Turn with me then, we're just gonna take a few verses from Matthew chapter two. And then we actually will continue on in the Gospel of John, the two do tie together. Matthew chapter two, of course, this time of year, this becomes more and more on our minds. We've heard this story countless times. I'm not gonna read all of it. But I wanna focus on the visit of the wise men and specifically their desire to worship the Lord, worship Christ as He was born and as they found Him. Because we're gonna find today, I think we have many, many examples in the Bible of what worship is and even what it isn't. But I wonder if we were asked to define what it means to worship God, how we would answer that question and how we would define it. What does it mean to worship? I tried to Google it, but I found that there's one thing Google doesn't know, and it doesn't know actually how many churches there are in the United States. And I guess that's asking quite a little bit even of Google. tens and tens and probably hundreds of thousands of churches, just lots and lots of places today where there will be what's called worship happening. And certainly we think, or I would think that not in every one of them will worship actually take place. But how do we judge it? How do we know whether or not what we are doing is worship? What does it mean to worship God? These wise men came to worship Him. That was their whole purpose. I pray that that's your purpose and mine to worship God. And I think when we turn back over to the 12th chapter of John, where we have been for some time looking at that gospel, we're going to see that Mary provides and offers for us a beautiful picture of what worship is. But these wise men came, in Matthew chapter two we read, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem saying, where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him. Skipping on down into the ninth verse, behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. And going into the house, they saw the child with Mary, his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then opening their treasures, they offered him gifts. gold and frankincense and myrrh, and being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country another way. they had come a great distance. And you've no doubt heard many times that story of the wise men. And as we often try to point out in our nativity scenes that we see very often in this time of year, the wise men weren't there. Then they came much later. But beginning now in John chapter 12, we are going to see what worship really looks like, what it is to worship God, and we're going to see how people respond to it, particularly those who are against it. So this morning, my prayer is that we would begin to understand a little more what it means to worship God. Chapter 12 of John, six days before the Passover, Jesus therefore came to Bethany where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. So they gave a dinner for him there. Martha served and Lazarus was one of those reclining with him at table. Mary therefore took a pound of expensive ointment made from pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples, he who was about to betray him, said, why was this ointment not sold for 300 denarii and given to the poor? He said this not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief. And having charge of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it. And Jesus said, leave her alone. so that she may keep it for the day of my burial. For the poor you always have with you, but you do not always have me." A clear picture of what worship is is given to us here. And we find that it includes a number of things. First of all, that we want to point out today is we understand that worship requires sacrifice. Sacrifice. The ointment that she used to anoint Christ was expensive. Judas estimated it at 300 denarii. If you remember in John chapter six, when Jesus fed the multitude, Philip, said to Jesus, Lord, 200 denarii would not be enough to feed, to even give even just a little to these people. And the idea in the sense, of course, is that this is a large sum of money. And if 200 denarii would have come at least somewhere close to feeding tens of thousands of people, we can only begin to imagine the wealth that's involved in 300 which is where Judas estimated the value of this. And I would suspect he was probably pretty close. He knew the value of worldly things. He didn't know the value of heavenly things, but he knew the value of worldly ones. And I would suspect that for many of us, we know the value of worldly things far better than we know the value of spiritual things. Pray that as we grow and certainly when we get saved that we would begin to grow in the wisdom of God and begin to value spiritual things above those things that are temporary. But we don't even really have to guess at how much this was. This was an enormous amount of money. One denarii was the typical wage for a laborer for an entire day. So 300 denarii, if you worked for six days a week and took off the Sabbath and then took off the days for the festivals that you were commanded as a Jew to