Alright, let's take our Bibles
this evening and turn to Mark chapter 14. Mark chapter 14. I'm going to deal with the first
nine verses, and it's concerning a woman that the scripture declares,
according to the word of the Lord, wrought a good work on
the Lord Jesus Christ. The scripture begins in verse
1, Mark 14, after two days was the feast of the Passover and
of unleavened bread. And the chief priest and the
scribes sought how they might take him by craft and put him
to death. But they said, not on the feast
day, lest there be an uproar of the people. Now, it's two
days. before the feast of the Passover. Two days before the Lord of Glory
will lay down His life for the sheep. It was to this end that
the Lord had come into this world to finish the work that was given
Him by the Father according to God's everlasting covenant of
grace. And now here's the Lord. And though when we look at this
passage of Scripture, it will appear as though that these things
just happen to fall out. Here is the Lord of Glory ordering
all these things. Everything that's happening is
happening absolutely according to His goodwill and His purpose. He worketh all things after His
will. Now, found within the unfolding
of God's eternal will and counsel for the death the burial, the
resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, found within all the
workings of His ministry is carnal man's desire to resist everything
that God has purposed, everything that God has decreed. And the
Lord is allowing them to be exactly where they are. These chief priests
the Scripture sets forth, they're seeking how they might take the
Lord by craft, that is, by deceit. They want to use Him. They want to use some bait. They
want to grasp hold of Him and put Him away. So they've got
a plan. But they said, let's don't do
this on the feast day. There's going to be an uproar.
of the people. So here's the Lord and He's walking
among the people and He's been proven by Almighty God by signs
and wonders and miracles. But these that despised Him and
hated Him, they didn't see it. They didn't see Him as the Messiah.
That sight takes a miracle of God's grace. God's going to have
to do something for man that man can't do for himself. The
scripture says, John 3, 3, Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily,
verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, born from
above, born from heaven, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Men and women will sit in the
midst of God's people. And they're hearing the same
words that are being heard by God's people. But they don't
see. They're hearing with a natural
ear, not with a new ear, a new heart. And so the Lord is in
this place and plotting against, and He knows. He knows. He knows the hearts of men. And here they are thinking, that
what they desire, that is to take him and put him away and
put him to death, they want to kill him, they think that they're
going to be able to accomplish it. But we can't do this right
now. Let's just hold off on this thing.
Now this shows you how men mean that which they do for evil against
God, but the Lord meant it for good. What did they want to do?
Well, they want to kill him. What was the reason that the
Lord Jesus Christ came into the world? To lay down his life for
the sheep. But the Lord said, no man takes
my life from me. I lay it down. They wanted him
dead. But they didn't want to offend
the people. They wanted to kill him. But let's don't do it on
the feast day. We don't want there to be a riot.
Why, they love the praise of men more than the praise of God. They love darkness rather than
light. And remember, this attitude of
this man-centered, free-will rebellion against God is the
attitude of every man, every woman born in Adam. That's their
desire. They desire to kill God. They have a heart that despises
Him. That's what the Scripture means
when it says the carnal heart is enmity against God. It's not in submission to the
Lord, neither can be. But though they feared men and
not God, Though they plotted to eliminate the one before whom
they are surely going to stand, give account, they were accomplishing
the absolute will of Almighty God. Hold your place right there.
Turn with me to Acts 2. Acts chapter 2 verse 22. This is on the day of Pentecost.
Now some of these very ones that hated the Lord, that plotted
against him, that schemed and tried to connive. We're going
to kill him, but we're not going to kill him on the feast day.
