Matthew 26:1-16 - Prepared for Death

To Matthew 26.

Matthew 26.

If you're using one of the Pew Bibles there in front of you, you can turn to page 881.

Matthew chapter 26.

Matthew 26 · chapter mention

Doug and Royal are away this morning.

They'll be back, and we'll look forward to seeing them again next week.

But we're continuing on in this Gospel of Matthew.

We're going to be looking particularly at the first 16 verses of Matthew chapter 26 this morning.

Matthew 26 · chapter mention

Matthew 26, verses 1 through 16.

Matthew 26:1–16

This is what Holy Scripture says.

When Jesus had finished saying all these things, he told his disciples, You know that the Passover takes place after two days, and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified.

Then the chief priests and the elders of the people assembled in the courtyard of the high priest, whose name was Caiaphas, and they conspired to arrest Jesus in a treacherous way and kill him.

Not during the festival, they said, so there won't be rioting among the people.

While Jesus was in Bethany at the house of Simon the leper, a woman approached him with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume.

She poured it on his head as he was reclining at the table.

When the disciples saw it, they were indignant.

Why this waste?

They asked.

This might have been sold for a great deal and given to the poor.

Aware of this, Jesus said to them, Why are you bothering this woman?

She has done a noble thing for me.

You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.

By pouring this perfume on my body, she has prepared me for burial.

Truly I tell you, wherever this gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will also be told in memory of her.

Then one of the twelve, the man called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and said, What are you willing to give me if I hand him over to you?

So they weighed out thirty pieces of silver for him.

And from that time he started looking for a good opportunity to betray him.

Let's seek the Lord.

Father, we want to be those who are filled with true hearts, with pure hearts, with sincere hearts, with overflowing and fragrant hearts of love.

So we're asking that you would guard us, guard us from the deceit that could be in our own hearts, guard us from distractions that would take us away from Scripture and this beautiful portrait we find that you would stir our hearts this morning.

We pray in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Different cultures over different centuries have different rituals associated with embalming and preparing someone for death and burying someone.

I did just a little bit of reading this week.

It's really interesting.

You can find, you might think naturally of Egyptian mummies and pyramids, but there's more than that.

You can find cultures that pack bodies with salt or honey or even vegetable powder.

You can find dances for the dead, laments for the dead.

You can find funeral burials at sea or tomb burials or even burials where bodies are put up on a pole for the birds to eat.

In verse 12 of our passage for this morning, Jesus says the woman who pours this perfume on him has prepared him for burial.

Already that should strike us as a little bit strange.

In the cultures and other practices I alluded to, they take a corpse, they take a dead body and prepare the dead body for burial.

Jesus is not dead, he's very much alive.

Eric Anderson is our resident funeral industry expert.

So if you have really specific questions about embalming or those kind of processes, don't ask me.

I don't know.

You can ask Eric.

He's the one who's reading scripture for us this month.

But I'm gonna make a strong assumption that when they're training people in the art of embalming, they don't take someone who's maybe on their deathbed and then embalm them.

They wait and they they apply that to corpses, or maybe they practice on people, but but not in that kind of complete way.

But here's Jesus being prepared for death with this oil that's poured on him.

And he's not dead, much less on his deathbed.

He's very much alive.

He's a man in his 30s, he's preaching, he's teaching.

So if you just came to this passage and you hadn't read or heard anything else in Matthew, you might find it very peculiar.

And Matthew presents it in that light.

But we've already seen in Matthew that Jesus has the constant awareness of his coming death.

Here's an example, Matthew 16, verses 21 to 23.

Matthew 16:21–23

From then on, Jesus began to point out to his disciples that it was necessary for him to go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders, chief priests, scribes, be killed, and be raised the third day.

And do you remember when Jesus says that?

Peter takes him aside and begins to rebuke the Lord.

Oh no, Lord, this will never happen to you.

Jesus turned to Peter and told him, Get behind me, Satan.

You're a hindrance to me because you're not thinking about God's concerns but human concerns.

Jesus came on a mission.

He knew he had to die, but his own disciples struggled to interpret the events of his life in light of his coming death.

But not this woman.

She does seek to cherish him and adore him, and Jesus himself interprets her action in light of his coming death.

We're pressing on towards the climax of Matthew's gospel, and that climax is the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.

So we just finished a large block of Christ's teaching.

We're not going to have any more large blocks of Christ's teaching.

He'll speak, but no large blocks of Christ's teaching.