observe, if you worked six days a week, this was essentially one year's labor. And to kind of put that a little bit in perspective, because sometimes we begin to lose sight of the value even of money. When one looks at the debt of the United States, it's a number that I can't even begin to comprehend. But to put this personally, what worship looks like with regard to sacrifice, imagine you came in here today fully intending and going through with writing a check for your entire annual salary. That's what this represents. I don't know. We don't know where Mary got this. We don't know. There's a lot of speculation. And theologians love to debate it. The Bible is silent on it. And so there's no need to be dogmatic or overly concerned about it. She had it, it was hers, but it was of great value. And worship to God involves sacrifice. Giving to God our time, our efforts, our talents, our love, our money, yes. That is all involved. Our worship of God, if it costs us little, then it's probably very little worship. And we say that not just on our own opinion, but in 2 Samuel, David says this. He is looking to purchase a threshing floor and purchase it from this man, Arunah. And Arunah is going to give it to the king. Say, Lord, you can have it. And David says this because he was going to use this threshing floor to offer service and sacrifice to God. And this is what David said when he was given the opportunity to just take this. He says, no, but I will buy it from you for a price, for I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord, my God, that costs me nothing. So David bought that threshing floor. And he bought it and he paid for it. And he said that I would not take it without buying it. I will not offer to God that that costs me nothing. And so As these wise men came from a far distance, we know that they didn't come empty-handed, and we know that it cost them whatever those material things that they gave to worship this Son of God, but it also cost them the time in their life and the effort and the toil that it took for them to get to that place. So worship of God involves sacrifice. Everywhere in the Bible that you see God being worshiped, In your life and in my life, when we worship God, there is a sense of a sacrifice that we have made. And don't misunderstand, it is a sacrifice that is made willingly and without reservation and without regret and with never thinking for a moment, what I'm going to get out of this. And you see, this is where so much of Christianity has taken a left turn from the Bible. So many go to church and they listen to the preacher and they listen to those who would teach them and they're listening to consume and to take and to take to themselves something when this is ought to be about, worship is about giving to God. We do not offer animal sacrifices anymore like they did in the Old Testament. But those sacrifices tell us and show us that worship of God involves sacrifice. What we have given. And so I ask you, what does your worship of God cost you? Has your faith in God cost you anything in this life? It is sometimes asked whether we should continue to tithe. Are we still required to tithe? It is argued and discussed that the tithe was an Old Testament practice and one that we're then no longer bound to since Christ fulfilled the law and we are now under the New Testament age. And if that is the argument, then we're in no better shape. Because from the 10th and the Old Testament, we find Mary and others forsaking all to follow Christ. So even if that is something that you believe is no longer required of us, He doesn't want just 10% of you, He wants 100%. And worship of God requires sacrifice. This is becoming more and more foreign to our minds. This idea that worshiping God is something that we sacrifice in order to praise Him and to honor Him. But this gift of Mary's was more than any of us in some sense have given. It certainly was far more than 10%. At least we must speculate certainly that it was. Jesus tells us that our obligations to God, once again, are far more than just a little, but it's everything. So worship of God requires sacrifice. And does our worship of God cost us then? Worship as well, we see here, requires and shows and involves humility. Mary could have come with this ointment of such great value. She could have come and given this sacrifice to the Lord. such a way as to parade it about and to show everyone what she was doing of the great gift that she was giving to Jesus and to his cause. She could have made sure everybody knew what she was doing and setting it there and doing just maybe what Judas would have had her do even though he really wasn't interested in the poor. But let's come and sell this, Lord, and use it to your benefit. Sometimes our worship of God It's really not worship of God. If she'd have come that way, it wouldn't have been. It would have been selfish. It would have been making much of her, but making very little of Christ. But she doesn't come that way. She doesn't ask anyone what they think she ought to do with this ointment of such incredible value. Most believe that it came from India, the plant that created