Days of the Alabaster Jar

Good morning. It's good to be here today. It's a privilege to be here today.

I was pastor at Eastern Heights, and I was recalling with your pastor just the other day as we went out to eat and came back that back in those days, back in the 90s, latter part of the 90s, it was Eastern Heights and Highland Park and Bartlesville Southern, and we were all vying to be the second Baptist church in town.

And we were, Mike McBride and Paul Rummage and I would get together every once in a while just comparing notes. What you doing? Well, I don't know. What you doing? How many did you have Sunday? I don't know.

And so, you know, it was a big, it was a healthy competition to say the least, but anyway, I'm glad to be back in Bartlesville for a couple of years and have been to Missouri on my way to South Carolina and then came back.

Kind of a weird, I've got a story about how I got back here, but anyway, I'll tell it to you some other time. I know that you're thinking, how long is this guy going to preach or how long is this guy going to speak? Well, I just talked to Danny a while ago and I asked her, when did, you know, when do you all usually get out?

And she said, oh, 115, 130. So we're good. If I get out that late, you can blame her. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. No, that's not my first rodeo. I know what happens around this kind of stuff.

What did you say? Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. Shut up, Willard. Okay. You know, Willard is my nemesis and he has been. We were, we were golfing buddies back in the day. We haven't been to golfing. We need to do that again. But anyway, he constantly, but he signs my paycheck. So, you know, I have to have to tolerate him. You know how that goes.

Anyway, it is good to be with you. And I, I've really enjoyed being here in Bartlesville these, these couple of years. And God has really laid some things on my heart as I began to look at our area and how I'm your missionary.

It used to be called an associational missionary. Then they called it director of missions, which is my official title now, but now they've changed it to missional strategy, associational missional strategist.

I don't know. Anyway, I'm not that, but anyway, director of missions, you can call it whatever you want to call it. What, what I do, people wonder, what do I do? What, what does a director of missions do? I say, I don't have a foggy study. No, no, I use, here's, here's what I do. I help our churches and our pastors come together to reach an area.

First and foremost, the area of No Water, Washington and Osage County. And by the way, we don't know how to change the name to include No Water. We don't know why all snow or why no us or anyway, it sounds, sound real like an Indian name.

But anyway, here's the thing. We've got it. We've got a schedule and we've got to, to look at, and we've got to coordinate different things to reach the three counties that we are assigned to.

We are not the Washington, Osage, um, association of the international mission board. That's, that's not what we're doing. We do do international things. In fact, I've been with Dan and Mike to Latvia.

You're going to have the pastor the last Sunday here by, uh, Skype, I understand. Uh, but the Edgars is going to be with you and I'm going back again in a, in a couple months, uh, to Latvia.

Now, however, that's not my job. My job is to expose our pastors to that so that they can have a partnership with the church in Latvia, which is what you're doing. And so I took both of your, uh, your guys over there and showed them, Hey, this is something you could do. And they said, Hey, what do we do?

And we got, got together with brother Edgars and, and there's a, there's a great partnership beginning to form there. We have, we have all the churches that have been, have, have formed a partnership, but that's not, that's not my focus.

My focus is to focus you as a church and the other 37 churches. There are 38 churches in our association. The smallest one has a regular attendance of four.

Whippoorwill. And the large one has around an average attendance of about 650, which is first Baptist church of, of Bartlesville. And you're in there somewhere, but we're, we're here to, I'm here to bring those 38 churches together. By the way, you might not know that the only organization that the church is a member of is the association.

You're not a member of the state convention. You're not a member of the SBC. You are aligned with those two entities. So we have a local, we have a state and we have a national, uh, group that comes together.

You're aligned with the other, the other two, but you're a member of the association, which means that you have a level of commitment that you don't have to the other two. Your level of commitment to the association is to come be a member, just like you're a member of a church and, and do what you're supposed to do.

Give regularly, be a part of the, of the association regularly and be in ministry with the other churches that are, are surrounding you. Eastern Heights, uh, Bartlesville Southern, first Baptist, all of these along the I-75 as you go up to Dewey.

And those churches up in there are, are all a part, as well as the Osage County and the underwater County churches are all a part and members of our association. You say, well, so what, what's going on in our area? Why, why do we need to, there's all kinds of churches around here.

Why do we, why do we need to do that? Uh, I may have shared with you, I'll share with you again, I share it with everybody. Oh, just about, uh, the truth is that Osage County and underwater County are about 70% unaffiliated.

