Leonard Ravenhill emphasizes the profound value of worship through the story of a sinful woman who anoints Jesus' feet with expensive ointment and her tears, contrasting her genuine devotion with the indifference of the Pharisee Simon. He illustrates that true worship comes from a heart that recognizes the depth of one's sin and the magnitude of God's grace, highlighting that those who have been forgiven much will love much. Ravenhill challenges the congregation to reflect on their own worship practices and the sincerity of their devotion to Christ, urging them to offer their best to Him rather than mere rituals.

I want to read from the Gospel of Luke. Luke recorded it in the 7th chapter from verse 36. Luke in the 7th chapter, 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 eat. And behold, a woman of the city, she was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster box of ointments, and stood at his feet behind him, weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears. And he wiped them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointments. Now when one of the Pharisees, which had been himself, he spake within himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is, that toucheth him, for she is a sinner. And Jesus answering, said unto him, Simon, I have some what 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, and the other 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 and said, I suppose, that he to whom he forgave most. And he said unto him, Thou hast rightly judged. And he turned to the woman and said to Simon, Seeest thou this woman? I entered into thine house, thou gavest me no water for my feet, but this woman hath washed my feet with tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head. Thou gavest me no kiss, but this woman, since the time I came in, hath not ceased to kiss my feet. My head with oiled art is not anointed, but this woman hath anointed my feet with ointment. Wherefore I stand to thee, her sins which are many are forgiven, for she loved much, but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little. This story is told in a variety of ways. Each of the evangelists, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, at least four of them have something to say about it. In my judgment, the story is profoundly simple, and it's simply profound. It's difficult to step out of a jet age, fuel shortage and other things, to go back in our minds 2,000 years and try to get the atmosphere in which this thing occurred. After all, Jesus was a great sensation of the day. He was something entirely new. He did everything that the prophet Isaiah said would do when he would come. The eyes of the blind shall be opened, the ears of the deaf unstopped. And it was a constant pageant of miracle and triumph. And this man managed to get Jesus to come to his house. Now that would be really something. It would be the social event of the season. And as soon as people knew about it, I guess they were trying to sell tickets, you know, scalp them if they could have got them, and say, boy, I'd like to get in. Could you find room? No, I'm sorry. Space is very limited. I'm sure the first thing he did after this fact had been made known to him that Jesus was coming, he'd be very careful about the food, I'm quite sure. If you had the President of the United States coming to lunch today, you wouldn't give him potato chips and hamburgers, or would you right now? But normally you wouldn't. You'd spread a table and you'd load it and say, my, the pageant's coming. And folks would be peeping from behind the windows, they're standing to wait to see him come. And this must have been the same, that this man had problems. He'd been in a limited area that he could feed the people in, and I can see him taking a list and erasing somebody's name, waking up in the night and saying, well, let's see, I've got this famous socialite, I've got the mayor of the town, the millionaires, the manufacturers, all the marvelous people, all the nice people. Now, I can do without him. And then he said, look, it can't get any more end. He settled for the right folk. He settled for the right food. I'm sure he had nice flowers. He settled for the right flowers, you know, to create a kind of aesthetic atmosphere. And if I know the man at all, I'm sure that he said to himself, this is going to do something. This is going to be the day of my exaltation. Already people are talking, how did he manage to get in there? Why can't I come in? This is going to be the day of my exaltation. It became the day of his humiliation. This is going to be a day I shall never want to forget in my life. And it became a day that he never wanted to remember. You know, like one of those days you had, when it looked as though you planned everything to go wrong. You know, from the moment you got up till you went to bed, this went wrong and something else went wrong, and oh boy, you were in a mess before the end of the day. And boy, I never want to remember that day again. And it happened like that, I'm sure, in the life of this man. People are going to leave this banquet talking about his liberality and they talk about his stupidity. Isn't it amazing, isn't it really staggering when you think of it, that we don't know one of the people that went to the banquet, all we know is the woman who wasn't on the list, she shouldn't have gone