it, that they made this ointment from a far distance and of this great value, but she comes in and humility she gives it in such a manner that it's clear that she's not trying to make a show of her gift. She's trying to make a show of Christ and show the world who he is. And she sees things, by the way, that the disciples don't. This account is recorded in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, as well as here in John, and there are a number of oddities between the four different accounts of this same situation, and we don't want to dive into that, but in the other accounts, in two of them, I believe Matthew and Mark, not only is it Judas that questions her, but it's the rest of the disciples as well. John calls out Judas here on purpose and with a point, and yet she comes in this great humility. She pours it out upon Christ and wipes her feet with her hair. And in the Jewish custom of the day, for a woman to unbind her hair was scandalous. It was to lay one open to criticism that was considered by many even as indecent. No doubt there were some present who were embarrassed at Mary's worship of Christ. And sometimes today, I think people when they worship Christ, I think others sometimes are embarrassed, shocked. Shouldn't be, but they are. She wipes his feet with her hair. Mary was not concerned about what anyone else thought. I'll tell you right now, one of your greatest hindrances to following Christ where he would have you to go is you're far too concerned with what everybody else is thinking. There's only one that matters, and it's Christ. And we are to encourage and exhort one another, and we are to be help to one another in a group of people that can talk with one another and in a church setting have the safety of love between one another and Christ and work through issues. But when God calls you to sacrifice and to worship him, it's the only thing that matters. One of the surest signs that true worship is happening is Christ is exalted and man is humbled. That's a litmus test for you and for me. In all of our life, as we go to church and as we try to follow God, there's a litmus test that can be used. Is what is going on exalting Christ or is it exalting man? However and in whatever way that it's happening, are my eyes pointing to Christ as a result of what's being said and done? Or are my eyes being pointed to someone or something else? Worship of God involves this great sacrifice and worship of God involves humility. And though she could have come in that way that I think sometimes many might come today and write this great check and sometimes people write great checks so that maybe their names would be put on the building or some other indication of telling the world just how much they've given. But if your worship of God is done so that others might see you and be impressed, your worship is entirely misguided. It isn't about how others see you. It's about how God sees you. It's about how Christ sees you. It's not about whether you impress someone else. It's not about whether you impress the preacher. It's not about whether you impress mom and dad. It's not about whether you impress friends. Worship of God is about coming to Him and being entirely concerned about His view. But if your worship of God is done to impress others, your worship is misguided. And so we leave that point of this. If you desire to make much of God in your life, you will likewise have little desire to make much of yourself. But if you have a desire to make much of yourself, it's likely going to be accompanied by a very little desire to make much of God. And that is not said to pound on our pride, although it ought to. That is not said to discourage us. It's said to remind us what worship is. Worship is the exalting of God, the abasement and the humility of man, The exaltation and the praise of the one who left heaven to come to earth. And the humility and the humbling of all of us for whom he came. Worship of God involves these things so far, this sacrifice, and it involves humility. But worship of God is not. In fact, if you were to stop here, many people in the world would say, I don't want to have any part of that. The Christian message comes to the world, and ears hear it that are completely worldly, and they say, so you're telling me that in order to worship God, I must sacrifice, give away my things, and humble myself, and feel no pride in myself, and I'm to be abased, and humble, and give away things, and the world says, no thank you. The world says I'm not interested in that because the world is interested, the unbeliever is interested in those two things to a great degree. I want to be exalted. I want to be seen. I want others to worship me. I want others to see me as something that is of great value. I want others to see just how rich I am. I want to hold on to my treasures. I don't want to let them go. Why would I do these things? And in the ears of the world, the Christian message is one that is resisted, and you may be resisting it because you may be saying those very same things, or at least similar. I don't want to give away my things. I don't want to give away my stuff to God. I don't