I mean, 70% of the people who live in Osage County and underwater County have no faith affiliation whatsoever. And you, you might say, oh, most of them are Baptists.

Well, that's what they'd say probably, but, uh, because, you know, there's more Baptists than there are people. You know that we've, we've counted them four times in different churches. And so anyway, you know what that's about, but, but, but truthfully there's, there's 70% of those two counties, uh, are not affiliated with any church, with any faith group, with any, they're not Mormons.

They're not Buddhists. They're not, uh, Islam. They're nothing. That's the group that's growing the fastest, by the way, in our association. It's called the nuns, N O N E S.

They are not affiliated with any group at all. And it's growing by leaps and bounds. That statistic I shared with you is 10 years out of date. That was done in 2010. So we get ready to do the census again in 2020.

We'll find out more. And I have a feeling it's going to be even more. We counted up and say to roughly how many people are, are in that area, these three counties. And there's about 40% in our area that in Washington County that is, that is unaffiliated.

So we're, we're counting up and it's a, it's around 50,000 people who are not affiliated with any faith group whatsoever. Dear friends, I want you to know today, you don't have to get in an airplane and fly like we did to Latvia or our other partnership, which is Malawi.

You don't have to do that. Now I want you to do that. And it's a much needed thing, but that you don't have to do that to be on mission. You, you have to concentrate on the people that are right here around you.

Now that's going to be hard because you go to Malawi and you walk into two, three villages and you'll win four or 500 people to the Lord. I did that back in brother Paul took us for the first time back in 98.

I went over there on that first trip. He and I, and a guy from Pawhuska went over there. We, in one weekend, we, we shared the gospel and 600 people came to know the Lord in, in about three days.

It's amazing what happened. They're so hungry for the gospel. The God, the Holy Spirit is just going crazy in the streets of Malawi. It's, it's crazy in the little villages. You can go do that. And I would, I would encourage you to do that.

You can go to Latvia where, uh, they're a generation ahead of us in secularism. And, uh, a communist, uh, been communist ruled for so many years. And so church was tossed out just like an old pair of whatever socks or it's got holes in them or something.

And, and there's no evangelical witnesses in those towns. And so you can go there, but I want to tell you, you can stay right here. And there are people all around you that do not know Christ as their savior.

They have no idea about who Jesus is. Well, they may have heard him or they may use his name in vain or all that, but they don't really know the gospel.

And if you think that we can, every Sunday morning, we can just open the doors and people are just going to flock to the doors, I got news for you. They're not coming. They're not coming.

I went by, uh, Egbert's this morning and I went by, uh, IHOP this morning. You can't find a parking place. I'm not doubting those people.

I'm not saying that's awful and you shouldn't go on, you shouldn't do that. I'm just saying they're not coming. Because we have an entire two generations now of people who don't know what the church is about and have no idea what goes on in here.

As a matter of fact, they go by your church every day. And by the way, you've got the best location in all of our association. I don't know who gave this property or who bought it, but they were thinking when it happened. But here's the thing.

You've got to understand. They'll drive by here every day and you're just another building. It's just another building to them. They have no idea what goes on here. They would not argue with you about what Dan led us in today, whether it was praise songs or hymns or preferences or that.

They don't know the difference. And they don't know what time you start. You see, I knew you were going to start around 1030, 1045. I've been a Baptist since I was minus nine months.

So I know how, I know how this works. Okay. I know, I know church stuff. I know when you stand out, stand up, sit down, fight, fight, fight, all that kind of thing. I've been on the fight, fight, fight part of it too. So, but here's the thing. You've got to understand they don't know.

But if for some strange reason they would get up this morning and decide they were not going to go to IHOP, they were going to come to your church for some strange reason. Maybe something's been niggling at them.

Maybe they're going through a crisis. Maybe there's something going on and they're looking for hope or they're looking for something that maybe the church could offer. If for some strange reason they would walk in the back here and you'd greet them and they'd sit down in the pew or wherever they would sit.

If they're not going, they don't know what's going on. All these weird customs that we have. They wouldn't know. And we talk about being washed in the blood of the lamb and all. They have no idea what that means.

Because they have no churchism in them. They're unaffiliated. We have got to understand the culture that we're in right now, right here in Oklahoma.

