In this sermon, the preacher discusses the concept of giving and the importance of doing so while still alive. He emphasizes that true giving comes from the heart and is not simply about donating money. The preacher then shifts to discussing the 400 years of darkness between the books of Malachi and Matthew, highlighting the difficulty of waking up a sleeping nation. The sermon concludes with a focus on a story from Luke chapter 7, where a sinful woman brings an alabaster box of ointment to Jesus and washes his feet with her tears. The preacher emphasizes the need for genuine repentance and love for God.

Okay, tonight we're going to look at the seventh chapter in the Gospel recorded by Luke. Sometimes the preachers, because they don't know any better, say that there are four Gospels. There are not four Gospels, there's only one Gospel told by four different men. And so they all make a different emphasis, and the story that's in this chapter is in each of the four Gospels. But to me this is the most fascinating one. Luke chapter 7, and verse 36. One of the Pharisees desired him that he would eat with him. And he went into the Pharisee's house, and sat down to meet. And behold, a woman in the city who was a sinner, the emphasis is a sinner, a real sinner. When she knew that Jesus sat for meat in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster box of ointment, and stood at his feet behind him, weeping. Began to wash his feet with tears, and wipe them with the hairs of her head. And kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment. Now when the Pharisee which had been themself, he spake within himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is, for she is a sinner. Jesus answering said unto him, Simon, I have somewhat to say unto thee. And he said, Master, say on. There was a certain creditor which had two debtors. The one owed him five hundred pence, the other owed him fifty. And when they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. Tell me therefore, which of them would love him most? Simon answered, I suppose that he to whom he forgave most. And Jesus said unto him, Thou art rightly judged. He turned to the woman and said to Simon, Seest thou this woman? I entered into thy house. Thou gavest me no water for my feet. But she hath washed them with her tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head. Thou gavest me no kiss. But this woman, since I came, since the time I came in, hath not ceased to kiss my feet. My head with oil, thou didst not anoint. But this woman hath anointed my feet with ointment. Wherefore I say unto thee, Her sins which are many are forgiven, for she loved much. But to whom little is forgiven, the same love a further. He said unto her, Thy sins are forgiven thee. And they that sat at me with him began to say within themselves, Who is this that forgiveth sins also? And he said to the woman, Thy faith hath saved thee, go in peace. If I were to put a label on this reading tonight, I would call it the complaining Christ. Last week you may remember that we considered the first part of a three-part message. This is the second, obviously. And we stated that in the erection of the tabernacle in the Old Testament, the first measurements that are given there are the measurements of the mercy seat where God said, There will I meet with thee. And the most important thing in the world is not how much we work for God. The most important thing in the world is how we worship Him. Prayer is preoccupation with our needs. Praise is preoccupation with our blessings. Worship is preoccupation with God Himself. One of the old hymn writers said, My goal is God Himself, not joy, not peace, not even blessing. You see, so often we think God is a kind of a great utility God. You just call and He answers. You put in your request, you give Him your shopping list, and sooner or later you get what you ask for. And unfortunately that idea is very prevalent in the day in which we live, a day when there's so much talk about spiritual Christian prosperity. I'm afraid lots of Christians are at least material prosperity. A lot of Christians who are materially prosperous are spiritually bankrupt. And, you know, it doesn't matter how rich you are. I know some of you are really rich, but it doesn't matter how rich you are. It doesn't matter about your positions or your possessions. We're still dependent on the cross of Jesus Christ. And God, if you can get this in your mind, it may help you, I was going to say a thousand years, but most of you won't live as long as that. But it will help you all your life to realize this. That the only person who can change God's opinion of you is you. No matter how much people scandalize you, you'll never move God's judgment. I tried to live in that verse in Romans 8, and I forget just which one it is right now. But it says, it is God that justifies. Who is He that condemns? If God smiles on me, do I care who frowns on me? If God frowns on me, does it matter who smiles on me? You see, the sum total of divine revelation and the work of the cross of Jesus Christ is that we, while we are still in the flesh, might walk as though or live as though we were living in heaven itself. Because the kingdom of God is within us. There will be a future kingdom, sure enough. But the kingdom of God is within us. That's when the other kingdom has been put out. Now, have you read this story tonight? I guess, well, in the framework of modern life, this isn't a very exciting story, is it? I mean, a woman coming and kissing the feet of Jesus, washing them, so what? I mean, what's that compared with a man walking on the moon? And, you know, computers, great printing machines. In that context, it's a fairly trivial thing. But supposing we could, we can't, we may try with imagination to step back into history, into the framework where this thing was done. Jesus goes into the house of a Pharisee. That's like hearing that the President of the United States, after he'd finished his daily toil today, went and sat down to eat with the Mafia. He'd raise a few eyebrows. Pharisees, they were very despised. We read the script, you