God will remember every deed of love, every forgetting of self, every emptying out of life.
Though we work in obscurest places, where no human tongue shall ever voice our praise, still there is a record kept, and some day rich and glorious reward will be given.

Is not God's praise better than man's?
"Ungathered beauties of a bounteous earth, Wild flowers which grow on mountain-paths untrod.
White water-lilies looking up to God From solitary tarns--and human worth Doing meek duty that no glory gains, Heroic souls in secret places sown, To live, to suffer, and to die unknown-- Are not that loveliness and all these pains Wasted?
Alas, then does it not suffice That God is on the mountain, by the lake, And in each simple duty, for whose sake His children give their very blood as price?
The Father sees.

If this does not repay, What else?
For plucked flowers fade and praises slay." Mary's ointment was wasted when she broke the vase and poured it upon her Lord.

Yes; but suppose she had left the ointment in the unbroken vase?
What remembrance would it then have had?
Would there have been any mention of it on the Gospel pages?
Would her deed of careful keeping have been told over all the world?
She broke the vase and poured it out, lost it, sacrificed it, and now the perfume fills all the earth.

We may keep our life if we will, carefully preserving it from waste; but we shall have no reward, no honor from it, at the last.
But if we empty it out in loving service, we shall make it a lasting blessing to the world, and we shall be remembered forever..