But now this drama is unfolding.

It's like the monologue has been given, and now the curtain's opening for this climactic act.

And here's the first scene that we come to here in John and Matthew chapter 26.

Matthew 26 · chapter mention

Jesus prepares himself for death.

This woman helps to prepare him for death.

And she adores him.

The death of Jesus should compel us to adore him.

That's the big idea for this morning.

The death of Jesus should compel us to adore him.

We're going to explore today this very true story, and we'll look at the setting of this story.

We'll consider the characters and the plot.

And then finally, what's the significance of this story for our lives?

With that big idea in mind, always in the background, and we'll come to it again and again here.

The death of Jesus compels us to adore him.

That was what this woman offered.

What about you and me?

Be thinking on that question as we go through this passage.

So, first, the setting.

Verse number two.

Jesus tells his disciples that he will die at the time of Passover.

That's not a coincidence.

That's a divinely orchestrated setting to this story.

When you or I think of Passover, it's still celebrated today.

We might think of it's a holiday, you get some time off of work, maybe the kids are out of school for Jewish friends that they have, they renew some acquaintances and they have some rituals with their extended family.

But if we think about when this Passover festival was first instituted, it was not something that Moses came up with himself or Abraham.

God himself institutes Passover back in Exodus chapter 12.

Exodus 12 · chapter mention

You don't have to turn there, but just by way of reminder, what's going on in that passage when God first brings out this festival of Passover?

The people of Israel are enslaved in Egypt.

And God has sent a number of plagues on the Egyptians as judgment on them.

And he's threatening one great final plague.

He's threatening to kill all the firstborn sons in the land.

And then he gives instructions about celebrating Passover.

And then he follows through on that threat.

And the Egyptians find that the firstborn child in each household has been killed.

So if we go back to the very beginning of Passover, it's not in that first instance a time of just simply celebrating with family and friends.

It's a death memorial.

Now, it was for God's people a time of thanksgiving because their homes weren't visited.

And that brings us to the instructions.

So God instructed the people take a firstborn animal and kill that firstborn animal and smear the blood over the doorframe.

And then as the Lord was passing through the land of Egypt that night, pass over, pass through, the homes that had blood smeared on the doorframe, he would pass over those homes.

He would pass by and not visit the judgment on those homes.

And that's what the Israelites were to commemorate year after year after year after year with the Passover.

And here in our passage, Jesus intentionally links his own coming death with this time of year of the Passover.

And if we think about what's going to happen, the blood smeared on the wooden doorframe becomes the blood of Christ on the wooden cross.

The slaughtered firstborn lamb becomes the slaughtered firstborn son.

God passing over the homes and the death and the judgment of those who applied the blood becomes God passing over the eternal judgment that you and I deserve because He has crushed His firstborn son.

And we find life in him.

That's what time of year it is here, as the story unfolds for us.

We also find that this setting is at a home.

We're told in verse number six Jesus is in the home of Simon the Leper.

Uh that might sound like you know a really cool name for a rock band.

I can assure you, no one wanted to be called a leper of any kind.

It was a disastrous disease to have in this time period, any time period, but particularly then, the people normally had to be isolated away from others.

And that's interesting because here, Simon the Leper's home, there are people there.

What's going on with that?

Well, it's possible that Simon had died, and perhaps this was still the name of his home.

I think probably more likely is that Simon had had leprosy and then he had been cured.

So it was okay for Jesus and these others to be in his home, but he still carries that name with him.

Even once you've been cured, once a leper, always a leper.

We don't know exactly all the people that were there in this home.

Matthew tells us about Jesus and his disciples.

If we bring this passage together with John chapter 12, John records a very similar anointing of Jesus in chapter 12.

John 12 · chapter mention

And so if we bring those stories together, John tells us that Mary and Martha and Lazarus were there in the home.

And John specifically mentions that Lazarus was the one that Jesus had raised from the dead.

So you've got, and Kevin and Sarah aren't here today.

Kevin is preaching at a church, and the pastor's name is Larry Lazarus.

Isn't that just a great name for a pastor?

I'm jealous of him.

So you have what's most likely Jesus in this house of Simon the leper, this house of death.

You have possibly there alongside of him a walking corpse in Lazarus.

Do you hear all of the death that's happening in this passage?

That's the setting.

The death time of year and the house of death.

What about the characters?

Have you got a good drama?

Every good drama and story is a cast of characters.