want to do that. I want to hold on to these riches. I want to keep them up. The one who dies with the most stuff wins, as they say. I don't want to be humble. It's not what the world says. How many bumper stickers have you driven by that says the power of pride? Say what the power of pride is, it's the power to ruin your life. That's the power that pride has. That's in the very small two point font print perhaps that we don't see and read. The Bible tells us that, that pride leads to destruction. So if you just left this reality of worship at the fact that it is costly and that it requires sacrifice and humility, so many would turn away and say, I'm not interested. But we're not finished telling you what worship includes. Worship creates pleasant scent upon our lives. A pleasantness. To the worldly person, once again, the worship of God does not appear to be anything that they would be interested in. Man's natural desire is to keep for himself his riches. Man's desire, again, is to exalt himself, yet far, far from bringing a life of sorrow and feeling of loss, worship leads to a life where there is pleasantness unlike anything else. I've been around people who have far less than me in the world. I've been places where people probably won't see the natural blessings, the natural resources that I have available to me now in a year. They won't see it in many of their lifetimes. but there was a pleasantness to their life and a savor and a sweetness to them and their home because they worshiped God and they loved him and it was evident and it was obvious. On the other side of the coin, I've been there and I know people that have far more than I do. and then they have things in a year or two that I won't see in my lifetime and yet there is no pleasantness. There's an aroma of bitterness, a distasteful impression because there is no worship of God in their life. Got all the things in the world and all the stink that comes with it. all the riches that this world can give you and all the poison that comes with it. The more you hold on to the things in this life, the less aroma of God might be there. And I'm not saying that the path to godliness, so don't misunderstand me and maybe we need to clear this up. The path to godliness is not defined by how little you have in the world. Abraham was a very rich man. Job was a very rich man. but they both worshiped God, and that's what made their life pleasant. You go after the things in this world, you will not experience the pleasantness that's involved in the worship of God, where it's just, there's this sweetness that comes with it. As the scripture told us, that Mary, as she broke that alabaster box and anointed Christ, and in two of the other accounts, again, I think Matthew and Mark, She is said, not even named, Mary is not named there, but this woman anoints Christ's head at the same time, it must be the same account, and she pours it over his head there, and then it drips down evidently, and she also anoints his feet. And we know that Mary's offering says clearly here, it fills the whole room with a pleasing sense. There's nothing. There's nothing like the ongoing worship of God to bring a pleasantness to our lives individually, as homes, as churches, and even as nations. Nothing will bring a pleasantness to life more than the worship of God. Even in the midst of the most difficult and trying times, as we cry out to God from what we feel like is the quicksand of this world and our own sin, and we cry out to Him, and we beg Him to deliver us, and we give Him worship and praise, and we give Him whatever He calls us to give Him, and we love Him and we honor Him and we follow Him where He sends us, even in the midst of those trials, there's a sweetness that attends our life. You take away that worship of God. And you take away that sweetness, that pleasantness, that comfortableness, and of course, the sweet smelling savor to God of your life. Worship involves sacrifice. Worship involves humility. And worship involves this pleasantness that it brings but it also requires understanding. True worship of God requires understanding. What do we mean by that? In verses seven and eight, Jesus said, leave her alone. She's anointed Christ. Judas has made his statement and the other disciples, according to the other counts, have mumbled at least their question as well. Why didn't she? Why did she do this? It's such a waste. But Jesus says, leave her alone so that she may keep it for the day of my burial. For the poor you always have with you, but you do not always have me. There has been much debate over this passage of scripture about whether Mary really understood what she was doing on this occasion, or that she was, was she really anointing him, and was she really consciously aware that what she was doing was picturing his death, that again, we're only in the 12th chapter of the Gospel of John, but we're already, already a week away from the crucifixion. John is all about this last week. In the whole last half of his book, it's about this last week. There's been much debate here about whether Mary knew what she was picturing. To me, it seems clear that she did. I