We're not going to kill him on the day of the Passover. That's
the very day in which he's going to be killed. In fact, he's going
to be killed at the exact moment when the sacrifice, the afternoon,
three o'clock in the afternoon, when that sacrifice was being
offered by the priest, many of these right here that just, you
know, said, you know, let's get rid of him. He's gonna be offered
at that exact moment, because while they're there in the temple,
whenever the Lord gives up the ghost, what happened? God rent
that veil. from top to bottom, he's gonna
die exactly on time. But here they are, these that
have plotted, connived against him and they're making their
case, building their scheme and everything like this. But what
happens on the day of Pentecost? Look at Acts 2, 22. Apostle Peter
says, you men of Israel, hear these words, Jesus of Nazareth,
a man approved of God among you by miracles, wonders, and signs
which God did by him in the midst of you as ye yourselves also
know him being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge
of God ye have taken and by wicked hands have crucified and slain
whom God has raised up having loosed the pains of death because
it was not possible that he should be holding of it. So here's some
of these. They're plotting against the
Lord. And Almighty God is going to
call them to record on the day of Pentecost. They heard what
Peter said, but here's what they're doing. They've got these evil
plans. And these plans were secret to
the masses, but not to the Lord. Matthew 26.2 of this very account
says, you know that after two days, and here's the Lord speaking,
after two days is the feast of the Passover, and the Son of
Man is betrayed to be crucified. Do you think the Lord knew when
they were going to bring Him and accuse Him and betray Him? Do you think He knew when Judas
would kiss Him? Do you think He knew when all
this would fall out? They desired to put him away
for he exposed them for their fallacy, for their being frauds. And what they purposed to do
was going to magnify the Redeemer. They were going to kill him.
Yeah, you're going to be the means by which God's going to
put his son to death. But the Lord said, you didn't
kill him. I laid down my life. Proverbs 16.33 says, the lot
is cast into the lap. The whole disposing thereof is
of the Lord. God works all things for His
glory, for the good of His people. Back in Mark 14, verse 3 says,
And being in Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper, as
he set it meet, there came a woman, having an alabaster box of ointment
of spikenard, Very costly. And she broke the box and poured
it on his head. Now, this is where he is. Now notice where he chose to
have all of this honor bestowed upon him. Look where the Lord
chose. Remember, he worketh all things
after the counsel of his own will. So he's in Bethany in the
house of Simon the leper. Who ordered that? The Lord did. And here comes a woman in this
leper's house. Let me say this before I go into
what happened with the woman. That house of Simon the leper. Leprosy in the scriptures is
a picture and type of sin. And there was no human cure for
leprosy just as there is no human cure for sin. And leprosy, what
it did was it separated men. Whenever a leper would be coming
down he had to keep his distance and whenever he would be approaching
someone he had to cover his mouth and cry out, unclean, unclean.
They knew, don't come near me. Just as leprosy separated men
from men, sin separates men from God. Isaiah 59 says, But your
iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins
have hid His face from you, that He will not hear. He will not hear. Oh, how we
need a priest. How we need one to speak for
us. how we need one to approach God
for us. Why? Because God won't hear.
A leper could have no interaction or communion with other men,
and fellowship could only be re-established for a leper whenever
a leper was pronounced clean by the priest. And likewise,
the priest of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, is the only one that
can make a spiritual leper clean. And that, by the application
of His blood, by the covering, by the atonement of the blood,
the blood that washes white as snow. That's always amazed me.
Those that have their robes washed white. Have you ever gotten any
blood on something? If you don't get it out, it's
going to stain. You know that. But I think about
the purity of his blood, the purity of his blood that washes
white. We don't know anything about
that, do we? We don't understand the efficacy of that precious
blood that washes whiter than snow, the scripture says. And
that's this leprosy. It was a defiling, it was an
odious disease, and it had one end, death. He was a walking dead man. Unless
God was pleased to heal him, he's going to die. There's no way out. Leprosy was,
but for the grace of God, 100% fatal. Oh, and the wages of sin?