there, she was a gate-crasher. Isn't it amazing that nobody else but the guests, except the women, shouldn't have been there at all? They were so busy looking at each other, they were so concerned about what they were all doing to right, and boy, I hope they don't eat all that stuff, that greedy fellow is taking too lots, and I hope he leaves some for me, you know, like you do. And there was a lot of agitation, and now it's staggering to me that I don't know who went to the banquet, except the woman that shouldn't have been there. I don't know of anybody that took a gift, except the woman who wasn't listed. And I'm quite sure she went with one supreme objective to this banquet, not to be seen, she went to take him a gift. What did you bring him this morning, apart from a dollar for the offering, or fifty cents? Because he won't get that. There's no way of shooting it up there, you can put men on the moon, but you can't put dollars in heaven. I get a bit nervous about some of you going, I'm not too sure you won't dig the streets up when you get there, because of solid gold, that he doesn't get the money anyhow. What can you render to him? And this to me is a story of a complaining Christ. Simon, wait a minute. I entered into thine house, thou gavest me no water for my feet, thou gavest me no care, thou gavest me no oil for my, but master, look at the table, it's groaning and stuff. Yeah, but Jesus didn't need that, after all, the dog isn't a fool. He won't tempt you to fly from here to New York, because you can't flip your wings and go. That's why he wants another level. He wouldn't have said to Jesus, turn these stones into bread, if he couldn't have done it. He just didn't want the bang for it, didn't need it. Well, he didn't turn stones into bread, are you sure? That's what I think he did. Oh, not then, but do you remember that resurrection morning, when he said, come on, boys. I think the Greek really says, come on, lads. And the old song says, there they met their heart's desire, bread and fish upon the fire. Do you think he went fishing that morning? Do you think he knocked the baker up before daylight, and said, hurry and get me some fresh baked things, I have to meet my disciples. Now you won't find it in any book, that's why I came to tell you. You won't find it in any commentary that passed out on his shelf. But I think that Jesus one day took some of those nice pebbles from the beach and set them in the row and said, become bread. And they became bread. And he said to the devil, very Lord, I'll do it when I want, not when you want. You see, the thing to do is to know when to use power. If you have power, you can use power in a wrong way, use it to a selfish end. And he wouldn't do it when Satan wanted him to do it, but he would do it when he wanted to do it. Now, this man has got everybody there. None of them have come yet, they're still coming. And he meets them at the door with the usual custom, you know, pomp and circumstance, the room has been freshly sprayed, and the flowers are there, and the table's growing, and the cantaloupe is there. It's a majestic outfit. And one of his servants says, Master, hurry, hurry, there's a tarot coming down the road. And he goes, there's a pair of snorting horses and a pair of Nubian slaves, maybe fanning the brass. And when the man gets out of his tarot, he's greeted in the customary way. He's kissed on either cheek. He's taken to have his feet washed. They've worn more holes. And he's anointed according to custom. And another comes, and another comes, and another comes, and once another... The servant says, You know that certain woman in town? Yes, and if she comes, turn the dogs on her. If she gets in this place, it's going to be a letdown, isn't it? Master, she's already here. I don't see her sitting... No, no, she's in the kitchen there. Get her out of here before... Before what? Before that miracle-working creature comes. She's already in here. Now, I can't prove this again, but according to the character of Jesus, I think he slipped in at the servant's door. After all, that's how he came into the world. When Hemrida says, A servant's form he wore, and in his body wore a dreadful curse on Calvary. He, like a victim, stood and poured his sacred blood to set this guilty captive free. You see, he came in the world through the back door. He came through the world, into the world through the womb of a young woman that wasn't married. And the liberals smear him with that today. Some say he was fathered by a German soldier. The Germans were in that part of the world, history says, at that time. And they've all kinds of dirty ways of suggesting Jesus came into the world, which, of course, are not true. But he came in a servant's body. He didn't come riding down the skies. He didn't come riding down the skies in a chariot like the one Elijah went up in. He came into the world without any ostentation, without any showmanship. And the poor man stands there and says, Boy, I've messed this up. He can't be a prophet. If he were a prophet, he'd know what kind of a woman she is. She's a sinner. And the whole city knows it. Jesus says, Simon, come here a minute. I have something to say. There was a certain man, a money lender, he had two debtors, one owed him 500 pence, the other owed him 50. And the man said one day, Oh, I'm feeling, I don't need the money, really. Get your 50 dollars