know, so, at least I have done, I confess, so unrealistically very often. I read it in the framework of my need. I read it in the framework of events round about me. Now, come on, let's think back. Between Malachi and Matthew, you have 400 years of total darkness without any prophetic light, total stillness without any prophetic voice. Now, this incident happened here after some great revolutions had taken place. Do you ever try to wake a sleeping man, or worse still, a sleeping woman? They don't usually wake up very comfortable, do they? It's time to get up. Or disgruntled. Well, what do you think it's like waking up a sleeping nation? Between Malachi and Matthew, again, you have a solid block of 400 years. You know what we learn from history? This is my definition, nobody else's. Maybe it is someone else's, but it's mine. The one thing we learn from history is that we don't learn from history. If we did, we wouldn't have all those idiots, Englishmen and folk in the Falcons fighting tonight. We wouldn't have people glorying in the fact we shot down more jets. Men will never get civilized. We've more education, we've more knowledge, we've more universities, we've more of everything, and yet we're stupid enough to think we can do like the barbarians did a thousand or two thousand years ago, shoot people out of the sky. So what? All we've left is a trail of orphans today. Trail of broken-hearted young widows. See, old men design wars, young men fight them. All the greybeards in England are stroking their beards, but it's young blood that's being poured out. Well, they're not too happy there, so let's go on. So there have been 400 years of stillness, no prophetic voice, then suddenly, dramatically, a character that Jesus says that no man in history, and he's including Jeremiah, Isaiah, and all the others, there's never been a greater man living than John Baptist. I preached in a certain place a while ago and a brother came to me and he said, you know, if you would go hide away for a while and wait on God and get a healing ministry, I think you could, well, shake a lot of Americans and a lot of other people. You see, miracles, healings, that's the thing, that's the thing. Well, after all, I talked many times with Katharine Kuhlman, had dinner with her, lunch with her, breakfast with her, talked with her. And at that time, Alan was around and Jack Cole was around, and there was a whole slew of tents around the country. We used to go to Katharine Kuhlman's meetings, and when she wasn't too well-known, before she got on TV, and get five, six, seven thousand people there. But what happened when she quit? What happened if she went? I told her one day, I said, the next time you come to town, instead of preaching for twenty minutes and having a healing service for three hours, tell the people next month when I come, I'm going to preach for three hours and have a healing meeting for twenty minutes. That means you get ten percent of the congregation. I'm not saying it's wrong, I'm saying that we've had more of that ministry than any people in history. You see, John comes on the scene, and the scripture is very clear, it says, John did no miracle. You kind of wonder how he got on without a naming list, but don't mention that after tonight, but there you are. And he didn't have a staff, and he didn't have any financial backing, and he didn't have the acceptance of the preachers and the hierarchy and the Sanhedrin of that day. He comes a lonely, desolate fellow, they didn't even have seats to sit on. Now our churches, they've got wall-to-wall rugs and rubber seats about this depth, so, you know, folk can sleep easier during the sun. And then in his day, they stood in the heat, and they came from Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the other most parts, there's no, well, there's no media, newspapers, no telephones. There is a simple thing you can get hold of, maybe, you never have to advertise a fire, whether it's spiritual or physical. If this place catches fire tonight, I hope it doesn't, I hope I'm not prophetic, but if this place were to catch fire at two o'clock tomorrow morning, there'd be people from all around the countryside who normally sleep, but somehow they'd wake up and, hey, the sky's growing, and they would rush from everywhere to see the fire. And John Baptist, you know, I like to tease, I like to get people angry, actually, with preaching, it's useless preaching if you don't upset somebody. And I go to Baptist churches, you know, and they're very much against the Pentecostal testimony, and so I say, wait a minute. Wait a minute about what? Well, the first man that preached the baptism of the Holy Spirit was a Baptist. John Baptist was the first Pentecostal, he preached the baptism with the Holy Ghost. And then when I go to the Pentecostals and they think they've got it all in the bag, I say, hey, wait a minute, the first fellow that preached your message was a Baptist, what do you mean? Well, I mean what the Bible says. John Baptist came across the sky like Haley's Comet went through the sky when it was dark. And he upset the social life, he upset the religious life, he upset everything. People were not going to the temple, they were going to see this rugged, rugged man out in the country, not doing any miracles. He raised the dead. He did something better than that, he raised the dead nation. They tried to exalt him and say he was the Christ, he says, no, I'm not. Don't find much humility around like that these days. Everybody's studying what our ministry does, not Israel. Maybe you do, I don't know, but they do on TV, our ministry is reaching it, our ministry is... I hear out of Temple and I hear people say how much we're doing, you know why? Because God rebuked David when he counted, when he numbered Israel. As soon as we get in the numbers game, we're in trouble. Right after that, pride comes. Once we boast, makes it easier to be proud. And God resisteth the proud. So John Baptist comes and he upsets the apple cart. Everybody's going, not to the temple, they're going to see this strange man. Right after that, Jesus comes. And Jesus is more devastating