And here we find in verses three and four chief priests and elders of the people that are conspiring to have Jesus arrested and killed.

So these are the villains of the story, these Jewish leaders.

And it's not anything negative about all Jews.

Jesus himself was a Jew.

He's the hero of the story.

But we do find right here that these Jewish leaders are trying to betray and kill an innocent man.

But it gets worse than that because one of Jesus' own disciples is even worse.

He's not just a villain, he's a traitorous villain.

Judas himself.

In verse number one, Jesus says the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified.

Verse 14, Judas asks the chief priest what he will get if he hands over Jesus to them.

Then in verse 16, we're told that Judas began looking for opportunities to, and the word here is betray, or yours might say deliver him up, but it's the same Greek word, hand him over.

Jesus predicts his betrayal, Judas inquires about the betrayal, and then Judas seeks to execute the betrayal.

What about the other 11 disciples?

Well, here in this story, they're not exactly villains, they're not trying to betray Jesus, but they're also not exactly presented as heroes in the story.

They're not presented in the most positive light.

It tells us that they're indignant with this woman.

You see that there in verse number eight.

One commentator pointed out these men, many of them were fishermen.

They were blue-collar guys.

They probably weren't the wealthiest people in the world.

So perhaps they had a little special hesitation about something extravagant being poured out or how money could have been used.

They might have had a sincere heart, many of them, for those that were poor.

And yet, Jesus doesn't commend them for their indignation, he corrects them for their indignation.

Because when the Lord of glory is present, everything should be focused on him.

And they don't see it the way that they should.

That leaves two main characters in the story.

This woman who's devoted to the Lord that Matthew doesn't name.

But again, if we bring in John chapter 12, he says it was Mary, sister of Martha.

John 12 · chapter mention

The one who had sat at Jesus' feet and learned from him.

If that's the case here, it shows that she's believed what she's heard.

She's not just there because she's got a sick child, and maybe if she does something extravagant for Jesus, her sick child will be well.

She's there because by faith she's grasped hold of what Jesus has been teaching all throughout the Gospels.

She's got eyes to see the Son of Glory, and she wants to show it.

She understands how soon he will be departing, and she wants to show her love for the Lord.

Christ is the anointed one.

In the Old Testament, kings had oil poured on them.

Matthew's presenting Jesus all the way along as the king.

And so isn't it interesting that there would be this woman who has eyes of faith that perhaps even in this action is trying to express something of her belief that he indeed is the Messiah.

He indeed is the anointed one.

So of course she must too anoint him.

And that brings us to Jesus.

Time and time again, Jesus is the central character in Scripture.

Time and time again, we find that he's the hero of the story.

As the passage opens in verse 2, he refers to himself as a son of man.

And that's a title that often speaks of his authority, his power in judgment.

That's how it's used back in Daniel chapter 7.

Daniel 7 · chapter mention

It's given a dominion and rule and reign.

In Matthew chapter 24, Jesus says he will come as the Son of Man with power and great glory.

Matthew 24 · chapter mention

Yet here, he says the Son of Man's going to be handed over to be crucified.

And he doesn't say he's going to do anything about it.

Here's the one with all glory and power and ability, and it's as though he's going to allow himself to be crucified.

What is this that someone with such great authority would allow this to happen to himself?

But he does.

There's the paradox.

He's the Lord of Lords, yet he's willing to suffer and be killed.

If you were watching, you know, this play out at a movie theater, you'd have right at the top of the marquee with the stars, there's Jesus' name first.

He says in verse 11, You always have the poor, but you don't always have me.

Jesus himself highlights his own significance.

Listen to what Deuteronomy 15, 11 says.

That is why I am commanding you, open your hand willingly to your poor and needy brother and your land.

Do you hear the contrast there?

Moses says you're always going to have poor people.

And his response is, well, not don't worry about it, just who can do anything about it?

Moses' conclusion is you're always going to have poor people, so be ready to help them.

And it seems like that's what the disciples were thinking, right?

We've got poor, let's be ready to help them.

Jesus doesn't say that we shouldn't care about the poor.

That's not the point.

But he says you're always going to have poor people in the land.

And the implication is be thoughtful of them, try to help them as you can.

But he he does something different than Moses.

He says, but you're not always going to have me.

And as long as I'm here, I have to take center stage.

If Jesus wasn't really God, wouldn't that be an audacious claim to make?