And it's better here than it is in most places. We've got to understand that right here in Bartlesville and the surrounding area, there's a mission field that you must engage.

Now, I want to tell you, I am so encouraged by what you're doing. You have this time. I asked Mike this morning, how did you get out of preaching for a month? What happened to that? He said, it's a blessing.

I said, yes, it is. But anyway, they say it too. No, I'm kidding. So anyway, let me just say something about it. Let me just chase a rabbit.

I almost finished one of these sentences, okay? But let me chase a rabbit for just a minute. Your pastor is a blessing to you. I want to tell you a few months ago, he preached a message on conflict.

You all remember that one? I know you remember that because you went out the back door and said, is something wrong? No, no, no. That's the best sermon on conflict I've heard ever. He took the word of God and he showed you how to deal with conflict.

Incredible. You know why I think it was incredible? Because the place I was in in South Carolina, I dealt with between 5 and 15 people a day that were in the midst of conflict in our churches out there.

5 and 15 people a day. I coached over 500 pastors a year in conflict situations. That's why I have gray hair and no hair, okay?

You've got to understand the blessing that God has given you. When you start treating them wrong, I'm going to go find some of you, Gal, and I'm going to whoop you, okay? I don't usually whoop people, but I think it's in my job description, okay?

Whoop people who mistreat pastors. But anyway, here's the thing. You've got to understand where God has put you and what God is doing. He's leading you toward engaging the culture.

There are all kinds of things that you can do to go out there and prepare the soil. That's one of the things we do in our association. We're standing upon preparing the soil, sharing the gospel, caring for those who love and have given their life to Christ, and then daring one another to get out there to the edge.

Preparing the soil right now is what you're concentrating on because the ground is so hard. You share the seed today, go out and start scattering seed and see what happens to it.

The birds of the air will come and snatch it off. And you've got to understand you've got to prepare that soil. That's what this engagement thing is about. Find some things that you can do around this community and show people the love of Christ by going and doing those things which are most important to them.

Maybe they need a new roof. Maybe they need some help cleaning up their yard. Maybe they need whatever. Those practical things that you can do to say to them, hey, I'm doing this because Jesus loves me.

He's changed me. He's changed all of my life and he can change you too. Let me show you one more thing and I'm going to start preaching.

You say, you haven't started your sermon yet. Yeah, I'm going to. Don't get nervous. I'm good. My daughter went to high school here. She's a flight attendant in American Airlines.

A couple of things that I'll share about her because I just want to brag on her. Can I just brag on my kid a little bit? 36 years old, still not married, engaged, and I'll tell you about that in a minute.

And last week she went through kind of a tough time and she was texting us. And that's the best way to communicate with a flight attendant because they're everywhere.

I don't even know where she's at today. She's out somewhere. She texted us these things and showed us the text of several of her co-flight attendants and a pilot and some others who were texting her about their spiritual problems.

And I said to her, girl, you in the ministry. And she said, no kidding. You see, folks, it doesn't mean that you have to be called to be a pastor or a music minister or some other official title director of missions because all of us are in the ministry.

She gave to me a pilot who was so messed up to coach for about, I coached him for about, hmm, about a year. The beginning of the year, he wasn't even saved.

He'd been in church all of his life. She said, hey, Tripp, you need to talk to my dad. And so we talked back and forth. About June or July, he gave his life to Christ. And he found a church.

Now, he's not there every Sunday because he's flying a lot. But he stumbled into a church and he became a member of a church. And he started to go into church. And he texted me at Christmastime and he said, Monty, for the first time in my life, when I go to church, I understand what's going on.

When the pastor stands up and speaks, I understand for the first time in my life what it's all about. He said, this morning, we started singing some songs.

I wept like a baby because I knew the person that I'm singing to. Dear friends, that's what it's about. It's not about going out here on the street corner and preaching.

If God wants you to do that, do that. But it's about going and caring and saying to people, hey, I love you. She was engaged and met a guy online.

I don't even know what the one that she, you know, there's all those different ones. She met a guy online. He lives in Calgary, Canada. You've ever been to Calgary? Or you've ever been to Canada?

You know they're a generation ahead of us when it comes to secularism. And what I mean by that is they have completely and totally put God out of their country.

God is not in Canada as far as their government is concerned. And so they are completely secular. And by the way, that's where we're headed. You know that. We're headed to the point where God is just not a part of anything.