to get it, your 500 pence. Which would love him most? Well, logically, the man who had the biggest debt hanging around his neck. Well, then he said, You see, it's exactly like that. You see, some of us come to church out of formality. You feel bad if you didn't do it. And you can't remember the time you kissed Jesus by his feet. It's a ceremony. It's a ritual. It's part of the pattern of life. And when we get excited about the redemptive work of Jesus, you say, Boy, it leaves me cold. Sure, it leaves you cold. You're dead. Did you ever find anybody warm who was dead? If you're dead in the desert, which you didn't see, the gospel goes clean over your head. You say, I'd like to hear the choir singing But I don't know why people get stirred. Well, Jesus gives you the answer. If you love, if you've been saved from little, you'll love little. If you say, like the psalmist, He brought me out of the horrible pit, you'll get excited about the gospel. One day a team challenged, it was my turn to go in the chapel, and this slide was lined up with some of the most beautiful girls you'd ever seen, and face and figure and everything else. And every one of them was a prostitute. Every one of them had been in jail, almost every one. And they were drug addicts. And some of them had degrees, and they were some of the most beautiful women you could find. Beside criminals. My dear darling, I said to me one day, You know that fellow? Then thing is then, he's a nice fellow. Why don't you ask him his background? One day I said to him, Hey, how are you? You've always such a pleasant smile. You're always such a gracious man. Even when you're handing out the little meals that we have there. What's your background? And without batting an eye, he said, I carried a 38 when I was 8 years of age. I shot a man. I killed a man when I was 12. I've been in so many murders and double murders, I can't remember them. I've just done 10 years in the same thing. But Jesus saved me. And we sat in, stood in church that morning, and they said, before Brother Abner speaks, let's sing that good old National Anthem. Amazing Grace. And you know, before they were through that first stanza, those girls' blouses were wet with tears, and those boys were pushing the tears away. And they sang the last verse. We usually strike that up again, when we've been there 10 billion years, quite shining as the sun. It sounds good. But you see, some of us don't know much about a lousy life like that. And at the end, a little Puerto Rican fellow with a smile said, you know, I came in here, and I didn't have to chew the end of my pillow and call on the saints and go through cold turkey. I just knelt there and said something like this. I don't know who you are, Jesus, to say you're up in the sky, but I want to tell you I'm the lousiest man that ever came. And I'm so messed up, and if you can put me together and clean me up and do anything, do it! And he said as quick as that. 14 years of drug addiction snapped out of me. I didn't have to do cold turkey. I was emancipated. I was liberated immediately. And they didn't sing when we'd been there. They went back to the beginning, amazing grace. How sweet the sound that saves a wretch. Because you were never a wretch, were you? We don't like those words. You're a wretch, me. I went to the doctor. I mean, I'm well bred, you know. You went on your daddy's door, you're well bred. So you feel a bit superior perhaps, eh? No, you see, I went to another church. Don't mention it, it was a Baptist church. And before I sang, for some reason, they decided to sing amazing grace. There was a little blonde doll down here. She was very attractive. It all went down with singing every night, but she was quite attractive. I think she had a wig, which always helped. And she looked there as they sang amazing grace. And I looked at her. You know how she sang it? She sang it something like this. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saves a wretch like me. I once was lost. And she was so worried about amazing grace and that little curl that kept going out. But I don't know how much stuff she put on it. But it was still out when she struggled with it. But you see, amazing grace didn't mean much to her. She wasn't a wretch. You know that hymn that we've sung so often? Did he devote that sacred head for such a worm as I? Your new book, I think, from Broadman Press wouldn't do that, eh? Did he devote that sacred head for such a worm as I? A worm like me? What, a worm in double-knit alligator shoes? A worm in a $300 dress? A worm with all I have on you? You never saw a worm glitter like I do. A worm like, oh, he was a worm and no man, it says in the 22nd Psalm. I am a worm and no man. That's his anguish on the cross. But you see, this woman knew she'd be liberated from much and he loved it much. Love so amazing, so divine that he saved me. Makes a world of difference when it becomes experimental and it happened in me. Until then, it's theology. Until then, it's something you read in a book. You see, this woman made up her mind she was going to get to Jesus somehow. Now, she had no reason to go. She had no right to go. This story is unprecedented, but not unpremeditated. I think if you'd seen her outside of the door before she went in, you'd have thought she'd got something under her dress. Her heart was just shaking like this. Should I really go in? And