Sermon Tone Analysis

In the movie Jerry Maguire, Jerry - a sports agent - is more concerned about his job than his wife.

Their marriage looks like it’s over until he comes to his senses and goes to talk to his wife.

He enters a room full of women that quiets down when he says,

‘Hello.

Hello.

I’m looking for my wife.”

She stands quietly.

In front of all these women Jerry says, ‘Okay.

Okay.

If this is where it has to happen, then this is where it has to happen.

I’m not letting you get rid of me.

How about that?’

Then Jerry starts to apologize and win her back.

But before he can finish his speech, his wife shuts him down & utters what has become a classic movie line…

“You had me at hello.

You had me at hello.”

Fully Forgiven.

He didn’t have to say all that right words, he just had to step back through the door.

Have you ever been forgiven like THAT…when you humbled yourself & walked back through the door?

Maybe you were forgiven by a spouse, a friend, or even a former enemy.

You humbled yourself, walked back through the door, and experienced what it was like to be Fully Forgiven.

But I have another question…if today were your last day on planet earth, can you trust you would stand before your Creator…Fully Forgiven?

How is that even possible?

Today we find out as we peek in on one of the most powerful scenes of forgiveness in all the Bible.

I realize that I taught from this same passage in March of last year during the ‘Not a Fan’ series, so I considered skipping this, but I trust that God is going to help us view the same story from a different angle.

As some of you have been reading the Gospels this week, I bet you read some things you have read before…but God used it AGAIN in your life.

I pray that happens again today.

PRAY

Luke 7:36 (NIV)

36 When one of the Pharisees invited Jesus to have dinner with him, he went to the Pharisee’s house and reclined at the table.

Context: Last week we read how Jesus said, “The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.”

This is the kind of language that Luke mentions coming from the mouths of the religious leaders and it is clear that Jesus wasn’t voted ‘most likely to be the Messiah’ in the Pharisees’ yearbook.

As will become obvious soon, this Pharisee didn’t roll out the red carpet.

We don’t know his intentions, but he likely wanted to have a one-on-one discussion about what Jesus had been teaching.

Maybe he wanted to set this ‘young buck’ straight or at least try to figure him out.

Luke says they reclined at the table.

This was a custom where banquet guests reclined on couches, resting on their left elbows with their feet extended away from the table.

This insight will become important in a moment.

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So here Jesus, the Pharisee, and other guests relaxed and talked during the meal.

Now I know some child or teenager is going to say, “Let's eat while laying down in the living room...after all..it's Biblical!”

Try that with your family and some friends this week.

Now imagine the door bell ringing and uninvited people stepping into your home while you entertain guests.

They sit against the wall and listen to the conversation, sometimes entering in.

How RUDE - at least for us.

But this was the custom in those days.

Dr. Luke spotlights one uninvited person in particular.

Luke 7:37 (NIV)

37 A woman in that town who lived a sinful life learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee’s house, so she came there with an alabaster jar of perfume.

First, we don’t KNOW what sin she committed, but it is implied that she wasn’t a godly woman…and everybody knew it.

She lived a sinful life.

Whatever she had done had deeply damaged her reputation in that community.

Although the biblical text does not say, most commentators argue that this woman was either a prostitute or an adulteress.

Whatever she had done, she could not erase the stain of her sin within her town.

And because of this sin, I doubt she had ever considered entering this Pharisee’s home before…but TODAY…Jesus was there.

And regardless of what it cost her, she wasn’t going to lose this opportunity to see Him.

Dr. Luke notes that she was carrying something with her, an alabaster jar of perfume.

Alabaster was a “very fine-grained, variety of gypsum” used for carved decoration stones, vases, & figures.

A perfume jar like this usually “had a long neck which would be broken off in order to use its contents.”

The jar housed perfume.

Some women used perfume as a lure to attract men like metal to a magnet.

But this perfume would not be used to lure a man to her bed.

I wonder what kind of discussion Jesus, the Pharisee, and the others were having when this sinful woman entered and made a b-line to Jesus.

But we quickly see why she had come.

Jesus’ feet were at the edge of the couch…

Luke 7:38 (NIV)

38 As she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears.

Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them.

She had come to anoint Jesus with perfume in the bottle, but her emotions could no long stay bottled up - and they spilled out of her eyes as she wept at His feet.

This word can be translated weep or wail, “with emphasis upon the noise accompanying the weeping.”

In other words, this isn’t something the guests could just overlook.

This woman’s actions had taken center-stage.

A couple of nights ago Tonya and I were praying in our bedroom as we prayed for families that are being ripped in two.

We prayed that men would lead their families & that God would get the glory from the tragic stories that are permeating our community.

And as we prayed…I felt my right forearm getting wet and I knew she was either crying on me…or snotting on me - one of the two.

And as her tears drenched the feet of Jesus.

She did something considered disgraceful & distasteful for a Jewish woman to do in public - she took time to unbind her hair.

This would have been unacceptable…but then she began to wipe the dusty feet of Jesus with it!

Ladies: Can you imagine doing that for a man who is not your husband - even if you KNEW his feet WERE clean?

Your hair is important to you…and it was to her as well.

But she wasn’t there to impress others.

This sinful woman was there to pour her love on Jesus, an extravagant display of affection & humble act of expectation.

This woman believes that Jesus - despite her past - regardless of what others think - Jesus will receive her & forgive her.

And this woman teaches us a powerful lesson - that…

BIG TRUTH: Gratitude is the Attitude of those forgiven muchBIG TRUTH: Gratitude is the Attitude of those forgiven muchBIG TRUTH: Gratitude is the Attitude of those forgiven muchBIG TRUTH: Gratitude is the Attitude of those forgiven much

BIG TRUTH: Gratitude is the Attitude of those forgiven much

BIG TRUTH: Gratitude is the Attitude of those forgiven much

She hasn’t heard the words yet - Fully Forgiven - but she EXPECTS to.

Richard Lenski writes these penetrating words:

The sinner’s head belongs at Jesus’ feet.

The hair is woman’s crown and glory.

It is often enough abused in vanity and pride but is here used in deepest humility and devotion.

Our highest and best belongs in the dust at Jesus’ feet.

What a tender picture of a sinner approaching Jesus humbly & sincerely while Jesus receives this woman’s offering…But that’s NOT what the Pharisee was thinking…

Luke 7:39 (NIV)

39 When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is—that she is a sinner.”

2 layers to his thought:

If Jesus WAS a prophet, God would let him discern how wicked this woman is.

If he knew how wicked she was, He certainly wouldn’t allow her to touch him like this.

Of course, this Pharisee was wrong on BOTH counts.