The Unused Bottle

I have a story that I have told for some years about an empty bottle. Now I have a new twist for it. A man bought a bottle of perfume in Paris at a very good price and brought it home under his customs deduction. It was very expensive perfume in a very beautiful bottle. His wife was proud of it, and used the perfume until it was all gone. Even then she kept the bottle on her boudoir table so that her friends, in coming into her room, would say, "Oh, that was such-and-such perfume." There came a function for which she wished some of this expensive scent, but the bottle was empty, so she put a handkerchief into the bottle and closed it. After a day there was enough of the perfume on the handkerchief to give a faint fragrance, but after that it was all gone. There was still enough odor around the bottle so that someone could say, "Oh, that was such-and-such." Many people in our churches are like that. If you come near them and listen to their conversation you may be able to say, "Oh, grandfather was a Christian," but as far as they are concerned, the bottle is empty. They have no life and fragrance of Christ.

Once I told the story that way and at the close of the meeting was walking down the street to my hotel. I overtook three people who had evidently been at the church service, and one of them was saying, "I liked that story that he told about the perfume bottle because it reminded me of a very expensive perfume that Frank brought me from Paris. It is a beautiful bottle, but I have never broken the seal. It sits right there on my dresser and the light shines through it. It is a beautiful amber."

I broke into the conversation. They recognized me and laughed that I should have overheard them. "But," I said, "don't you see that the perfume was given to you for use? And what an illustration that is. There are so many Christians who have been given so much, but they keep it tightly sealed in themselves. No one passing near would know for a moment that they have the life of God in them, for not even the tiniest particle of the essence is allowed to come forth. And the wonderful thing about God's perfume is that as fast as we waft it forth He keeps filling the bottle and it would seem that its fragrance changes and grows and is more glorious every time we send it forth. That is God's way." "Now thanks be to God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the perfume of his knowledge by us in every place" (2 Cor. 2:14).

1. This story is a lot like the Parable of the ten talents, how do these two stories parallel to make Dr. Barnhouse’s point?
2. Have we examined our lives to see if we are being a good steward of the Gospel?