than John. And it was this man, Jesus, who at that time was the greatest sensation in the world. Maybe a Pharisee went up and timidly and said, well, I don't know whether you'll do this because I am a Pharisee, but would you like to come to dinner at our house? Tuesday night, Wednesday, whenever it's convenient. He said, sure, I'll come. And this spread through town. I imagine that that man made a list, you know, of the guests who were going to come to the feast. I think he got up at night and crossed some names out and put other names in. He crossed other names out and put some other names in. Until eventually he got a little watertight list of people, just the right people. You've got to get the right folk there, you know. Then after that is to get the right food. And I think he made quite a splash with that. And then he got some flowers and decorated the place to make it look, you know, give it a nice aesthetic atmosphere. And I imagine he went to bed that night and said, you know, tomorrow is going to be the greatest day of my life. It's going to be a day that I'll never forget. And it became a day he never wanted to remember. You've had a day like that, haven't you? If you haven't, it's coming. You know, you get up and you say, oh, it's just one of those days. And everything goes wrong during the day and your prophecy was fulfilled. You said it was one of those days and the Lord saw it was. You expected it and your expectation was not cut off. Oh, I'm sure this will be wonderful. No, no, you want to forget it. This is a day of my exaltation. Everybody will talk about my extravagance, my banquet. And instead of a day of his exaltation, it became a day of humiliation. I can imagine this feast is all set. He set his servants up, told them to watch, you know. They didn't have windows. They had lattices and the lookout says, oh, your majesty, our master so-and-so is coming. He sees this beautiful chariot come up, you know. They had no Jaguar XK120s and no amazing Datsuns in those days. So they had to ride horses and mules. And they had their class distinctions. And as each man comes up, the fellow says, so-and-so is coming. And according to custom, he went to the door and he hugged the man, you know, held him this way and put his cheek the other way at the other side of him. And, oh, here's somebody coming, distinguished person. You see, he got the mayor of the town and the millionaire and the masters and manufacturers and all the starry people, people that had social standing. No dares he's going to get in here. And he is busy doing something and his servant says at the corner there, and the boss comes up and says, what do you want, what do you want? He says, well, we don't have a certain woman in town. Oh, now, don't bring that up at the feast. I mean, if she comes, turn the dogs on her. Well, she's already here. No, I don't see her. Oh, she's in the kitchen. She's making such a fuss about this Jesus fellow, you call him, this prophet or something that you have. And Simon goes and looks and says, I surely made a blunder there. After all, if he were a prophet, he'd know what man or woman this is, for she is a sinner. And Jesus caught him up like that and said, here, Simon, did you notice something? There's a certain creditor had two debts, one owed him 500 pence, the other owed him 50. And when he had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. Which of them would love him most? Well, logically, he says, if this man owes $500 and this man only owes $5, well, this man who had a debt of $500 forgiven will be more grateful than the man who only had $5 forgiven. He said, you answered it correctly. Simon, seest thou this woman? Now hear her, his complaints. I entered into thine house. Thou gavest me no kiss. Thou gavest me no oil. You didn't do the ordinary task of washing feet because, you see, in those days there were no holes. And lots of people couldn't even afford shoes and so they got the grip between their toes and they didn't like to sit at meat. There was a grip between their toes. It was uncomfortable. I entered into thine house. Now, how did he come in? I seriously doubt he came through the front door. Isaac walks. There's a hymn in which he says, A servant's form he wore, and in his body bore our dreadful curse on Calvary. He, like a victim, stood and poured his sacred blood to set us guilty, captive, free. I see bumper stickers and a lot of them are silly, even with so-called scripture on them. And you see a very silly little face, you know, with a curve in it, smile, God loves you. Well, if you have that on, you should have a bumper sticker at the other end that says, God is angry with the wicked every day. We could be laughing people into hell. Jesus was attractive to sinners. I talked with a man this week, a very remarkable man. I wanted to meet him for a long while. In fact, in the space of about ten days, I talked with two of the best-known preachers in America, if not in the world. And then I met this man who is very ordinary, and he's very extraordinary. Tell you why he's extraordinary. He's one of the most knowledgeable men I've ever met, and until recently, he was one of the chief men on Mr. Reagan's certain committee, and he resigned from it. The remarkable thing about that man is, in busy America, that man prays eight to sixteen hours a day, giving up his work to do it, giving up a pastorate to do it. He said, Lord, I want to do this, now you're allowed to supply my need to keep my family, and he put a figure up and said, and not many days after, somebody said, I feel led to send you this and give you so much a month to the end of the year. That's how God works. But he has learned to worship God. Now, going back to this, this woman came in, and I like this story, I like it very, very much. Because, you see, it's unprecedented. She wasn't copying anybody. So many ministers, they copy spinoffs of others. We do what they do and do what they do. No, no, no, no. This ministry is totally unprecedented. But it wasn't unpremeditated. She's risking her neck. This is a stag party. She's maybe the worst known woman in the city, and she's going to