Perfume from the Titanic

Deep-sea divers recently recovered a leather case containing 40 small vials of perfume oil from the wreck of the Titanic. The little bottles, which probably would have been sold in New York as the ingredients for cologne, belonged to a businessman from Manchester, England. When they pulled the case from the water, the fragrance of the oils filled the air, after almost a century.

“To smell something that smells the same as it did on the Titanic before it went down is simply incredible,” said Graham Jessop, an expert in the retrieval of such artifacts.

My wife would say that must be good perfume. A dab lasts a long time.

One time a woman slipped into the dining room after dinner,carrying a small flask. She broke it open and poured it on the head of the honored guest. The room was filled with the smell of very expensive perfume. “What a waste,” some of the guests said. “We could have sold that and helped the poor.” It cost almost a year’s pay.

The man she anointed cut their complaints short. “She’s done a beautiful thing. When she poured this perfume on my body, she did it to prepare me for burial. I 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 so it has. Because of her love for Jesus, the woman risked rebuke from the crowd and gave the very best she had, from motives as pure as the oil she offered. But even now, two thousand years later, her sacrifice is remembered, to her credit. Her sacrifice smells as sweet now as it did then. And that is simply incredible.

But in God’s economy, it’s the incredible things that count most, the things that are hardest to understand and to believe. Even today, Jesus calls us to give our best—our best service, our best offering, sometimes our last dollar. In the back-to-school season, when our plans are fresh and programs are cranking up again, we may sometimes wonder if it’s really worth it. Does anyone really know or care how much church leaders sacrifice in God’s service?

God does.

And our service is a sweet-smelling sacrifice to him. It will always be remembered.

“Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain” (1 Corinthians 15:58).

Eric Reed is editor of Leadership journal.

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