You know, sometimes you'll hear people say, Well, I don't know if Jesus was God, but you know, he was such a nice guy, so so humble, and he cared for the poor.

That doesn't work from our passage.

Jesus says, Yeah, the poor, but me.

If he wasn't God, he's not a nice guy.

He's an insufferable egomaniac.

Or he's telling the truth and he's giving people what they really need to take him, to view him, to prioritize him, to love him, to adore him.

Jesus' death compels us to adore him.

And let me just put in one church application here.

I know we haven't gotten to the significance yet, we'll we'll come to that.

But just as a church, we have To prioritize Jesus and his death and his entire work.

He doesn't specifically mention his resurrection and ascension here, but that's that's part of the grand conclusion.

But we as a church have to prioritize Jesus and his death above everything else.

You know, I know this is kind of getting to baseball season, and you've got some churches where it's like if you think about it, like a baseball team, it's like, all right, we've got starting pitcher, the new children's wing.

And then we've got starting at first base, caring for the poor, and starting at pitcher is the music ministry.

None of those things are bad.

If you want to uh um I started to say if you want to die and give us money, I don't want anyone to die.

So let's let's not don't if you want to give us money to help the re revamp the white building next door, we'll we'll take it.

Those aren't bad things, but we have to prioritize Jesus, most of all.

We don't want it to be like, you know, where's Jesus?

Where's his gospel?

And it's like, well, okay, I think I see him.

He's in the upper deck, he's selling peanuts, he's got an apron that says, I died for you.

So this is still a gospel team.

This is great.

All right, but no, we want Jesus to be front and center of our life, of our ministry as a church.

And then those things come alongside as a support to lift up who Jesus Christ is.

We've taken a look at the setting, this place of death, and these different characters with Christ Himself at the center.

What about the plot of how this unfolds?

You know, at first glance, it might seem like those verses I read are kind of disconnected.

You have some people wanting to kill Jesus, you have a woman dumping perfume on Jesus and some controversy about that.

Then you have Judas trying to betray Jesus.

So we see the first and last part of that, how they work together, but what's what's going on in the middle?

Well, I've already mentioned this, but again, we see this threat of death as the plots unfolding.

Verse 2, Jesus predicts his death.

It takes place during Passover, this feast associated with death.

In verse 4, the villains are trying to conspire and kill Jesus.

Jesus in the house of a leopard, he's probably alongside a resurrected dead guy.

In verse 15 and 16, Judas is conspiring to get Jesus killed.

And then right at the heart of the passage, right in verse 12, this woman, Jesus says, has anointed him for burial.

So you've got this threat of death, but we see a contrast in the plot of this story and the way that people approach his death.

Jesus is preparing himself for death.

The chief priests and elders, they want to prepare Jesus for death.

Judas wants to prepare him for death.

And the woman wants to prepare him for death.

But they're doing it in all kinds of different ways.

Some from hearts of hatred and betrayal.

In the case of the woman, from lavish devotion and love.

You can see the actions that happen there.

Judas is willing to hand the Son of Man over.

We know from scripture he's going to betray the Son of Man with a kiss, and the woman's going to use her hands to take the perfume and anoint Jesus with love.

You see it too in the value that's placed on these actions.

That's a little harder for us to see.

It says that Judas agrees to betray Jesus for 30 pieces of silver.

Now I know in our day, whenever you hear like silver coins, you're thinking of a pirate's treasure chest, and you read a story about some woman that found a silver coin in her attic that was worth$300,000 or whatever, and like 30 silver coins.

That's pretty amazing.

Silver was a fairly common currency in Jesus' day.

And what Judas agrees to is really not life-altering money.

Some people value it at a few hundred dollars.

Some people say maybe it was a few thousand dollars, but either way, it's not life-altering money.

Judas is willing to betray the Lord who walked with him for three years and gave him friendship and teaching and encouragement.

And he's willing to do it for a flat screen TV.

You see how little the value is he places on Jesus?

Contrasting that in the plot is the woman.

It says in verse 7 that the perfume is very expensive.

And then in verse 9, the disciples say that it could have been sold for a great deal.

Now, again, I know we don't think of perfume as that valuable.

If you're on Let's Make a Deal, and Wayne Brady says, All right, behind curtain number one, we've got some perfume.

Curtain number two's got some silver coins.

We won't tell you how much and how valuable it is.

What do you think you're going to take?

People are going to go for the silver coins, of course.

But Matthew's intending to show that this is very valuable.