knock at the door. I'm not going. But maybe she was watching and saw Jesus going to the back door. In any case, he's going to the house of a Pharisee, and they're a pretty stinking crowd. Anybody, anyhow. And she goes in, and immediately she goes in. She does, well, she does some very wonderful things. Why did she go? Do you think she stood on the edge of the crowd many times and thought, oh, if I could just reach out and touch the hem of his garment. If I could just get five minutes with him and unload all my rotten sins and my corruption. Do you think she fell to her left hand and reached out to the crowd, and then she does this very dramatic, dangerous, defiant thing? Hey, lady, watch it. Those Pharisees, you walk in there, they pull the skirts on one side and say, put the dogs on this stinking woman. What did she go for? Did you guess? She went to worship him. How do you know? For two reasons. Number one, she took a gift and it was the most expensive thing that she owned in the world. And not only did she take a gift, but she never said a word to him. I reminded you last week, if you were here, that Dr. Tozer told me once that often he would lay at the feet of Jesus for four, five, six hours and never say a single word. Wouldn't pray. Wouldn't praise. I fastened on to some aspect of his holiness, or his majesty, or his purity, or his eternity, or his omniscience, or his omnipresence, or his omnipotence. Do you often enter into that realm? Or is God like the convenience store? You just say, well, Lord, I need this and I need some stamps, I need some money or this, give me a bit of help, direct it to me. I say again that prayer is preoccupation with our needs. Praise is preoccupation with our blessings. Oh, thank you, Lord. Oh, thank you, thank you. But worship is preoccupation with God himself. My goal is God himself. Now, when did you last get along with God and say, Lord, I've not come to ask you for a thing, I'm not going to thank you for a thing. I want to gaze on your mercy. You lifted me out of a horrible pain. I could be a prostitute or something. And then you get past that and you gaze on his splendor, his majesty, his holiness. You see, this woman goes along and again I say that she took a gift. Simon looks at this woman and says, what shall I do with her? And Jesus steps in and says, wait a minute. You know, it's ironic when you think of it that we don't know who is at this banquet except the woman that shouldn't be on the guest list. How many others were there? Who were there? I don't know. Oh, I can tell you one or two. But I don't doubt that this great social event, it would never be repeated again and I think the house was jammed with people, with men. And Simon looks and thinks, hmm, if he knew what, I wouldn't let that woman touch my feet if she put her hand, touch me and contaminate me. And Jesus says, wait a minute. You know what the customs are. You should have washed my feet with water when I came in. But this woman had thought it all out. She'd had some sleepless nights over it, I think. She said, when I get there, I won't wash his feet with water. I'll wash his feet with my tears. Maybe Charles Wesley got his inspiration there for one of his great hymns. Oh, let me kiss thy bleeding feet. And bathe and wash them with my tears. The story of thy love repeat in every group in sinners ears. That all mankind with me may prove thy sovereign everlasting love. But he says, let me kiss thy bleeding feet. You see, we preach to congregations as though, you know, most of you are living, you know, you've got a girl on the side, you've got another woman or you're stealing money or do something like that. Well, that's not a way to preach to people. They used to learn at Manhattan and I taught with her. He came to see me for half an hour and he stayed over three hours and I was glad he could have stayed another three as far as I was concerned. But I'm hoping to meet him later. And he said, you know, I've been thinking about the difference between the Quakers and the Puritans. We've got some lovely Quakers around here. Most of you know the Browns, they're Quakers, very precious people. I don't know anybody that lives out the Gospel better than the Browns. They help people, even when they haven't money. I know they've got some in order to help other people, not for their own needs. The Quakers, of course, were founded by George Fox, a very dramatic character, a man that made himself a pair of leather breeches because the other breeches wore out so much, riding horses or riding through forests and so he made himself leather breeches and he had some leather lungs and two things were very conspicuous in their theology. One was what they called the inner light. You see, the human heart is dark. We're in the kingdom of darkness and then the light of the world comes and lives in us. Again, you're not a Christian because you gave up smoking or prostitution or jail or some other lousy thing. You're not a Christian because you believe the Ten Commandments or try to practice the Sermon on the Mount. It occurs about, what, a dozen times in the whole of the New Testament whereas the word disciple occurs about 25, I think 200 times, over 200. Jesus didn't come to make us Christians. He came to make us disciples and part of that word disciple is disciplined ones. A disciple is one who drinks in all that the teacher teaches. George Fox had a remarkable experience of God from England, of course, as you would expect. There we are, he came from England. And George Fox was one of the outstanding men in history. There's another man that came with him or that worked at that time by the name of John Woolman. You get his journal, you can still pick them up in George Fox's life. Read it, you'll find it very electrifying. You know, when they came, this was a country full of savages. There's still a lot left and when the Puritans came, they came up to the Indians and said, you dirty, rotten criminals, you wicked people, you've blood on your hands and you've got tomahawks and this. Oh, they really blasted the poor old Indians. The Quakers went to them and loved them. William Penn, that's