100% fatal. But here, this man, In Bethany, the house of Simon
the leper, here was one that obviously the Lord was pleased
to cleanse. Here's a miracle of God's grace. Here was one that was a former
leper, but the Spirit of God never allowed him or any of us
to forget it. What did the Spirit of God call
him? Simon the leper. Every believer
remembers the slew of despond from which he's been dug. Like
Matthew the publican. Nobody called Matthew the publican
except Matthew. You'll find that in the book
of Matthew. Matthew the publican. Paul the chief of sinners. By the grace of God, I am what
I am. So here's the Lord in a house,
the house of Simon the leper. What an honor for this leper,
former leper, to have the Lord of glory there. And while the
Lord is in this house, the scripture says in verse 3, as he said it
meet, there came a woman having an alabaster box of ointment,
spikenard, very precious. Now the amazing thing, there's
speculation on who this woman was. Some say it was Mary, the
sister of Lazarus. Some say it was Mary Magdalene. Here's what the Spirit of God
said about her. A woman. She was a woman. That's all we
know. There came a woman having this
box. It was an alabaster box, but
this woman is without a doubt a beautiful picture of every
vessel of God's mercy. She had one thought on her mind. Him. Him. She had one desire to come to
him. She's like that woman with the
issue of blood. If I can touch but the hem of his garment, I
will be made whole. The scripture declares that she
came to him. Matthew's account says there
came unto him a woman having an alabaster box. Here is a woman
that is a type and picture and shadow of every vessel of God's
mercy. And what she had in her hands
set forth and glorified only the Master that she loved. She
held a precious alabaster box in her hand, a beautiful picture
of the humanity of the Lord Jesus Christ. Alabaster is a stone
from which that box was made, but is that not a fit type of
the Lord Jesus Christ, the rock? Restricted by Moses, the rock
in whom all the people of God are hidden. Is that not a picture
of Him, the rock upon which the church is built, the foundation,
the cornerstone Himself? So here was a box. I don't know
how big it was, but it was a box. It was a stone box. A picture of the humanity of
Christ. And inside that box, there was
some perfume. It was called spike nard, made
by the crushing of an herb, nard. Nard is what it was made from.
They crush it and it was a precious, a precious ointment. In fact,
one account says, well we'll say it in just a minute, they
said it could have been sold and could have sold 300 pence.
Pence was one day's wages. So what she had in her box was
a very expensive, about a year's wages for a working man. And
she has this alabaster box, and inside was that precious ointment. And do we not immediately, does
our mind, our heart not fly to the Lord Jesus Christ and his
blood? That precious ointment within
him, the blood that God says, when I see, I'll pass over his
people, That ointment that was in that box, that stone box,
it could be enjoyed, experienced, and have the fragrance of. To those around, it could only
be experienced one way. The box was going to have to
be broken. It was a sealed box. And the Scripture says that this
woman, she came And she had an alabaster box of spikenard, very
precious, and she'd break the box. She'd break the box. Was it not the Lord that said,
this is my body, which is broken for you? When we take the Lord's
Supper, we read that precious passage of Scripture where the
Lord said concerning His body, He said, this body is broken
for you. I lay down for you. box when
she broke it. Beautiful picture of the Lord
Jesus being smitten of God. That precious ointment, the blood
of Christ might flow forth into life everlasting to every chosen
vessel of God's mercy and compassion. So she took it and she break
the box. Now this woman When she broke
that box and poured it on his head, she, based on what the
Lord's getting ready to tell her, I can tell you for a fact,
she believed Him to be the Messiah. She believed God. She did what
she did, she broke it by faith. That was the setting forth of
Christ laying down His life and shedding His own blood. She took
it and broke that and poured it on His head, onto His burial. And that act of faith, she was
saying, this is the man of Christ Jesus. It gives His body to be
broken. And when she poured that precious
ointment on Him, She set forth that God's debt, I mean God's
law that demanded the debt that had been incurred by God's people
be paid. That debt to that broken law
was put away, it was paid, it was finished. The justice of
God had been satisfied for God's elect. What she did was a precious
act of faith. But with that precious act of
faith, I want you to look at the disrespect that was shown
to that woman. Verse 4 and 5, there were some
that had indignation. Matthew's account tells us who
those some were. It says when his disciples saw
it. That's Matthew 26. They had indignation
and said, to what purpose is this waste? Says there were some
that had indignation within themselves and said, why was this waste
of the ointment made? Now, I want you to notice something
here. They didn't say it out loud. They didn't say that out loud.