He doesn't tell us exactly how much, but it's it's a contrast to the coins.

Uh John mentions it's valued at 300 denarii, which is more like a year's salary.

So you've got, you know, maybe 500 or even maybe$5,000 compared to$50,000, or it could be as great a difference as$100 compared to$100,000.

And people in this day and age didn't generally have bank accounts with a lot of savings.

Here's a regular ordinary woman.

How she got this, if this was given to her, we don't know, but this is her valuable assets.

And she's willing to give it all up for Jesus because she loves him so much.

The story is designed to draw us in to the claims of Christ about this woman.

She's prepared me for burial.

She knows who I am.

What about us?

Do we recognize the Lord?

And does it show in the way that we live?

Does it show in that kind of an outpouring of devotion?

That brings us finally today to this significance of all of this.

If we said, well, what's the moral of the story?

That's too trite.

But what does this mean for us?

Let me just suggest three applications here as we draw towards the close.

First, we should marvel at the sovereignty of God in directing world history.

Why do I start there?

Well, you go from the time of Passover, which calls to mind an event that took place more than a thousand years before the coming of the Lord, slaughtered lambs in ancient Egypt.

Then you've got this home and this everyday normal woman and her actions.

And you've got what Jesus says, wherever the gospel is proclaimed, what she did is going to be told in memory of her.

So we're helping to fulfill that prophecy today by just talking about this woman.

We're fulfilling what Christ said was going to happen everywhere in the world, even on a place like Long Island, way away from the Middle East.

This is being fulfilled today.

So we've got hundreds of years before the birth of Jesus to this woman to preaching on Long Island.

What could bring that all together?

Only the Lord.

And what's the thread at the heart of all of that is the death of the Lord Jesus Christ.

You have to marvel that God in his sovereignty would plan redemption, would accomplish redemption, would now allow redemption to be proclaimed everywhere.

Second application.

And that's just one story.

This is just one story.

There's all kinds of stories in the Bible that do just that.

They bring us to Christ.

Second, we should be believing that Jesus came to bring life to the dead.

Yes, there's a lot of death in this passage, but he's coming to affirm this woman.

He's coming to receive her devotion.

Even the disciples that are kind of confused here, they're going to one day see more and understand more.

And the same Jesus that's preparing himself for death is not going to remain in the grave.

He's going to be alive.

He's ascended to the Lord's right hand even now as we proclaim him.

The disciples don't want to accept this woman, but Jesus sees her heart.

He vindicates her amidst all of her accusers.

Do you feel sometimes as though you're not vindicated before the eyes of the world?

They want to leave you out for dead, but Jesus vindicates his people.

And he says, Well done.

Romans 5.8.

God commended his love toward us, and that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

If that's his love for us, no love on our part could be too great to express to him.

We sing the song from heaven, he came and sought her to be his holy bride.

With his own love, he bought her, and for her life he died.

Jesus comes to bring life, and he does it through his death.

What a glory.

And then last, and coming back again to our main idea, we must adore Jesus and His work with everything we have.

So I already touched earlier that we as a church have to make Christ, the crucified one, our priority.

That's not just true of us as a church, that should be true of us individually.

This is a very personal and individual story.

One woman's lavish love.

She's enraptured with love.

And think about what she does.

What if you had perfume, a bottle of perfume that was$50,000 or maybe more?

What would you do with it?

You know, maybe got a date coming up.

This guy could be the one.

I'll get a dab.

I'll get a dab.

Promotion at work.

All right, I'll take a dab.

Promotion at work.

Maybe your wedding day, like I'm going four dabs for the wedding.

Okay, this is this is serious stuff.

She doesn't, there's no dabbing here.

She doesn't parcel it out over time like we do.

She just, she just pours it out.

Like, this is it.

Well, how can I worry about the future when Christ is here right now and I love him so much and I've got to show it right now?

It's more than just prioritizing Jesus.

Now I know I use the word priority.

It's a fine word to use as long as we recognize how how much she is abandoning herself to the Lord.

It's not like there's my adoration for Jesus, and then he's number one, and I got some other things that are kind of right near it.

There's no close seconds.

This is not, if I said I love ice cream, I've got a priority for Hagendas, but Ben and Jerry's is like right there.

It's like number two.

It's not what's going on here.

There's no close seconds.

The Lord is it, she's enraptured with love.

And this woman is a spectacle.

She's a spectacle of emotion and devotion, and it's beautiful.