why wasn't he the one that was given territory, could walk around Pennsylvania, was founded through him because they had love. Because this woman loved. Jesus said she loved much. And she says, I'm not going to wash his feet with water, I'm going to wash them with my tears. And she didn't go and find the best oriental towel that she could. What in the world would she dry his feet with? Then she'd pull the pins out of her hair. Oh, that wasn't the right thing to do. That's what loose women did. It's a suggestive act. You see, love is blind. She doesn't care what those guys are saying round about her. She doesn't care if they're high priests or millionaires. Here is the one, here is the one who is the Christ of God. I love him. I sense his love and his mercy. And she says, all right, I've washed his feet with water, now I'll dry his feet. And she takes the pins out and wipes his feet with the hair of her head. My, that must have felt gorgeous, I think. Now she still had long hair, she could sit on it. She could sit on the pins, you know, I was going to say for teeth or whatever it is that makes up the birth. And my mother would, oh, Annie would sit on a seat and Mother would go over her hair night after night after night and it used to shine without any of the shoe polish your girls put on. It really shone beautifully. And Mother would look at it sometimes and she'd say, Lynn, come here, come here. And she'd say, put your hand on Annie's hair. Oh, it was lovely. Silky hair. It felt so lovely. When my mother wasn't looking, I pulled it. But I've often thought of the fact that Jesus, on his way to the cross, and she washes his feet with water and she takes that silky hair and dries his feet with the hair of her head. And then she brought a box of ointment which she was saving for her own burial. Lots of people have laid more money on one side to be buried than they've given permissions. And she takes that ointment and breaks it. Yes, she had to break the vase or she had at least to open the vase and she put it on his feet. Then what did she do? She wiped his feet again with the hair of her head. So what happened? Well, obviously the fragrance she poured out on him came back on her, didn't it? She put that price for ointment on his feet and immediately began to dry his feet again with the hair of her head. And everybody gasped. And Jesus says, wherever this story is told, wherever men live, this story, not the man who made the feast, not the man who cooked the turkey, not the man who cut down the biggest bunch of grapes to go on... No, no, no, they're not mentioned. This woman, somewhere secretly she learned to worship and this was an expression of it. She never said a word to him. She didn't even say, Lord, I'm not worthy to do this. And notice what she did. She didn't just kneel. It says that she knelt at the back of him. She didn't hang her neck. In other words, it was an entirely difficult thing to do. It was a very expensive thing to do. She took the ointment which should have been for her own funeral. She poured it out and it came back. Frieda Hanbury Allen wrote this. I haven't memorized it totally, but this is a lovely, lovely thing that says the same thing. Within the veil, that's in a place where you shut the world out and you shut all other thoughts out and you shut out all your needs and you shut out even your praise and you start gazing on his loveliness, on his mercy, on his pity, on his compassion. Frieda Hanbury Allen says, Within the veil be this beloved thy portion, within the secret of thy Lord to dwell, beholding him until thy face is glory, thy life is 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. Within the veil, his fragrance poured upon thee. Outside the veil, that fragrance shed abroad. Within the veil, his hand shall tune the music of your heart, shall tune the music which sounds on earth from God. Within the veil, thy spirit deeply anchored, thou walkest calm above a world of strife. Within the veil, thy soul with him united shall live on earth the resurrection life. One of the common sayings of Mr. Spurgeon, the great preacher there, Mr. Spurgeon used to say, a little bit of faith will get you to heaven, you see the word says we are citizens of heaven. Paul says to the Philippians our conversation is in heaven. He's not talking about this conversation, he's not talking about something verbal, that word there is citizenship, our citizenship is in heaven. If you go to England, you find a lot of cities that end with Chester, Chichester and Manchester and Rochester, and I don't know how many others, Chester itself. And everywhere where a city, the name of the city ends with Chester means the Romans once had a colony there. Now the Romans were in England 55 years before Jesus Christ was born, 55 B.C. the Romans went to England. When they got there, they found almost semi-savages and what they did up, they set up colonies and they lived inside like the American ambassador to France or England, they don't keep the 4th of July, but they shut up the embassy and they get their turkey out and they have a swell do, they live as Americans on that day, maybe other days, but they separate every other, they separate their distinctive American holidays even in a strange land. Well that's exactly what we're supposed to do, you see if the world is going to pieces, if it's going to hell, if it's full of war, if all your circumstances are as chaotic as they can be, within the veil thy spirit deeply anchored thou walkest calm above a world of strife. Within the veil thy spirit deeply anchored Oh, let me put it straight here, within the veil thy spirit deeply anchored thou walkest calm above the world of strife within the veil thy soul with him united shall live on earth the resurrection life now one of the versions says she brought him a she brought him some ointment she stood at his feet look listen weeping washing wiping kissing that's extravagant love isn't it but love isn't love if it isn't extravagant if love doesn't break up your pattern of life well you're sure not in love if your love doesn't make you reach out to do things that previously you