Verse 4 says, there were some there that had indignation within
themselves and said, obviously in their hearts, they had it
in themselves. Why was this waste of the ointment made? And in
themselves thinking, this might have been sold for more than
300 pence, been given to the poor, and they murmured against
her. But who heard it? who heard what they said within
themselves and had indignation within themselves. The Lord heard
it. What did they do? They judged
her. They judged her action based
on what they thought was the right thing to do. They did not
see her faith. The Lord did. Oh, how quickly
we're reminded that the best of men, these were the Lord's
disciples that did this, the best of men are but men, frail,
forgetful, insensitive creatures of dust in which the treasure
of the gospel has been imparted. Honor is given unto the Lord
by this woman. She didn't say anything. She never said anything. She
walked in, she broke that box and poured it on His head. And
they had indignation within themselves. But the Lord who promised to
never leave nor forsake His own immediately flew to her defense. And the Lord said in verse 6,
the Lord said, You let her alone. Why trouble ye her? She has wrought
a good work on me. That's an amazing statement.
She has wrought a good work on me. What the Lord said she did,
she did. She honored Him as the Messiah,
the Savior of sinners. Therefore, the Lord said, That
was a good work. He knew her intent. He knew her
love. He knew her desire. Her work
was obviously out of a thankful heart to her Lord, a heart made
willing in the day of God's power, a work done for the glory of
God. That's what Scripture says, 1 Corinthians 10.31. Whether
therefore you eat or drink, whatever you do, do it to the glory of
God. The Lord said, you have the poor with you always, and
whensoever you will, you may do them good, but me you have
not always. Men by nature do what they do
for other men to be seen of men. That's the general intent. But the Lord said in verse 8,
she hath done what she That to me is the most convicting
passage of scripture that I can read. She had done what she could. What a blessing, what faithfulness,
what generosity, what sacrifice. How many of us truthfully can
say, I've done all that I could possibly do. I've done everything
I could. The Lord said concerning a certain
poor widow casting in two mites. The Lord said this woman's given
more than all the others. She gave all that she had. She had two mites and she gave
them. She gave all that she had. This woman took an alabaster
box and she broke it. She said, it's a year's wages,
man. Well, what is that? I don't know. A year's wages
to one can be a lot less or a lot more than a year's wages. But
whatever it is, if it's a year's wages to you, it's a lot. She
took and broke that. He said she wrought a good work.
And then he said this concerning this woman. He said, verily I
say unto you, where so ever this gospel shall be preached throughout
the whole world. This also that she hath done
shall be spoken of for a memorial of her." I've often wondered
how many people that's ever said in church has never heard of
the woman with the alabaster box. We've all heard that story. And
the Lord has promised. He said that woman is going to
be remembered for what she did. It's going to be wherever the
gospel is preached. It's going to be for a memorial to her.
Now in closing, let me tell you something about a good work. Number one, according to what
this woman did and what the Lord said, a good work is only done
by faith It's done to the glory of God and not to be seen of
men. And as surely as I'm standing
here, I believe this. No man, no woman ever sees that
which they do as a good work. What we see is the attitude of
Paul the Apostle. Oh, wretched man that I am. Only the Lord sees a good work. You know there will be many,
the Scripture says, It will stand before the Lord, and this is
recorded in Matthew chapter 7. Many will say unto the Lord in
that day, Lord, Lord, have we not wrought many good works? Many works. We've prophesied,
we've cast out devils, we've done many, many. Only the Lord
sees a good work. Not me, not you. Only the Lord
can see a good work, because only the Lord can see faith.
Someone can do something and someone can say, I can't see
why you did that. I don't understand that. Yeah,
but you're judging. That's what judging is. That's when you're
judging the intent of what somebody does. This woman did what she
did for the Lord Jesus Christ. So no believer ever sees themselves
as ever. Ask a believer, have you ever
done anything that's good? They won't even have to think
about that one. But there's come a time when the Lord says, that
He's going to divide the sheep from the goats, and He's going
to put the sheep on His right hand, the goats on His left,
and He's going to say to those on His right hand, enter in. Well done. Thou good and faithful
servant. All that we've ever done, all
that we've ever desired to do, has all of its merit only in
the Lord Jesus Christ. that which He has done, charged
to our count. This woman believed God. She believed Him by faith. Where'd
she get the faith? The Lord gave it to her. She
desired to seek after Him. She desired to come to Him. How
was she made willing in the day of God's power? We're not going
to have anything to glory in. But when the Lord declares that
this woman had wrought a good work, She wrought a good work
to the glory and praise of the Lord Jesus Christ and for the
good and comfort and rest in Christ of the believer. I pray
that God bless this message to our heart for Christ's sake.