after all, I don't have very much to take. And then she decides that she'll do it. And she goes in amidst all the splendor and all the socialites and she runs up to him and she made up her mind she wasn't worthy. Do you know why? Because she didn't even kneel in front of him, she knelt behind him. She didn't even kiss his head, she kissed his feet. She didn't even wash his feet with water, she washed his feet with tears. She didn't dry his feet with a beautiful towel, she let those long tresses down and washed his feet with the hair of her hand. You see, three times this costly gift was given to Jesus. Once when he was a little baby and he couldn't recognize it. And it's essential if you read the four accounts to put them all together because she brought a box of ointment a pound. Do you care whether it was a pound or five pounds? Oh yes, oh yes. You see, maybe this girl, Mary, is the sister of Lazarus. But when Lazarus died, she didn't love him enough to endow him with it. I guess that's about average for sisters anyhow. She wasn't going to put all her costly gifts on her dead, she saved it for what? For her own funeral. Isn't it a shame that all that big funeral you planned you won't be there to enjoy it? You know, it's really miserable, isn't it? I mean, when you think of all the folk that have lied about you and snared at you and criticized you, oh, you'll be a hero that day. Oh, they'll drag up every good thing you can ever remember. One day you gave the baby a packet of gum, and this day you did, oh, they'll remember all your saintly acts. And let me see. She comes and she brings a gift, a pound. And one of the disciples says angrily, why wasn't it sold and given to the poor? Not that he cared for the poor, but he was very mercenary. And he was worth 300 pence, and people worked the whole day for a penny, and they didn't work every day in the week. And they had many long festivals. And maybe it took 10 years of labor for her to pay her way and save up money for this precious ointment. But she took it to Jesus. Now, when it was first bought, they presented gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, and Jesus was too young to understand. Did you ever wonder why they took those costly gifts to Jesus? I can give you an answer, my answer anyhow. You see, Jesus was going out of the country where he lived. His people had to flee because they wanted to put him to death. And the only way to pay his expenses in a motel, it was a long journey. You look on the map. From where he was born in Bethlehem, right down there down the country into Egypt and back, how would they pay their way? By selling the gold and the frankincense and the myrrh, I'm sure. So it was brought to him when he was a babe, unconscious. It was brought to him as a young man, and it was brought to him later. You could have seen somebody climbing up the hill, a couple of men carrying a thing like this, and you say, what in the world, what have we got? We've got a million dollars worth of stuff here. What do you mean? Doesn't it say Nicodemus went carrying a, a what? A load of a hundred pounds of his precious ointment. But that was no good either. It was no good in one sense when Jesus was a child, he didn't understand that. It's no good bringing an expensive gift to Jesus when he's dead. It was too late. Some of us are going to do a lot for the Lord when we die, aren't we? Oh, I've got my will all made out, you know. I know where my money's going when I die. Do you? Yeah, I, I, I've got a million to, uh, to baptize foreign nations, and I've got some what? If you leave ten million dollars to the kingdom of God when you die, God won't give you ten cents for it when you get to heaven. Well, that's a bad investment. Well, how do you know? Well, let's say here's a casket, and we've got a multimillionaire here, and, uh, he's dead. We've said all the nice things about him. He bought stained glass windows for the church, the new organ, and he, he put new asphalt and other things around the church. He's been very generous to the church. And not only that, but he's left five million dollars to mission. Isn't that great? Now, just before we close the lid, I want you all to get up and have a look at him. Because this good old book of mine says, The Lord loveth a what? A what? Does he look very cheerful? He's given five million dollars to missions. I don't see him smiling about it. He just looks about as stiff and cold as he could if he'd left five cents. He didn't give it. If he was living, he'd still have it. Death. They've surrendered everything you've got. Your breath, and your bank account, and everything. This woman came, an old strong American says, you know, do your giving while you're living, then you're knowing where it's going. It's not as good as Shakespeare, but it's pretty good anyhow. Do your giving while you're living, then you're knowing where it's going. The woman brought an alabaster box of ointment, and she knelt behind him, and she washed his feet, not with water, you see. She goes a second mile. She gives the best things. She doesn't give the cheapest things. She gives the most expensive. You know, a week after this, Jesus was nailed to a cross, and everybody stood there weeping, and everybody was embarrassed and ashamed that he hadn't finished up better than that. People thought he was bringing in the kingdom. I think there was one woman