wouldn't do be sure you're not in love she wiped them with the hairs of her head and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment what happened well i'll tell you what happened the most amazing thing happened that jesus recognized the thing that she'd done he not only recognized it he received it he normally not only received it he rewarded it this is going to be a memorial now one of the virgins say she took a pound of ointment a pound just a little thing like this in a in a fancy jar that wasn't made on a machine somebody had to sculpt it out of the rock or something and they filled it with that ointment and it gives you the price of it 300 pence in those days people worked for a penny a day and surely she hadn't been fasting for a year she must have been saving for years she'd have to buy clothing she'd have to buy other things and yet she she saves up this vast amount of money you know in our system of living and she buys one pound of ointment well so what so what what does it matter do you care if it's a pound or five pounds well you may not but i do because you see she does this just before jesus was crucified is it was that some feminine instinct that she had just a week before jesus is crucified and you remember when he's crucified all his disciples had run away his mother's at the back of the crowd and i guess everybody there at that crucifixion was full of sorrow and full of anguish except this one one woman and i kind of think her face lit up and said well hallelujah bless the lord yeah i can see the nail through his feet i can see the blood running down and to think just a week ago i had those feet in my hands and i even kissed his feet and i took my hair which is a the word of god says a woman's glory is a hair she didn't care what depth of humiliation she was trying to not convince him so much as herself that she'd give it all she has and she looks and says well i'm glad i did it i remember standing at the door my heart was beating like this when i went in these guys may kick me out throw me out on my neck but i'm going to do it anyhow and she has an eternal memorial here in the word of god well again what's so important about that one pound oh i'll tell you i'll tell you what's important because a few days after when jesus was taken down from the cross and taken to the tomb you could see two men going up the hill like this staggering under a load on a on a branch of a tree and they had a big box and it had a hundred pounds of assignment in it people have estimated it that would be more than a million dollars worth in our present values and these two men are going up the hill they say hey what have you got in that box oh it's it's it's full of this fresh assignment you know the ointment they gave him when he was a babe they presented unto him gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh but he was too young to recognize it then and this man's put a million dollars to be a embalm jesus a but wait a minute jesus will never see it never smell it he's dead what's the best thing to give him what you have while you're living or leave it in your will people say well i'll tell you what my relatives aren't going to get my money and get drunk on it and buy automobiles and do this that never i'm reading it all to missions well i may be wrong here but i'm usually right and uh i i think i'm right here in saying this that if you leave 10 million dollars to missions god won't give you 10 cents for it at the judgment seat why not well the lord loveth what what uh-huh here's a man in a casket and uh he's a texan so he has a solid gold casket you know everything is done extravagantly down here you'll find out if you don't know already and they just say this is mr so-and-so he started as a poor boy down you know in houston somewhere and then he found some oil and he's he's piled his money and he's done this he's left 50 million dollars 40 millions are going to missions and just before you we put the lid down this gorgeous casket i want you all to fly around and see him and there he is lying you know but he left 40 millions to missions but the lord loveth what i mean uh you really think he looks cheerful he didn't give that money he'd still have it if he was living he surrendered to the pistol death came and took it from him he didn't give it so a smart american says do your giving while you're living then you're knowing where it's going it's not quite as good as shakespeare but it's not bad yeah the woman bought a gift while he was living the man bought his million dollar gift and jesus could not couldn't use it couldn't smell it couldn't see it couldn't value it meant nothing to him at all now there's another thing in uh i think matthew's version it says that it's jesus went into the house of simon what was it simon of what a leper yeah that's not sense how could he go into the house of a leper a leper wasn't allowed to live in the house the man one day goes to his wife and says well darling i've got to tell you this i hate to tell oh you've got leprosy have you used the towels don't want any children and he runs to the to the temple and he says to the priest i'm unclean unclean and he gets his name crossed off the register in the temple then he goes to the gate of the city where they have his name and they raise his name he's a leper and don't dare ever put your feet in this city again so jesus came into the house of simon a leper then how could he get in the house of a leper and then he went well i know have you been healed of his leprosy he'd come running back oh that's okay we won't have a funeral service for a bug all right what was i saying good i wonder if you've forgotten looking at the bug oh it goes to the house of simon a leper i think simon was on the roadside one day he saw jesus come he said have mercy on me have mercy on me i have a wife and children home i'm a leper i'm a leper i'm unclean and jesus spoke the word and simon goes back to the gate of the city the man says i know who you are you're simon don't you dare put your foot in this city why because you've got leprosy where your hands are all rotten he says oh you've got hands