best we can to legally dismantle the Ten Commandments. We've abolished the, we've abolished capital punishment. We've legalized abortion. We've legalized prostitution in parts of Nevada. You can get away with almost any crime. How much longer? Do you think God's going to listen to a stinking mess much longer? I remind you again that Francis Schaeffer says that every main town and village in China, 800 years ago, eight centuries ago, every town and village in China had a thriving New Testament church. Do you realize that when Jesus walked out on Jerusalem, that Jerusalem was before a bride? At least Israel, God was married to Israel. He served with a bill of divorcement. He hasn't bothered with us for 2,000 years. What makes you think he's hanging on America or England right now? The greatest threat to America is not invasion by communism. The greatest threat to America, the great problem, the headache of God, is His church. In the Old Testament, God's problem is not the Amalekites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, it's Israel. In the New Testament, you've got Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. You have the manifestation of the church in the Acts of the Apostles, doing everything Jesus did when he was in the flesh. And when we recover the glory that's been lost, we'll do everything Jesus did. Now remember after that, there is no epistle in the New Testament to sinners. The whole story from the Acts of the Apostles to the end of the book is to the church, the sick church, the weak church. John says, I wept. It's the same kind of weeping. It's a man with a broken heart. It's a man confused and baffled. My God, what will I do? If nobody can take the title deeds of the universe out of him that sits on the throne, what do we do? And suddenly he said, there was a voice that said, weep not. Now that must have excited the millions in eternity. This is a preview that he has. You see in the fourth chapter, I mean the third chapter, he's had a horrible rundown of a bankruptcy of the churches, finishing with the Laodicean church that we're in right now I think. In the fourth chapter he says there's a door open in heaven. He has a new vision. In the fifth chapter now, he sees the throne and the title deeds that no one found worthy. And then suddenly he hears this tremendous voice that cries out, weep not. Behold, a lion of the tribe of Judah has prevailed. And I beheld, and lo in the midst of the throne, and of the four beasts, and in the midst of the elders stood a lamb that had been slain. I like that. Twenty-seven times in the book of the Revelation he mentions the lamb. The lamb that had been slain. And he said, wait a minute, this is no ordinary lamb. Remember in the Old Testament when they were going to make a lamb to sacrifice, what did they do? They had to keep it in the house for four days. And everybody got to love that darling lamb. And then daddy said, we're going to take it out. Why? I remember when we had lambs, our boys had lambs when we were in Ireland. We used to follow the boys to school. I had to chase them and pull them back. They were beautiful lambs. Oh, how strong they got. They were pet lambs. They'd run in the kitchen. You had to chase them out. The little Jewish boys, they loved their lambs. And then one day daddy said, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, we're going to. No, no, no, not our pet lamb. Do you know this is exactly what the word of God says? Doesn't the Greek say that? Do you remember Jesus said, feed my sheep, feed my sheep, feed my pet lamb. And here is the pet lamb of God. He didn't have a flock. He had one son. And the hymn writer said, thou didst not spare thine only son, but gavest him for a world undone. And freely with that blessed one thou gavest all. As the lamb as it had been slain. Verse seven. He came and took the book out of the right hand of him that sat on the throne. And verse eight. When he had taken the book, the four beasts and four and twenty elders fell down. See that's the only place to go. Do you remember a point that said, never nearer than thy cross and never higher than my feet. You know when you worship, you feel the dust is still high for you. You feel you need to make a hole below the dust to really worship him in his beauty, in his glory, in his majesty. He came and took the book out of the right hand of him that sat on the throne. And the elders fell down. And then verse nine says, and they sang a new song. Well everything is new in heaven isn't it? God's going to make a new heaven, a new earth. We're going to have a new name in our foreheads. They sing a new song, worthy is the lamb. It's a new Jerusalem. It's there for all who have received a new nature by faith in Jesus Christ. He makes all things new. But you see there's been an awful, awful, awful, awful lot of failure to worship. You know I was thinking about this the other morning about two o'clock. I was running over it in my mind. I like to sing to the Lord. Nobody else likes me to sing, but he does. The scripture says make a melody unto the Lord in your heart. The tune gets a bit messed up coming out, but in my heart I can sing like Gabriel. And often when I wake in the morning I lay back and sing that hymn we sang tonight of Matthew Bridges, crown him with many crowns. Wouldn't that be wonderful? You see there's an ascending scale of adoration and worship and praise in the book of the Revelation. If you go back to the first chapter there's a twofold doxology. If you just get back here into the fourth chapter in verse ten, the four and twenty elders fall down before him that sat on the throne, and they worship him. You see again they fall down to worship. They fell on their faces to worship. They fall down and worship him that liveth forever and ever. And they cast their crowns before him. Crown him with many crowns the Lamb upon his throne. Hark how the heavenly anthem drowns all music but his song. Awake my soul and sing of him who died for thee. And hail him as thy matchless king through all eternity. Crown him the Lord of spheres, the potentate of time. Creator of the rolling spheres, ineffably sublime. All hail, redeemer, hail for thou hast died for me. Thy praise and glory shall not fail through all eternity. Now there's going to be some singing. It says in this last verse of the fourth chapter, there's another doxology here. It's a threefold doxology. Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power. And in the thirteenth verse of the fifth chapter it says every creature which is in heaven and on the earth and under the sea and such as are in the sea and all who are in them heard I say blessing and honor and glory and power. So you've got up one. It's like a fourfold doxology. And you go into the seventh chapter and it says at the end of the eleventh verse, the elders. Now you've got to have something to move on boys. And it says in verse eleven, the angels stood round about the throne and about the elders and the four beasts and they fell before the throne on their faces. You see every time they worship they fall on their faces. I can hear Dr. Tozer saying to me, Elaine, look, let others do as they like. You and I will worship God's face downward. That's the only way you can worship him. You can pray to him on your knees. You can stand up and sing. You can only worship him when you're blind in the dusk. All right, I'll wrap it up for you right here. It's an exciting chapter this, isn't it? Makes you wonder why preachers have managed to make the gospel so dull. It's a great chapter, saying with a loud voice. There we've got it again, a loud voice. You can't miss it. Oh, right, I was meditating the other morning about two o'clock on this very theme. I'd sung crowning with many crowns. I'd recited some of those lovely hymns that Tozer got me tagged on to. And then it was, you know, the Lord said this, look, today, you know, you saw those big old automobile tires burning? Ooh, they make a stink. They make a black cloud, oi, hardly it goes up enough. And then you remember you saw some smoke that was white, just a whisper going like that? Well, all of that black smoke today is typical of all the curses and the profanity and the vulgarity and the indecencies and the obscenities that have come off the lips of everybody in America today. All that filth is ascending my nostrils and it stinks like hell. And the little whisper that goes up, that white thing, is the praise that my people have given me. And God said it to me, you don't have to agree with it, I don't care whether you do or not. God said to me the only way you can compensate for all the profanity and cursing, all the indecency, all the pornographic literature, all the filth, is to step up the praises of God's people, my people. Step up that praises, step up that adoration. God has said later in this chapter that there's a hundred million people, it says ten thousand times ten thousand, but you see when you come to praise you can't measure it. You've got the numbers of elders, the numbers of slaves, revelation is all numbers, but there's no number of the redeemed, there's ten thousand times ten thousand, which is a hundred million, and thousands and thousands, and they're saying with a loud voice. Man alive if you put all the earthquakes in history together, they'd be like a whisper compared to this. God is going to get praise out of every living creature that ever was or ever will be. I can't wait for the moment when I go to the supreme messiah's court of the ages and I see Hitler bow beneath to Jesus, or Genghis Khan, or Philip of Macedon, or Mussolini. Every one of those wretched guys are going to do it. They're going to kneel in the presence of the son of God and say he is God to the glory of the Father. And it says a hundred million people are going to praise him, and then in the fourteenth chapter that a hundred and forty four harpens with their hearts. Boy it would be good if you had a glorified body to shut your nerves if you didn't. Can you imagine a choir of a hundred million? Can you imagine an orchestra of a hundred and forty four thousand playing? Not the artist's tune? Even the pastor would be able to sing then. And you know if you've got a bass voice you'll sing better than Paul Robeson, he's a majestic voice. Ever hear Gulley Gertie sing? I have an old record of Gulley Gertie. Now she climbs up above the stars. Every woman. You may never have sang a note. My wife never sings at my meetings. You may never have sang a note on earth. But I'll tell you when you get to heaven and he tunes you up, brother you'll have a voice like a volcano. There's going to be a hundred million and a hundred and forty four thousand, but listen I got the best thing till last. There's a little note. John left me this note and I'm very grateful he did. I got it from the Isle of Patmos. Do you know what he says? This is ridiculous. This is stupendous. Oh Disneyland has thought up some wonderful things for kids, but this is beyond anything anybody ever dreamed of. Do you know what he says about that choir? They're going to sing blessing, power and riches and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praising. That's the people. You know what we say sometimes? We used to sing a hymn, there is singing up in heaven. And I expect to help them make the courts of heaven ring. Tell me anywhere in the scripture where angels sing. You can't find one. You say they brought Jesus to earth and they sang glory to God in the highest. The scripture says they said glory to God. Angels can't sing redemption story. They've never been redeemed. You imagine me standing there on a star singing and all those angels bowing their heads and saying I've never heard a song like that. I say well you were never redeemed like that. You see in the previous chapters you've got little subsidiary thrones, but you've got no other throne here. It says even here that the 4 and 20 elders at the end of chapter 4, verse 10, the 4 and 20 elders fall down before him that sat on the throne and worshiped him and they cast their crowns before him. Now you've got a hundred million people, you've got 144,000 with their instruments and then listen to this. It says in chapter 5 of verse 13, every creature that is in heaven and such as are in the sea. Isn't that wonderful? And all that are in them heard I saying blessing and honor and glory and power to him that. Wouldn't it be wonderful to hear the crabs sing. That's what I didn't say, that's what the Lord said. Everything in the sea. Wouldn't it be wonderful to hear an old elephant lift his trunk and play the bass fart in the orchestra in heaven. You'd be saying would be such, because you see God's going to get praise out of everything. Everything's going to be subject to the blessing. There is nothing that grieves. We better close or we might get excited.