And he was a typical Canadian. Over the months, I thought, you know, she's going to join herself with somebody who does not know Christ.

And I'm heartbroken about that. God brought him to a place of crisis in his life. Incredible crisis.

Through the counseling, some things came out that he was dealing with. And last Tuesday night, he bowed and gave his life to Jesus. Now, friends, I'm not really sure when they're going to get married because of this counseling thing.

They maybe have to put it off. They had it originally scheduled for next month. But it may have to put off. I don't know. It doesn't matter. What matters now is he's my forever brother. And when they do join one another in marriage, he's going to know.

How do I know that sincere? By what he asked me. He asked me several questions about this and this and this. And he's a different person as a result. That's what I'm talking about. Now, I've lifted up my child to you, of course.

And I can tell you a lot of other great things about her and some crazy things about her, too. But I've lifted up to her, not to make her a hero, but to give her as an example of, As you go, make disciples.

The literal translation is this go and going. And Jesus actually said, as you go, disciple. Do this as a discipler.

No one can make a disciple except God. But he has gone along and given us a way that as we go, we are to disciple individuals.

Watch them come to Jesus. You've got friends and neighbors that need Jesus. You've got friends and people that you know that needs Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior.

Right here. Right now. The majority of the people you know do not know Christ. So we're on a mission field. And I'm excited to be along with you as you're a part and a member of our association.

Well, let's turn to the scriptures, okay? And I promise I'll make this quick or quicker than I was planning on. Matthew 26, verse 6 through verse 13.

See, I believe, as I've illustrated just a while there, I believe in my heart that we are living in the days of the alabaster jar.

Some of you know this story. Most of you have been here a long time. You've been in Sunday school. You've seen this. You've read this story. You've heard it preached about several times. But let me just lift it up to you once more. And then I want to share some things with you out of the scriptures that I believe we need to take to heart.

And some things that I think that we can really see what God wants to do among us. Matthew 26, verse 6. While Jesus was in Bethany in the home of a man known as Simon the leper, a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, which she poured on his head while he was reclining at the table.

When the disciples saw this, they were indignant. Why this waste, they asked? This perfume could have been sold for a high price than the money given to the poor. Well, aware of this, Jesus said to them, Why are you bothering this woman?

She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, but you'll not always have me. When she poured this perfume on my body, she did it to prepare me for burial.

I'll tell you the truth. Wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told in memory of her. And one of the twelve, the one called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priest and asked, What are you willing to give me if I hand him over to you?

So they counted out for him thirty silver coins. And from then on, Judas watched for an opportunity to hand him over. Well, let's pray together.

Lord God, thank you for the opportunity to be here before these people. Thank you, dear God, for this message that I believe they need to hear and I need to hear this morning. And I pray, Lord, that you'll use this word as a word that would speak to hearts, not just to heads, but to hearts.

And God, that we'd leave here transformed and changed as a result of being exposed to your word. And I ask this in Christ's name. Amen. Amen. Let me lift a few things out of the scripture today that I think we need to take to heart and then we'll contemplate what we need to do here.

The first thing I want you to hear is the setting that he was in. He was in a house of Simon the leper. Now, nobody went to a leper's house.

Nobody wanted anything to do with leprosy. And it's not the leprosy that we think of. It was any kind of skin disease. They lumped it all together. And nobody wanted to be in Simon the leper's house. It was just, I don't want to be in there.

That's contaminated. But right in the middle of it is Jesus and all of his disciples. Right in the middle of this Simon the leper's house. Watch with me as something happens that is incredible when it has to do with a meeting like this.

Here's all these guys gathered around the table. Now, they didn't sit at chairs. They laid down around the table. There was a central place. And they used their hands to eat from. And out of the side door or someplace came this woman.

She wasn't part of the meeting. But she came with this expensive nard in a stone box, an alabaster box.

And she broke the box. She didn't break the seal. She broke the box. And poured it on Jesus' head. And as you watch there, that ointment, that oil comes down his head, goes past his ears and through his hair and into his beard and down into his clothes.

And it is incredible that this is happening. And the smell absolutely contaminates all the air in that one little place where everything was so tight and so hot and so smelly of people's stuff.

And here's this pure nard coming down his cheeks and through his beard and down the front of his clothes. It's incredible.

What we see here, first of all, is a spontaneous extravagance. This pure nard, it was rose-colored, would come.