like a like a girl almost smooth beautiful oh you can come in the city now it runs to the temple a priest says don't come in here and defile it why because you're a leper oh i saw those hands full of leprosy well here they are now it says what beautiful hands oh yeah you can come back and wash it he goes home and he calls in the house maybe sarah or rebecca rebecca rebecca didn't say becca like we do it says rebecca she says oh jacob is that you don't come in the house why not you know why you're a leper he says okay darling just come and look through the lattice see see my hand beautiful hands isn't it wonderful how they got them without oil of their legs beautiful hands whatever happened to you oh that man jesus he came down the road and i said have mercy on me and here is a man who's brought back into society he's brought back into the temple he brought back into his home and he forgot to kiss jesus now before you throw a hymn book at him tell me did you kiss him today time and again you're reading the word of god when jesus appeared in their peru what happened they fell at his feet and they seized him by the feet maybe the greatest sin we commit we never call it sin is ingratitude we take it for granted i'm not the thief i used to be not a prostitute not on drugs but a clean fellow before long you you enjoy your own righteousness she wept and she worshipped i imagine that shannon said that now lord just just a minute don't judge me too harshly look you see this table look it's it's belly and it's so loaded with food and and it's loaded with everything do you know this cost me to put this banquet on did you ever try to get god to see things your way i have many times i think you're on a gym but i don't know no lord you just see it this way this i'll make it you know it's strange that there's no record here that jesus ever took a bite of food or drank any of the wine or anything there's no account that he did it i think it brought the party up you mean to say that the chief guest has been in that back room with that woman all this time and and all this fuss going on and i could hear somebody sobbing and there's a perfume that nearly bowed me over i mean what's going on they wanted jesus for the social advantage of it they wanted jesus maybe for some religious kick but lord you don't realize listen i'll be honest with you i've had i've had to borrow money to put this banquet up i didn't have enough money i've got a gold candelabra there look at this fruit this fruit's out of season i had to bribe somebody in her garden to get this and you know he goes on with this no wait a minute wait a minute what did jesus want he didn't want food he wanted fellowship he wanted worship you make a million dollars and give them commissions you won't make god rich we can't improve god's conditions we can't improve his holiness we can't improve his majesty the only thing he requires of us really is that we worship him but again you see as i said last week we have taught in the average church we've been taught to work for god we've talked to witness but we've not been taught to worship worship is speechless adoration which this woman had i can see her there she's washed his feet wiped them with the hair of her head and she looks up into his face and she's transfixed with the face of the son of god oh jesus jesus didn't want food now then that's all he had no problem with food you know the devil is pretty smart but he'll never tempt you to do what you can't do you never say you jump up and catch an airplane that's going over you miss the dallas or jump up you can't do ridiculous things and he's tempted to do what you can do but you can never do the wrong thing at the right time though you can do the right thing at the wrong time do you remember jesus was tempted satan says look look this is what you do you take some of those rocks put them all on the floor there and uh come in with these stones we made bread and jesus said no so he didn't turn the stones into bread but i think he did now the bible says he didn't well i still think he did why not on that occasion do you remember that resurrection morning when he said uh come and dine the greek he says he said lads lads hey lads come on come and dine do you remember a song that says jesus had a table spread where the saints of god are fed he invites his chosen people come and dine with his manner he does feed and supply their every need oh it's sweet to suffer with jesus all the time the chorus says come and dine the master calleth come and dine and he says come on lads dine that was some breakfast and the hymn goes on to say there they met their hearts desire bread and fish upon the higher that was the greatest breakfast ever cooked remember jesus said one day peter you've got some money to pay yeah we don't have any money he says there's a fish just going past grab hold of it and on the back of the there's a finger mark and there's a thumb at the back right here and people superstitiously say that's the finger mark of peter and and the thumb the thumb mark and peter it's still on the face just as like if you look at the donkey it has a black stripe down its back and black stripe over its legs and down the other side it has a it has a cross every donkey has a cross on its back they say traditionally the the the robin was like a sparrow but it was there at the cross pecking around it got blood well these are superstitious things or at least they're interesting things maybe no value in them at all but i'm quite sure jesus didn't say well i have to be up early in the morning i'm making breakfast for the boys i think he just went and stood because he had dominion that was what adam was supposed to do that's what we're supposed to do in the church of god have dominion over all the power of the enemy i think he just went and spoke to the fish and it came up and he picked it up like that and he filleted and then he he cooked it then i think he took some of those nice round pebbles you see on the beach you normally put them outside on the ground like that and he said become bread and they became bread and the devil looks and he says i'll do it