think she understood what she was doing. There's a man named Richard Linsky. lived in the late, born in the early, late 1800s and lived through and he says this and he writes this, it's somewhat lengthy but I want to read it because I can't say it any better. He says, but did Mary actually think that she was anointing the body of Jesus there at the supper for his entombment? Is that what she was doing? Some think of only a providence and regard Mary's purpose as an unconscious one. Some let Jesus lend this significance to Mary's act. Some think of a foreboding, an indistinct premonition. Only a few state that when Mary brought and had the ointment ready, she did this consciously for the very purpose Jesus so clearly states. This is what I want you to consider. Was Mary aware of what she was doing or not? And I don't suppose that, again, we can be terribly dogmatic, but I think this argument is strong. Let us remember, Lenski goes on to say, that what Jesus spoke in Galilee In Matthew, what he told his disciples so plainly at the beginning of this very journey from Ephraim. Remember where he had gone after raising Lazarus and as the Jews were gonna take his life and he leaves and he goes to Ephraim and now he's coming back. He says, remember what he spoke so plainly at the beginning of this very journey. What he told his enemies in Jerusalem and John and what these enemies well knew, Mary must also have known. Mary must have known, Linsky is arguing, she must have known what was going to happen. Jesus is going to die. These Jews, Jewish leaders, they're not going to let him live. And she comes with this ointment of great value and pours it over him and anoints him. Linsky continues, she knew in addition about the threats and the plots of his enemies with which Jesus too had charged them openly. The disciples, it is true enough, did not realize what was so close at hand. Remember, six days from the Passover, the final Passover for the earthly ministry of Christ. It is true enough, the disciples did not realize what was so close at hand, but why should not at least one heart, Lenski says, realize it? The character of this woman is such that it ought not to surprise us that where dull-witted men failed, she saw that Jesus was indeed going straight to His death, even to crucifixion, as He Himself had said. Thus her mind leaped to the conclusion that when the tragedy now broke, it would be utterly impossible to anoint the dead body of Jesus. Did you hear what he said? If she had this awareness, and I understand that this is somewhat speculation, but if she understood what she was doing, and she anointed Christ, it is as though she is saying, Christ, you're going to go to your death, and when they take you from me, I'm not perhaps going to have this opportunity, and so I'm going to do it now, because I love you, and I want you to know how much I love you, and that's what worship is. It's letting Christ know how much you love Him. And that's why when we talk about sacrifice, I'm not asking you to meet some objective, to give a certain amount. I'm asking you to give you to Him. I'm not asking you to do anything less than that. And she comes to Him and Linsky makes this so clear, thus her mind leaped to that conclusion. That is why she acted now, unhesitatingly embracing the opportunity which she had hoped would come and for which she had prepared. I agree. I must agree with him. I believe there was at least something of an awareness of Jesus' coming death. And that is what drove her worship, her understanding. her understanding of what Christ was going to do. When we understand, when we truly understand what Jesus has done for us, it removes the many obstacles that would bar our way to obey Him. When we do not understand or when we allow ourselves to forget about it, we will not be moved to this sort of worship We'll offer a tacit, cheap, infrequent worship when we don't understand what Christ did. In the Protestant Reformation, long before the Protestant Reformation, Luther gets all the praise. He was certainly an interesting fellow. Won't take away from that. But for hundreds and hundreds of years prior to then, the church had been going through all kinds of change, not all of it good, in fact, much of it not good. And one of the changes that had taken effect was this idea that if you baptized an infant, that they would be taken to heaven, and there was a great debate among Christianity in those early days, and one of the divides in the very early days was this. Does a person need to understand the gospel in order to be saved? And I say, along with the scripture and Christ himself, the answer is most assuredly, yes. And when we understand what Jesus did for us, because we're sinners and he is the son of God who came to the world to lay his life down so that we might not only have life here and have it abundantly, but to have life eternally, all of a sudden, the obstacles that stand in our way of worshiping God begin to crumble, as they should. But when we don't understand that, or when we set it out of our mind, when it is not with us when we awake in the morning and with us when we go to bed at night, our