And it would come upon his face and into his hands and other places. And as it did it, it stained his hands. It stained his face. It stained his beard and his hair.

It was this rose-colored, pungent kind of smell that would come. And it was poured upon him. She didn't portion it out and say, well, I'll just give you a little bit.

Because I've got to keep this back. I mean, this is expensive stuff. Let me just give you a little bit here and I'll keep the rest for myself. No, she poured it upon him. You know, that's the biggest thing I think we're dealing with.

One of the biggest things we're dealing with today in the church and among those who are followers of Christ. We want to portion out Christianity. We want to portion out our faith.

We want to keep it, just give a little bit out so that we can keep it for ourselves. When what Christ has decided for us to do and as we follow after Christ is that we're to pour it out.

Not portion it out. Not keep a little bit back just in case for a rainy day. You see, I think it's interesting how we as Christ followers, we see our lives sometimes like a pie.

Anybody here like pie? I love pie. Okay. They didn't have much pie in South Carolina. They had cake. Okay. So back then when I shared these things, I would say a cake. But we're going to talk about pie because we like pie.

Right? Anybody? Anybody? Y'all awake? Hello? Okay, good. We like pie and so we like to put it in little sections. And when you're doing a pie, you put a little bit out and you keep a little bit back.

And you put a little more out and you keep a little bit back. Now I used to have friends who could eat an entire pie at one sitting. But I'm not talking about them. I'm talking about those of us who do this in portions.

When what we really need to be seeing our lives as, and stay with me now because I think I've got a good idea about this. We want a portion, but what we really need to see is our life as a bowl of spaghetti.

And it's all messy. And it all touches one another. You know what I'm talking about? And you put the sauce on and you put the other ingredients in. And in the sauce you put different things. And it just tastes all good.

And it's not a portion necessarily. It's just that it's all mixed up. It's all in our lives. When what we really see, what we really need to do is understand that when we come to Christ, we can't portion it out to other people and them understand what we're doing.

We've got to give it all. We've got to say, hey, this is messy. This is all part of my life. And yes, this touches every, Christ touches every part of my life. And everything I do, it's who I am.

In Romans 12, 1, we read that we're to put our lives on the altar of Christ as what? A living sacrifice. We're to give it all for Him. It's not something we do.

It's who we are. Now, beloved, I want you to know today that the struggle we're having in our association and really all over through our country and through the world is that followers of Christ have decided that living for Christ is something we do.

Some of you have decided that it's something you do from 1030 to noon on or whenever it is on Sunday morning. When you show up with other Christians, you put on a mask, you put on a face, and you act like a Christian.

But when you go out into the world or go to Walmart this afternoon or go to the restaurant this afternoon or go to your work in the morning, you can just act however you want to. You see, that's portioning.

That's putting it into little chunks. That's putting it in little slices in your brain and in your heart. When it needs to be messy. It needs to be everything and touch every part of your life.

So that when you walk around in this world, in this city, in this town, people say, there's something about that person that I want to know what's going on in their life. You want to scare your family to death?

Go to a family reunion next week or this summer sometime and act like a Christian. It's amazing what will happen. Act like a Christ follower.

Go into your family and just say, hey, I'm a Christ follower. And see what happens in your family. See how it changes. You see, this was a spontaneous, a spontaneous extravagance.

There's other places in the gospel where it tells us that it was worth an entire year's wages. Think about how much money you made last year. And think about going out and spending it on a bottle of perfume.

I'm not talking about Chanel number five now, okay? This is expensive stuff. Now, where she got it, nobody knows. Somebody gave it to her. Maybe she, I don't know, added up her money, had some extra cash or something.

And she bought that, she put it upon a shelf in her house. And she kept it there. And out of love for her Lord, she knew exactly what was getting ready to happen because he was on his way to the cross. And she came in out of spontaneity.

And she came in with extravagance. And she broke it. And she poured it on him, expressing her love to him.

A spontaneous extravagance. Secondly, an unrighteous indignation.

As soon as he did it, some of you can identify with the disciples in verse 8. When they said, well, what a waste. I mean, who does she think she is anyway?

We're having a perfectly good meeting. And we got dressed up for this. And everything's good. And we got a perfectly good meeting. And in comes this lady who, nobody knows, a woman.

Who knows she's a lady or not. A woman. And interrupts our perfectly good meeting with doing something like this. What a waste. I mean, my goodness. She could have at least given it to somebody.