when i want to do it not when you want me to do it that's what he called victory it you see you don't fall for every snare of the devil you don't do things because somebody else does them but again the astounding thing is this that this lord the lord jesus just one woman as far as we know ministered to him on the way to the cross she took a choice's gift she didn't say a word but she satisfied the heart of jesus christ and the question with all of us whether you're as old as me or as young as some of you the question at the end of every day is not how much i've served god now how many doors i've not done how much how much work i've done how much of my worship or do i worship can i get along with for periods and say lord i've not come to ask anything of you i love when we sing on friday nights we're using it so much all come let us adore him christ the lord that's what worship is worship is adoration and meditation on his majesty and concentration cloud clouding out of crowding out every other thing and contemplation because that's all we're going to do in eternity so shouldn't we practice now the angels the holy being cease not to say by day or night holy holy holy is the lord of hosts let's be quite sure we don't disappoint christ but he doesn't say at the end of the day well you've done a lot you never touch me you know i used to think that all my my values were set very much as an evangelist and how many people came to the altar at night i've seen them come some nights two or three hundred when they've been in big meetings you know i believe you could win a hundred people a day or a hundred people every hour on there and still leave jesus christ unsatisfied he didn't say first of all go and win men he didn't say go into all the world and preach the gospel he said the supreme thing in life is this i shall love the lord my god with all my heart and soul and mind and strength and love what does it do it risks there's a big risk for the woman to crowd into their house she wasn't on the list she was a female she was a bad woman she had everything against her but she said i don't care i've just built up a love relationship there's something in my heart i'm going to spill this at his feet if they kick me to death and i'm taking all my life savings and i'll humiliate myself to the nth degree whatever other people say you know usually people say something to fall in love anyhow let's not disappoint him let's see first of all we love you with all our heart and soul and mind and strength after all and i finish with this if a man who had leprosy was so grateful that he brought him to his house in the first place and then so forgetful that he didn't give him the common courtesy of life what should you and i do because leprosy in the word of god is perpetually a type of sin and that leprosy would have eaten that man up i went once in a leper colony it's the most horrid thing i've ever seen in my life i think people who had no only half nickels all yellow with puss dripping puss people who had their whole cheek eating out just a string holding an eyeball and you could see down their throat whether where the tongue was joining in their throat smell like a manure heap some were blind somebody uh just a half leg all green with gangrene it's one of the most hideous things i've seen in my life can you imagine if somebody went in there and had the power to command deliverance for them and healing for them i think they'd sing the hallelujah chorus whether they knew it or not they'd sing it for a week you wouldn't be able to stop them i've got a new leg i've got a new arm i've got a new eye i've got a oh i can breathe i don't smell anymore well if they do that for physical healing and some of us have had some great healings how much more should we do for the one who loved us the great hymn my faith looks up to thee was written in boston i preached in that famous church in boston coming and the tune was written by the uh organist in that church my faith looks up to thee the second stanza says may thy rich grace impart strength to my fainting heart my zeal inspire as thou hast died for me all may my love to thee pure warm and changeless be a living fire that's one of my favorite verses all may my love to thee not be erotic not one day i'll die for you next day lord won't somebody help my feeling i love as constant as the love of god i love like john wesley writes about when he says love divine all love excelling i love like it's spoken of in the what in the uh book of prophets i think but it says that love the divine love of god is a fire it consumes it's not something trailing behind in my life it's something that's total control of my life and and sacrifice i i don't think there's a guy anybody's in love if they talk about sacrifice because love doesn't have sacrifice in its vocabulary it's joyful it it thrillingly gives the most expensive costly thing that it has and you and i only have one thing to give that's our lives love so amazing so divine demands people often change that and saying shall have i don't like that it still demands it whether you say shall have or not love so amazing so divine demands my soul my life my all don't go to bed any night feeling that the lord is saying to you thou gave us me no water thou gave us me no oil thou gave us me no kiss father we thank you for your word tonight we would call upon your blessed feet the warmth the affection the fragrance of our hearts hearts are the clean now whereas we were unclean but clean because of your blood we bless you for your great love gift to us we if we had a thousand tongues we couldn't sing your praise we've had a thousand lives we we'd like to give them all if i had a thousand minds we think of you we don't have them but we pay what we have we won't hold it back but we'll give it as a living sacrifice that our lives may be poured out for me as your love and life are poured out for us and we give you praise in jesus name we really hope that this teaching has ministered to you and in some way drawn you closer to our lord jesus be sure to write if we can be of any help or provide you with any additional ministry tools