The apostle Paul writes in Corinthians that the apostles have become a spectacle to the world.

We're fools for Christ.

And what beautiful fools they are.

What beautiful fools we are.

If the world sees us as reckless and foolish and well, we love our Lord.

So of course we'll sacrifice.

Of course we'll do and attempt great things for him because we love him.

The death of Jesus compels us to adore him.

So does the way you live your life cause others to say, wow, what that's that's bizarre.

They could have used their time or or their money or or their or their possessions, they could have used it like in more valuable ways than that.

What's gotten into that person?

Is that what others would think?

Is that they see you living your life?

There's a cost.

I mean, this woman suffered financial loss.

This I was talking to Kevin this week.

He's like, this was probably her nest egg that she's giving up here.

Maybe, but definitely she incurred significant financial loss.

But she adored the Lord.

For some of us, there's gonna be perhaps even bodily cost.

Jesus has already said back just two chapters ago, Matthew 24, that they're gonna hand you over, they're gonna hand him over, they're gonna hand you over to be killed.

Most of us haven't had to face that level of bodily cost for following Christ, but we don't know what the Lord's gonna have us in the future or now.

There's always gonna be some measure of social cost.

Again, Jesus says, you'll be hated by all nations for my name's sake.

But I mean, the cost is like it's so little compared with the love we can have for the Lord.

So, what is it in your life that you can just just pour out in service to Christ?

I don't mean get rid of.

This is not a competition to say you can just get rid of the most things.

And it's also, this is not about, well, this woman, it was her perfume, her money.

She had a right to do with it what she wanted, and the disciples should have stayed out of her pocketbook.

It's it's not about that.

It's about what can we do to show our love for the Lord?

How can we how can we pour out the valuable things in our life and give it a fragrance of him everywhere?

Are there things that would tempt you to be ashamed?

Don't be ashamed.

Jesus justifies this woman before her accusers.

Jesus in the final day will justify your lavish love for him.

This woman had faith, and may we too have faith, because again, as we as we close here, think about what she's doing.

She's she is in the presence of Jesus, but she's seeing something that hasn't happened yet.

She's anointing him.

They're all there with Jesus, but they don't all see what she sees.

She's got a measure of faith that has grabbed hold of God's word.

And we, even though we don't have Jesus here, we're still called to have the same faith that grabs hold of the word of the Lord, that said he would suffer and die and rise again.

And we by faith believe that.

We trust that.

We we know if we know the Lord that we've experienced that.

And if you haven't, consider what you are living your life for.

Are you saving up a little dab here and there?

And then what at the end of your life?

Come to the Lord.

Come to his mercy.

Come and prepare for the great wedding feast of the Lamb.

1 Peter 1, 8 and 9.

And I think Peter later came around to fully appreciate that woman.

He probably proclaimed her quite a lot when he was teaching after he saw the end of her faith and the salvation of her soul.

1 Peter 1, 8 and 9.

Though you have not seen him, you love him.

Though not seeing him now, you believe in him, and you rejoice with inexpressible and glorious joy, because you're receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

Let's pray.

Oh Father, oh God, give us this overwhelming love, a love that stretches into our words, but beyond our words, into our actions.

A love that comes from sincere hearts, not wanting to receive the praise of men, but out of a passion for you, that we must live our lives for your glory.

Lord, if there are any here today who you would you would urge them to even even consider where the gospel hasn't been proclaimed, and to proclaim this woman's story where no one has has heard.

Let that be a sacrifice of praise that we could consider and and pray through and send.

Lord, as we're going out into the world, help us not to cling so tightly to our possessions that others would look at us and think that really our number one priority is our future, our hope, our comfort.

Let them know that amidst all of the right wisdom there is and planning and preparing, that yet what's at the center of our life, what drives us is love for the Savior.

Lord, grow our adoration.

We have your love in our hearts.

We have the fruit of love from the Holy Spirit.

We want that to grow.

We want adoration to take hold of us and move in us and to bloom over and over again in us.

Father, you're worthy, and the Son is worthy to receive blessing and honor and glory and power.

And you're worthy to receive our lives and everything about us.

So Jesus Christ, please be kind to us.

Please free us from the tyranny of others' opinions.

Free us from hesitation in our love for you, that others would see and know that indeed you are Lord, and you are the altogether lovely one.

And so we say, We love you, Lord, and we lift our voices in praise to you now.

In the name of the Son, we ask all these things.

Amen.