And we, one of us. And we would have taken it somewhere and sold it. Took the money and given it to the poor. Or what, we could have used this a lot better than she did. I mean, how wasteful can you be?

How interrupting can you be? You see, they didn't get it. Because just before this in verse 25, Jesus is saying, when you've done it to the least of these, you've done it to me.

They said, well, and at one point, there's the king says, I tell you the truth. Whoever you did for one of these, of the least of these brothers of mine, you did it for me.

And they said, well, what are you talking about? We don't know when we helped you. We clothed you. And we kept you together. And we helped you. And we visited you in prison. And we gave you food.

When did we do that? When you did it to the least of these. And so the least of these heard that. This woman. And bounded into this perfectly good meeting and interrupted everything.

Took that nard and threw it over the head of Jesus as it went. And it was incredible what she did. You see, the least of these is most important.

We're not going to win our association to Christ. We're not going to turn those statistics around by doing the same things that we've been doing for the last 50 or 60 years. You know why? It's not working.

We've got to go to the least of these. To those people who are in need. To those people who are hungry and sick and in prison. I know you have a prison ministry. Praise God for that. Those who are in need around you.

Those who are your family. Those who are your friends. Who have those needs. And you need to minister to them. Here's what I said. It's more important. I wrote it down so I don't forget it.

How you treat the janitor is more important than how you honor the king. You see, if the CEO comes into your office tomorrow and he interrupts your meeting, you're going to interrupt everything.

But if the janitor comes into your meeting, you're going to say, hey, out of here. We're meeting. This is important. That's exactly what the disciples are saying. Who does she think?

Hey, we're having a meeting here. This woman. Take that out of here. What do you think you're doing? But it's more important how you treat the janitor.

As a matter of fact, do you know the janitor's name? Maybe you go to school. Maybe you're in at work. Or maybe you've been to work.

Or maybe you're retired from work. Do you know the janitor's name? Do you know the CEO's name? What's your reaction to them?

You see, the thing we've got to do is understand that we have perfectly good meetings that need to be interrupted. See, we're having a perfectly good meeting today. But something could happen today that would interrupt this perfectly good meeting.

And some of you would say, well, what a waste. Why? Constitution and bylaws say we can't do that. I'm not against Constitution and bylaws.

I help churches with them all the time. But when we use the Constitution and bylaws as a weapon to keep us from doing what God wants us to do, to keep us from interrupting our perfectly good organization and way things are going, when we use that as a weapon to keep the Holy Spirit at bay, we better start changing our Constitution and bylaws.

Why do I say that? Because I've been in meetings before with deacons who are dealing with conflict in their church. And I'll say to them, well, the Bible says this and the Bible says that. And I literally have been in several meetings with different authorities in the church who have turned to me and say, they'll say, we don't care what the Bible says.

Our Constitution and bylaws say this. I promise you it's happened. More than once. At that point, I usually would get up, get in my car and go back home because there was nothing I could do.

Folks, when we put those things above what we think are important, the organization, the way things ought to be, any kind of theological belief that comes against the gospel or limits the gospel, we've got to understand that is not what God would have us to do.

You sit around, and I'm not saying you shouldn't keep some money back for a rainy day. I know. But listen, it's a downpour. Okay? Understand it's a downpour. And we've got to put that money in a place where it can be used the most.

These guys are saying, well, we could have had an outreach to the poor with this stuff. But she does this. And right there in verse 10, Jesus says, hush.

Hush. Now, I would have said shut up. We don't say shut up at our house. But anyway, he says, hush. Hush. Why are you bothering this woman?

She's done a beautiful thing for me. You're always going to have the poor. But realize, guys. He wanted to shake them, I'm sure. Realize you're not going to have me. We're right on the way to going to the cross.

It's going to be over soon. And what she's done for me is she's anointed me for my burial. So, see there the spontaneous extravagance.

See there the unrighteous indignation. And, last, see the complete contamination. The Bible says that she poured that beautiful nard perfume upon his head.

Rose colored, did the staining, and as I said, but also the smell. Now, the smell was a sweet, spicy, musky kind of smell.

Not one that you would think like French perfume like we like today, ladies. It's not like a cologne that we may spritz on ourselves today, men. But it was the smell that would remind them of who Jesus was and is.

Stained his hair, his beard, his face, his clothes. It was absolutely permeated every single molecule of the room.

