Devotion to Jesus

Context

Fifth Sunday of Lent. The last Sunday of Preparation before we enter Holy Week, the week of Jesus’ passion.

Our Scripture lesson is also located immediately before the beginning of Holy Week. Six days before the Passover, to be exact. A Saturday night.

Jesus is at the home of Lazarus in the Bethany, just outside of Jerusalem, where within the week he will be betrayed by one of his own disciples and be put to death.

I believe he has come to Bethany to be with Lazarus and his two sisters, Martha and Mary, because he has a special bond with them. He wants to be near those who love him before he enters into his suffering.

We know Jesus was very close to the family at Bethany from stories told elsewhere in the gospels.

Luke 10. Mary sat near Jesus and learned from him.

John 11.

Jesus said, I am the resurrection…do you believe this? Martha: confessed: you are the Messiah, the Son of God, who has come into the world.

Most famously, Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead because he “loved him”.

Jesus with the family at Bethany a special bond, especially in connection with his intimate teaching on death and resurrection.

Text

John 12:1–8 NRSV

Six days before the Passover Jesus came to Bethany, the home of Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. There they gave a dinner for him. Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those at the table with him. Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard, anointed Jesus’ feet, and wiped them with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (the one who was about to betray him), said, “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?” (He said this not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief; he kept the common purse and used to steal what was put into it.) Jesus said, “Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial. You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.”

Introduction

Exegesis

Jesus is at the home of Lazarus and his two sisters, Mary and Martha. His apostles are with him.

They gave a dinner for him. In honor of him.

they sensed Jesus was at a juncture in his ministry.

He has been intimating that he was going to die in Jerusalem and be raised from the dead.

This idea met with confusion and resistance from his disciples, but seemed to be understood by the Bethany family.

After dinner it would have been customary to have conversation. Jesus may have been teaching again about his death. A last week ahead of him.

This a kind of “last Supper” — before his passion week. A calm before the storm as it were.

Mary makes the most of the moment. She has prepared something for Jesus.

She goes to her room and gets a special treasure. A pound of costly perfume. Pure nard.

A scented ointment imported from the Himalayas in alabaster boxes and opened on special occasions.

Jerusalem and the Himalayas are located on opposite ends of the Asian continent, with the Himalayas being in the east and Jerusalem in the west, making the distance between them roughly 4,000 miles.

Estimates are that it was worth almost a year’s worth of wages.

She has saved up for it. Now she takes it out. She goes to Jesus feet and pours the perfume over his feet and begins to wipe them with her hair.

Love. It is an incredibly intimate moment. She lets down her hair, which usually a woman would be reticent to do with any man but her husband.

Service. She uses her hair to wipe his feet, an act of utter humility. A slave would use a towel to wash a master’s feet. She uses her hair.

Worship. The house is filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

The language used here is reminiscent of how the smell of incense would fill the temple. The incense represented the prayers of the people and the presence of God.

Grief. The temple also a place of sacrifice.

Mary actions hints at this too. For Mary anoints Jesus’ feet, not his head. Usually priests and kings were anointed on the head. Mary anoints his feet. The feet were anointed only when one was preparing a body for burial.

Mary is showing love, service, worship, grief. All rolled into one. UTTER DEVOTION.

Did all this symbolism register with those present. Seemingly no. Though all were probably stunned at this act.

Until one speaks up. Judas.

Why wasn’t this perfume sold and the money given to the poor?

How it must have intruded into the moment

Utterly generous, to wasteful. From insightful, to foolish.

He criminalizes Mary’s motives for offering the gesture, and Jesus’ character for accepting it.

Jesus knows Judas’ heart - Judas is a thief and is controlled by the love of money. He will later sell Jesus to his persecutors for 30 pieces of silver.

Judas is the one whose values are out of order. He shows his duplicity.

Jesus is a means to an end. The love for him that others have can be used to generate money.

But Jesus comes to Mary’s defense. He quotes scripture. Deuteronomy 15:11 “Since there will never cease to be some in need on the earth, I therefore command you, “Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.””