in the crowd that smiled and said, I'm glad I did it when I could. I know I was scared stiff to do it, but I'm glad I did it. Those feet running with blood, I had them in my hands, and I washed them, not with water, but in my tears. Now, I don't know if he got it there, but sometimes I wonder if Charles Wesley got it in there when he said, oh, let me kiss thy bleeding feet, and bathe and wash them with my tears. When did you last take Jesus? Oh, I don't mean you gave ten dollars. I don't mean you made a pie for Jud. Everybody made pies for this man. There's no evidence that Jesus ever took a bite of food or drank a thing at this banquet. It was all in vain. He didn't need it then. He needed his, their love and their devotion and their, because he was within sight of the cross. And nobody understood, but the woman that they saw didn't understand. She didn't wash his feet with water, she said, not those feet. But she washed them with tears. She didn't wipe them with a nice towel, she wiped his feet with the long hair of her head. She didn't anoint his feet with oil, that was the cheap way. She anointed his feet with the most costly thing, precious oil, precious ointment. And the critics looked down and said, what in the world is she doing? And Jesus said, listen, you don't understand, but she does. She has anointed me unto my burial. Again I say, I don't know anybody else. You see, I know she went there to worship him, do you know why? There's no evidence she ever spoke to him. Nobody else bought a gift. Maybe if you could really spiritually analyze this with a kind of x-ray this morning, maybe that only two people have really worshipped Jesus Christ since they came in the sanctuary this morning. Everybody else came in just because it's Sunday. Did you say, when all thy mercies, oh my God, my rising soul pervades, transported within you, have you really been stirred to the depths of your spirit that you've got through another week on these busy highways you weren't mashed up and you've had grace every day to resist temptation and you've been able to worship him in truth? As I said the other day, this is the rarest thing that we're taught. Men tell me I've been through Bible school and seminary. A brilliant pastor of the First Baptist Church in a great town down there in Florida told my wife and I not too long ago, he said, I went to Bible school and seminary. I never heard the word worship and I had never talked to worship. I reminded you of Dr. Tozer saying he could lay on his belly as he used the word in his office, take the phone off, tell his secretary to go home. I can't dictate this today. I can't interview anybody. I've got the spirit of worship and he said, Len, I can lay on that rug for four and five hours without saying a word of prayer and without saying a word of praise. I just worship him. There's a lovely hen, praise my soul, the king of heaven and the fellow runs out of expression. He says, angels, help us to adore him. Ye behold him face to face. Seven moons bow down before him. You know that's all we're going to do. We're not going to get cocked up in heaven. There'll be no sobering in heaven. There'll be no preaching in heaven and no healing in heaven. All I know about most holy beings is that they go around in his presence and they cry, holy, holy, holy, Lord God almighty. Dr. Sangster Westminster used to say he tried to go to a different country each year. You know, in England we can jump across the ditch there, the English Channel, it'll be pre-war days when the countries were open. You go to Austria this year, Bulgaria another, Latvia another, and it was very cheap. You know, in my day when I was a youngster you could go from England to Palestine and back on a cruise ship for $30. That was some good going. You couldn't get it anymore but those were the days. And Dr. Sangster said that if I decide to go to Rome next year, I get a book on Rome. And for a whole year, somewhere during the day I'll open that book and read a part of Rome and I say yes, now I know that. That's one street, this is the other, there's a certain monument, here's something else. And he said I plan it and I think about it and I live in it before I get there. So he said if I do that in the natural sphere, shouldn't I do that in the spiritual sphere? It's going to be pretty embarrassing to get to heaven and have to learn our ABCs in worship, isn't it? You see, we're activists. We like to run here and do that and go home exhausted. I'm tired, but I've done it enough. Look. You could preach a sermon, bring a thousand people to the altar, I believe, and Jesus Christ say thou gavest me no king. What did you enjoy most? You enjoyed your own ministry. You enjoyed your activity. You enjoyed ministering to others, but you still ministered to others before you ministered to him. Thou gavest me no water, thou gavest me no oil, thou gavest me no tears. But Lord, look at it from my angle. Have you ever tried to get the Lord to look at, I've tried to get the Lord to look at things from my angle and he turned me down for 50 years. So I quit. I've always received things from his angle. Sometimes we try and say Lord, you know, you know, I sacrificed so much. Oh, come on. You never sacrificed. You would have been in hell fire this morning, but for the mercy. What can you give God? He hangs the stars there. He put every seed of gold up in the hills