worship is going to be cheap and seldom and not what it ought to be. Mary understood what she was doing. She knew very well what she was doing. But when we don't, again, our worship will suffer, perhaps, Perhaps we'll go to church, even regularly. And maybe we do that on the basis to just avoid confrontations with families or others, but we'll live lives that keep back the unrestrained worship God is owed. Examine your life. Is it full of this kind of worship? Anointment worth a year's salary. Just given away. Does your worship of God cost you anything or would you be hard pressed to count a single cost beyond the occasional check in the offering plate? Are you humble? Are you humble enough to be seen as foolish by the world as you offer worship to God? Or are you too proud to be seen by others as a believer in God? Is there a pleasantness to your life that is attributable only to the fact that there is sincere worship to God? Or does your life have the scent of bitterness and loneliness and pointlessness without Him? Do you understand what God has done for you? Do you understand what God has done for you? How many Christmases have you heard the story? Do you understand? Has that understanding moved you to unrestrained worship? Or are you ignorant or perhaps forgetful of the Lord's work on your behalf which leads you to a life of empty pride? I wanna hurry through the reaction and I will hurry through it. But it bears our noting. How did Judas respond? And this is how people are gonna respond to you, and this is why I think it's important not to leave this out, even though I'm somewhat long at this point. People are gonna discourage you from what I'm talking about. Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples, he who was about to betray him, said, why was this ointment not sold for 300 denarii and given to the poor? Of course, it goes on to say he was not concerned about the poor at all. He was a thief, and he was concerned about the money. Mary has offered to the Lord a pleasing act of worship, and Jesus sees only waste, or Judas sees only waste. Judas sees in this act of Mary a ridiculous waste. He's simply beside himself at what he believes to be a complete and utter waste of money. His heart is not one ready to sacrifice. He is not humble. His life is not attended by the pleasant aroma of a worship of God. He does not understand at all what's going on around him. And so he sees this act of worship of Mary and he sees nothing but waste and I wonder how many people in this world, maybe you're a child of God and you know him and you worship him and you love him and you've had to sacrifice some great thing for him in your life and there've been people in your life that have looked at you and looked at you like you've got two heads growing out of your shoulders and seeing nothing but waste. Why'd you do that? Mary, that was a year's salary. How long do you think it would take you to save up a year's salary? She just gave it to him. And Judah says, what a waste this is. He hides his true motives here by claiming that the money could have been sold to feed the poor. And how many encouragements to withhold worship of God have been laced with words that sound so sweet that are driven by selfish motives. What camouflage? We camouflage our rebellion against God and we put on the uniform of Christianity, but we've got no Christianity in our hearts. It doesn't warm us. We live a life of cold distance from Christ that doesn't include the worship that brings a pleasantness. And so what is the response to this instead of sincere thankfulness of what an incredible thing that Mary has done to exalt Christ? Judas, and according to the other accounts, the other disciples are looking at her with a raised eyebrow at least and open accusation at worst. And you know what? Those who will challenge your sacrifice, those who will challenge our sacrifice are often gonna be inside Not outside. Many reasoned arguments are gonna be given to you. It will often be the case that fellow Christians will stand most in the way of our sacrificing what we believe God has called us to. It's just true. The world doesn't care. They're gonna look at you like you're crazy, but they're not gonna stop you. Often, it's going to be those on the inside, and they're gonna give you reasoned argument after reasoned argument. They're going to say to you, are you crazy? You can't go to the mission field. Are you crazy? You can't submit to a call to preach. Are you crazy? You can't raise your children that way. Mom, you can't make sure that they're constantly being given scripture. You're crazy. You can't do that. It's just insane. And there's going to be times, and I think many times, it's going to come from inside, not outside, in well-meaning, even good intentions. Many people have been discouraged from giving to God what he calls them to give. But let me ask you this, wasn't the ointment Mary's? It's hers. It wasn't Judas's. It wasn't his before, and it wasn't going to be his after. What did he care? It was hers to do with as she felt compelled to do. And you know what? Your life is yours. It's not mine. Your life is yours that