You always have the poor, but you do not always have me. Jesus is not saying that the poor are not to be cared for…but is contrasting a perpetual obligation to do good, with the unique, unrepeatable, moment at hand.

Mary is showing appropriate devotion to Jesus at the greatest moment in the history of the world.

Jesus is going to die for all the poor sinners.

Jesus knows that this is Mary’s intention.

Mary has saved this up. For me. For my burial. Jesus knows what it means to Mary, she is saying goodbye and thank you.

Leave her alone. She is on holy ground.

And the house was filled with perfume of loves and worship and sacrifice. Mary and Jesus looked at each other in solemn devotion - Savior and saved.

Interpretation

On this evening, two ways of relating to Jesus are illustrated.

The wrong way exemplified by Judas is to love Jesus as a means to an end. Judas “loved” Jesus because he could get money from the arrangement.

Incredible? Not really.

Many of us are in romantic relationships: why do I love this person: they make me feel special, they make me laugh, they give me security…Not a word about the other person…

Its not wrong to gain from a relationship of course, we just don’t want to be use to the person we say we love. They have needs and purposes too.

We want to give to them.

Same in our relationship with Jesus. We can be tempted to love Jesus in an instrumental way.

“love” Jesus because we want that relationship to result in us obtaining things we desire other than Jesus himself — health, wealth, security, safety, preferential treatment.

For me, the temptation toward instrumental love with Jesus has been to obtain knowledge from him.

Sometimes I “love” Jesus because I want to understand things about the Bible, religion, about the spiritual life.

Seems innocent enough: Jesus is the way the truth and the life. So it is correct that these are only gained from him.

But it is wrong to want these things from Jesus, rather than to want Jesus himself.

As if at the dinner. Mary anoints Jesus. And I say: why the grand gesture…just explain to us how atonement for sin works.

And I would be missing the moment to actually love jesus as he loves me.

Mary shows the right way. To love Jesus for himself.

This is a good love because it reciprocates the love God has for us.

God sent his son Jesus into the world to die for sins for no other reason than because he loves us.

He did not send Jesus to gain glory for himself. Perfectly glorious.

Not praise. God is perfect and complete in the divine self. He needs nothing from us.

Not to gain power, for he made heaven and earth.

Not to gain knowledge, he knows everything.

He did not send Jesus because we deserve it. No we sin against God. All have strayed.

He did not send Jesus because we were so lovely. While we were his enemies.

There was nothing in us or lacking in God that prompted him to send his Son Jesus into the world to die for us — there was only love.

GOD SENT JESUS BECAUSE HE LOVES US.

In love God created all things. In love God created us. In love God has sent his Son. In love Jesus died. In love God raised him from the dead. In love God gives life to all who trust in Jesus.

God loves, which means God gives.

Mary loves God back. She loves God by loving Jesus God in the flesh about to die for her and everyone in the room and all around the world and throughout time.

She gives herself completely to Jesus the way Jesus gives himself to her and to the world.

In so doing gained a moment with Jesus that stands forever, a moment of connection, a moment of true devotion, true abandon, not caring what anyone thinks or what she will need later…only Jesus.

Application

O to be able to express love and devotion to Jesus the way Mary did.

Don’t our hearts desire to be free to love Jesus fully!

O to be devoted to Jesus so much as to let other things go, as Jesus taught over and over.

the Kingdom of God is like a merchant looking for a pearl of great price. He finds the perfect pearl, so he sells everything he and buys it.

Jesus gave up everything for us. Will we give up for him?

The kingdom of God is like a man who found a treasure in a field. So he sold everything he had and bought that field.

Jesus died for us and was buried for us, will we sell everything to obtain him.

The kingdom of God is like a woman sold everything she had to buy perfume to anoint his body.

Jesus suffered for us, o that we could be truly thankful.

Communion.

Offering and Tithes are like a symbol of this desire. We give a little every week to show that what we really want to give is our whole selves. But can we also give our whole selves?

Make our lives a devotion that we treasure in eternity? You gave yourself to me, and I did not withhold myself from you.

Conclusion