there and every deposit of silver. He owns the world and all that's in it. What can you do? Jesus said, my father seeketh such to what? To worship him in spirit and in truth. And again in the very beauty of holiness. The stories are very interesting when you put them all together. You see this story is told in the 26th chapter of Matthew again and to her it would think, there's just a little illuminating word. It's not very different by the count except it says he went into the house of Simon. Well, doesn't it say that? Yes, it does. But it says something else. He went into the house of Simon, a leper. Now, what was a leper doing in the house? He had no right to be in the house legally, no right to be in the house socially, no right to be in the house spiritually. What was Simon doing in the house? Because there came a day when he said to his wife, I have to tell you, I don't want to tell you, but look at, oh, you've got leprosy. How long have you had it? The children are using the towels you're using. Well, you'll have to go tell the priest and he goes to the sanctuary and the priest says you're unclean. And he goes to the gates of the city and they strike his name off the register. He's not allowed to socially mix with anybody. To go on the highway and ring a little bell and cry unclean, unclean. But he's home. And Jesus went into the house of Simon, a leper. Right. There's only one answer as far as I'm concerned and that is that Jesus cleansed him one day. There's no other healing for leprosy. And isn't it amazing the man that Jesus cleansed of leprosy is the man who forgot to kiss him? But before you pour your hymn book out and tell me this, did you kiss him this week? Did you kiss him this morning? Did you fall down in your spirit and worship him and adore him and magnify him? This man comes running back. Get out of here. You can't commit this to me. Why not? Because you're a leper. We have you listed here. Oh, my wife wishes she had hands like this. You've got hands like a newborn baby. How? How did it happen? The man called Jesus cleansing. Oh, you'll have to put your name back on the list. Here's your name, Simon. There you are. Go in the city. He goes to the sanctuary and the priest says, don't come in here. You'll be fired. Why? Because you're a leper. You're a leper. Show me your hands. How come? That healer man, Jesus, did it. He goes home. His wife's busy in the kitchen thinking, how am I going to make things go? It's getting worse and worse. What are you doing here? Please, darling, I love you. Look, get out. Don't touch the children. You'll contaminate them. Why? Well, you know why. You're a leper. Hey, sweetheart, look at this. What happened? Jesus did it. And it's this man that's throwing the banquet, throwing the party. And he kissed everybody else that came in and so they got their feet washed and anointed. But he slipped up on Jesus. You know, some of us do more for the pastor than we do for Jesus. Some of us do more for the church than we do for Jesus, certainly. When do we bring him our costliest gifts, our greatest offering? Simon, I entered into thine house. Thou gavest me no water. Thou gavest me no... But this woman, man, she not only kissed me, she won't quit. She didn't kneel in front. She knelt behind with a broken neck, getting her head round. But she kissed those feet, anointed those feet, dried those feet. And as I say afterwards, I'm sure she looked there on that marvelous day and said, I'm glad I did it. It was an awful risk, I guess, but I'm glad I took his feet. And I have them in my hands and I washed them with my tears and I dried them with the hair of my head. I have no regrets about it now. And you know, if you do a thing like this, for one thing, you sure do get criticized pretty mercilessly. Before I pass it up, there's another lovely thing in this story. Do you know what she did? One account puts it very clearly that she took that spikenard. It had two things about it. One, it was very precious and it was very rare. Three, second, and thirdly, it was tremendously pungent. As soon as she opened it, the whole house was filled with the fragrance. And Jesus says, do you know what? That fragrance will never die till I come again. Whatever this story is told, the fragrance of it will will fill the house. But wait a minute. You say, yes, I'm not very lovely. I'm not very spiritually attractive. I'm not very smooth in my spirit. I'm not very lovable. I'm not very tender. I'm not very loving really. And you sing wistfully, let the beauty of Jesus be seen in me. And that's fine. But do you see what she did? She took an alabaster box of ointments and she put it on his feet. And then she wiped his feet with the hair of her head. Well, then the fragrance that she poured out on him came back on her. I got in a bus in England, a typical English day, pouring with rain, and I was pretty wet. And as I got in the bus, didn't smell of tobacco, stinking old tobacco. Oh, I guess some lady dropped her perfume. And then one lady put her hand up like that to pay, because we have men walk up and down. They won't trust in England. They walk up and down the center of the bus, pick up your money, and they knock the double-decker, you know. And she put her hand up and she had a cuff with a striper. And I noticed people putting their hands up like this. Then I noticed the colors on the uniform under the