God has given to you. It isn't mine. Are you going to lay it out in an unrestrained worship and obedience to God, or are you going to hold it back even at the advice and counsel of well-intentioned people? What place, though, did Judas have to even be angry Many times the resistance we receive from other Christians comes from their own unwillingness to sacrifice for God and ours will make them uncomfortable. As we head to a conclusion, we must realize here that we are also in the place of Judas. Do you realize that? It was said that Judas was the one who kept the money. He's the one that held the money back. So do you, and so do I. You are the one God has given a certain amount of things to. Time, relationships, people. And we look at Judas and we shake our heads and we wonder how he could be so blind. Yet while we shake our heads and stand amazed at his lack of belief, we are holding on to our own money bags as tightly as ever. Which is more dear to you, Christ or the money bag he's allowed you to carry? Some wonder, Jesus, why did you let Judas be the treasurer? Jesus knew who he was from the beginning. Have not I called you 12? He said, and one of you is the devil, and the one that's the devil is the one that's watching the money. Jesus, what are you doing? Why did God allow this to happen? And we ask the same question. Why would God allow you and I to steward our lives? Why would he give us choice? Why does he give us such gifts? Why does he give us money and time and relationships and talents and all of these things? Why did he give us these things? Why did he give us talents that we have and give us these things so that we then would have this obligation, the answer is so we can, of course, give it back to him in worship. Jesus didn't lower himself to the position of preventing Judas from robbing from him. What would that have looked like? Jesus saying, oh wait, no, not Judas. Matthew, you take care of this. You're the tax collector. Somehow Judas ends up with the money bag. And guess what? Somehow you ended up with responsibility for your life. How did it happen? God gave it to you. And God allowed you to have it. What you do with it is gonna make a difference. Jesus did not lower himself to be this one who just prevents Judas from having the opportunity to rob God. And he'll not lower himself to that position with you or me either. He knows it's all his. He knows every coin in that bag is His and eventually it's gonna come His way. He knows everything is His. The Lord's not worried that you are not giving Him your resources because somehow you're robbing Him. He's worried that you're not giving Him your resources in worship because you're robbing you. You can't rob God. Not in that sense, it's gonna, it's His, it's still His. When we steal from God, we are thieves, but it is ourselves we have robbed. My encouragement to you is this, as we close, stop stealing from yourself. I'm just gonna read this and I'll be done. Stop stealing the peace God wants to give you by looking to your possessions for that peace. Stop robbing yourself of the comfort of his presence by ignoring him. Stop wasting your life because you're unwilling to be seen as wasteful by the world or your misguided Christian friends or family. There's no better time than today, certainly as we enter into the Christmas season, to evaluate where you are before the one whose birth we celebrate. As we buy gifts for loved ones, let us remember the greatest gift of love that has ever been given. That gift is the gift of God to man, the gift of himself, the gift of his life here on earth, the gift of his death on the cross, the gift of his resurrection from the dead. Take inventory today of your heart. Is there true and sincere worship for God lodged there in the deepest part of you? Is your life attended by sacrifice to God who sacrificed so much more for you? Is your worship attended with humility that makes much of God and little of yourself? Does your life have a pleasantness afforded by true and sincere worship of God? Do you understand why we worship God? Do you get it? Do you understand why we're here? Do you understand why we try with such passion that God will give us to convince you that the only way to live your life is for him and that we have an eternity at home that we all headed to that know him and it's worth giving everything up in your life to find it? Is your worship motivated by that understanding or is it motivated merely by a desire to look Christian in order to fool others around you? Is God calling you to great sacrifice? Have others discouraged you from following that call before? Or do you hesitate obeying God because you fear that others will just not understand you, will doubt you, or try to discourage you? As Mary came with her sacrifice, I believe she knew very well that many would not understand and many would call her wasteful and worse, but she didn't care. Or at least she cared much less about what man thought of her than what she cared about how God saw her in this sincere act of worship. I believe that's all. Pray that God would bless His word in your heart and that we would obey if He is calling.