Not too long before the cross. And so, the smell and the stain was probably still there. As Jesus hung on the cross that day.

And every time they smelled it, it brought back this day. It was totally viral. When we were in high school, and that was back in the dark ages, by the way.

But when I was in high school, we had two famous colognes that we all wore. One was Brute. Anybody with me? Yeah, Brute. Some of y'all are old as I am.

Don't act like you're not as old as I am. You know what I'm talking about. The other one was High Karate. Remember High Karate? It was a big, oh, yeah. Hiya, hiya. I used to have a, I had a friend, and he's still my friend.

But, he loved High Karate. You know how I knew? Because you smelled him before you saw him. Okay? He always used too much.

And so, to this very day, if I ever would have a, or find High Karate, something's still out there. If I would ever find that and smell that, I would be reminded of my friend.

You know, we'd say to him, see you, we'd say, smell you later, Terry. You know, that kind of, anyway. That's the same thing that happened here. Smell is a sense that brings back more memories than any other.

And she, somehow she knew this. And somehow she knew that if she would give all this to him, and she would pour this upon him, and she would do what needed to be done to express her love, that it would go viral.

And it did. It's like a virus everybody takes. By the way, my wife's not here today because she has the flu. I mean, it's a virus. It's awful. It's terrible. I've witnessed it for 10 days.

Please. I waited on her. Anyway, it's one of those things that happens. It spreads like a virus. You see, we try to portion it, and we try to box it, and we try to put it together, and we try to put it in a little box, and we give you a listening sheet and a PowerPoint, and we say, here it is.

It's $79.95. Here's how you reach your people for Christ. Here's how you reach the people around you for Christ. When the truth of the matter is the gospel is not something that you can box. It's not something you can go through for spiritual laws.

It's not something you can do by doing the faith thing back in those days. It's not something by doing EE or CWT or all those other abbreviations. It's not that. It goes viral. That's what we're looking for here.

We're looking for a virus that will go viral, that will permeate the room. And the only way that it can be done is if you break yourself and pour your life out.

Sacrifice yourself, your most prized possessions, those who you think and those things you think are most important, and come to the place where you say to Christ, here I am, a living sacrifice on the altar of God.

The Bible says here two things in conclusion. Jesus says, she's done a great thing. She's prepared my body for burial.

And in verse 13, when he says, I tell you the truth, I think the King James will probably say, barely, barely. I tell you the truth. I tell you the truth. Listen. Listen. Listen. I tell you the truth because here's the whole thing that Jesus wants to hear.

It's red letter words. Wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told in her memory.

It's 2019. We're still talking about her. You just heard about her. I just preached about it.

Still being heard. The second thing I'll share with you is the last verses. It was the breaking point for Judas.

He couldn't handle it. When he saw that waste and he saw Jesus' reaction, that's when he knew it was time for him to go to the priest, the chief priest, get his little bit of silver, which is amounted to about $3,000 in our money today, so that he could betray the Lord of Lords and the King of Kings.

Folks, it's a dividing point. We're at today at a point where we're saying we're either going to go this way or we're going to go this way because there's no in between.

The gospel being preached here is one that says this woman has done what she did out of love for me. She gave her all. And Judas, who followed him for all those years and walked with him and saw that he did, said no more.

There's another place where it says Judas loved to take money out of the bag because he was the holder of the bag. And see, he was in love with himself and with the money that he was amassing.

He could do no more with it after this day. So we're at a decision point. We're at a point where we're ready to say one way or the other, what are we going to do?

We've told you of all those who are out there that you live in a mission field with. I've shown you what our mission is. It's the association, and you're a part of that.

The question today is what are you going to do about it? And I can't make you do things. I'm just the director of missions. I'm not the bishop. I'm not the person who puts orders out and you've got to do it.

No, I'm talking about people today. You've got to do it yourself. Maybe today you all have an invitation. We're going to have an invitation.

Here's some prayer benches, both sides. These steps, these front pews, whatever. I want just to use them for an altar today.

And in your coming, you would say, okay, I'm a Christian. I'm a follower, but I'm portioning out instead of giving everything.

And today I'm willing to give it all. I'm ready to run into this messy, connected world where only Jesus is the center of my life.

I'm willing today to make the step that goes across the line. And though people would criticize me or misunderstand me, I'm still willing.

I'm going to give it all. Take care. Take care. Thank you.