coat. Oh, oh, oh, oh. Some of you buy your husband English leather. And it's made in that factory at the end of the road. It's a perfume factory. And you know, sometimes when your husband comes home, he says, ooh, you smell of tobacco. Yeah, I've been in a plane all day, you know, with my puff away on my comforters and got into your clothes, I smell. You know, those people live in the presence of perfume. They put it in bottles. They put it in soap and it gets into their clothes. And everywhere they go, when they got in the bus, the whole bus smelled as though somebody had been spraying it with rich perfume. Why? Because they lived in the presence. And as we said last night, those disciples, they took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus. And when she poured the fragrance out and wiped his feet with the hair of her head, that fragrance came out. Well, what's the secret? Hmm, what was her name? Frida, Frida Humbery Allen gave it to him years ago. I think she's talking about this very thing she said, within the veil. That's where the woman went. While the others were all fussing around and eating and gabbing and talking, she got on to his feet and worshipped him. And Frida Humbery Allen says, Within the veil be this beloved thy portrait, within the secret of thy Lord to dwell, beholding him until thy face is glory, thy life is love, thy lips his praise shall say. Within the veil, you see, it isn't what's stuffed in your head that makes you beautiful in Christ. He's got to slip right down here and be worked out. 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 unsullied grace. Within the veil, his fragrance poured upon thee. Without the veil, that fragrance shed abroad. Within the veil, his praise shall tune the music that sounds on earth, the praises of our God. Within the veil, thy spirit deeply anchored, thy walk as calm above a world of strife. Within the veil, thy soul, with him united, shall live on earth the resurrection life. You know people that you bump into and every time you see them they leave a fragrance with you. You know what it is, Mary, she's a wet blanket, she grumbles about this, knows what's wrong with her. And some people don't seem to know what's wrong with anybody. And every time you meet them there's a fragrance, there's a radiance, right? Because they've been in the veil and he poured his fragrance upon them. And when they come out, that fragrance is shed abroad. I determine you're as spiritual as you want to be. It's not your mother or your husband or the devil or your mother-in-law. You're as spiritual as you want to be this morning. You have all the resources of any saint that ever lived from the day of Jesus Christ. You have the whole Word of God, you have the Holy Spirit, you have available everything that will make you a spiritual millionaire. Or to keep to a figure, you have everything that will make you spiritually beautiful. I don't understand how a man who had been a leper could be cleansed and then get lost in so much social activity that when Jesus, he was in the very presence of Jesus and he forgot to give him something. There's no evidence he gave Jesus anything. There's no evidence anybody else gave Jesus anything. But this woman brought the treasure of life and said it's the only chance I ever had. You know, only one life will soon be passed. I better do it now while I can. Briefly, there's one story more about a thing in the Bible to me than this. That the man who was saved and healed from his leprosy and forgot to worship. And that's the story of the most amazing woman in the world. For how many million across the bridge of time, I wouldn't know, but one woman was chosen to bear the Son of God. And it's right to call her the Blessed Virgin, the Scripture says there. And when the little fella grew up, they decided to go to a big conference. Conferences are great, aren't they? We talk about everybody but Jesus. You get rid of the preachers, they don't talk about Jesus. They talk about Hank Aaron, he's in the home run, or football, as you think so. They don't talk about Jesus. I've been to so many ministers' conferences, I don't want to take this. If I don't go to any more, as long as I live, I won't worry. They talk gently to me. And these people went up to Jerusalem, it was a custom. We sing sometimes, they march into bed. That's exactly what they did, they marched into bed. And they sang songs to about 145 women. And the women went in front and they sang a verse, and the men behind sang a... The men went behind, why? So they could watch the... Thieves and brigands didn't come from the hill, and grab the women and grab their treasures. And you know, the nearer they got to the city, like little streams coming down, and joining a big stream, and joining a river, the people got until there was a multitude, and they really exalted God. They sang the great hallelujah, like the hallelujah chorus, and they marched into Zion of Judah. And then the feast was over, and they came home. And it got to the end of the first day, and would you please remember, there was no blacktop roads, and no Howard Johnsons, and no Hollywood, and no hot dog stands, and nobody selling pop. All they did was go down a dusty road, and if you were at the back of the crowd, all they did was spit out their... Could you think of a million and a half people trying to get out of a city with dirty roads?