Scripture: John 12:1-8; Philippians 3:4-14 Series: Lent
When we encounter Jesus we are called, like Mary at Bethany, to extravagant, relational self-offering rather than utilitarian efficiency, both giving lavishly and graciously letting others give in return.
Illustrations: passover-cleaning-leaven, visitors-during-cleaning, judas-perfume-meme, covenant-food-pantry, pastor-not-delegating, spock-needs-of-the-many, meat-grinder-of-existence
April 6
Philippians 3:4-14
even though I, too, have reason for confidence in the flesh. If anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.
Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ. More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal, but I press on to lay hold of that for which Christ has laid hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider that I have laid hold of it, but one thing I have laid hold of: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal, toward the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus. - Philippians 3:4-14
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 reclining with him. Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard, anointed Jesus’s 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.” John 12:1-8
The Bible has some confounding moments. It’s honestly one of the things I like about it. I like that it’s not super clear. Some things are clearer, some things are really not clear. Sacred books in other religions are a lot more straightforward than the Christian Bible. Our belief is not in our knowledge of God or our knowledge of Jesus, but in Jesus.
In the gospel of John, our gospel passage for today, we get a confounding moment. Jesus is visiting Bethany on the way to Jerusalem. This is six days before his final passover. It is a time of preparation for the household. Jews are going through their house. Mary and Martha at this time and Lazarus (if he’s feeling up for it) are going through their house and getting rid of all the leavened goods in the house, the yeasted breads. They are cleaning or replacing anything that’s touched those yeasted breads They’re cleaning everything out. This is when Jesus comes to visit. It is a confounding time to visit. I don’t know about you all, but it can be hard for us to receive visitors in the middle of cleaning; when the house is turned upside down. Someone shows up early and it is hard to know where our focus should be.
It is during this time that Mary does something flamboyant, extravagant. She anoints Jesus. More than anointing, she prepares his body for burial. Amazingly, Jesus receives it.
Which gets us to Judas. And for me, gets me to this meme from a few years ago.
Judas points out something very clear. You know, it’s a waste. Why’d you waste that on on Jesus? You could have given it to the poor.
And then Jesus says one of these more confounding statements that he’s known to say: you always have the poor, you will not always have me.
Now, this verse can be taken in a number of different ways. One way, the most crass way, would be to say that Jesus is justifying letting the poor die. I don’t think that’s what he means, but people can read into the Bible what they want. I can imagine some Christians abusing the scripture to say you shouldn’t give money to people in need and instead you should give it to the church because we should give to Jesus. I believe in the ministries of this church what we are doing at Covenant and who we are and supporting what we do, but we are not Jesus. We are not God and guilt is not step towards generosity of spirit.
To think that this is what Jesus means is for Jesus to contradict himself and what he says in many other passages in the other gospels. Jesus doesn’t contradict himself so I don’t think this is a fair reading either.
I think that there are a few things going on with just this one verse and that each is very profound. One is, again, to think about Mary preparing Jesus’ body for burial. Jesus alludes to this fact when he says, “She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial.” Mary is the one who understands what is going to happen in Jerusalem. She understands because she paid attention. She contemplated Jesus. She knelt at his feet when he was there before. She knew. She didn’t yell at him like Peter, but anointed him, prepared him, blessed him for this. I think this is one way to read it. Another is to think that Mary is giving a great gift to Jesus and he receives it.
There’s a concept in Judaism called a mitsvot, which is like an act of kindness or a good work. There is a concept about offering the opportunity for someone else to do mitzvot.
Let’s think about it with our food pantry. I love it how we have a number of amazing volunteers who come there each week, sometimes multiple times a week, to make it possible for us to feed hundreds. One of the reasons why that ministry has been able to grow and be sustained is that the leadership of that ministry is consistently offering people the opportunity to do a mitsvot, to do a good thing. They don’t have a closed off mindset. I have been a part of ministries in the past where there were a set of volunteers and they didn’t want other people to come. They had their duty and their job and that was that. That’s not what it’s like at the food pantry. If you haven’t had a chance to see it or help, come by on Wednesday afternoons, not the third Wednesdays, but on most Wednesday afternoons from 3:30 to 5:30. The parking lot will be packed like it’s Easter morning. and there are a lot of new clients who come every week: a lot of people from Hondures and El Salvador, Cuba, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Ukraine. They come through and are given a lot of food, a lot of good food, a lot of protein, fresh produce, shelf stable goods, a lot of bonus things at the end, sometimes there are cakes or breads or candies or random drinks.
It’s important to offer people an opportunity for a mitszvot, for good deed, as a church and a ministry. Nobody does it to save themselves but because Jesus already saved them.
I think it allows for a ministry to thrive when there’s opportunity for others to join in. I think it’s also important in interpersonal things. It’s a hard lesson for me. I’m a very independent minded person. I like to take care of things because then they’re done and sometimes(or all the time) in a previous appointments, I would never delegate and never ask people to do a thing because then I didn’t know if it would be done. If I did it, it would be done, and it would be done to a level that I was satisfied with.
But what I did in those cases is I took away the opportunity of someone to do a mitzvot. I took that away.
If someone is earnestly giving you a gift or a chance to do good, it’s not for you to turn it down, but to let them do that. It matters. Jesus was giving Mary an opportunity to perform a mitzvot on him, and Judas was trying to take it away. Judas was saying this is not efficient. This is not an efficient use of church resources and it’s gotta be shut down. I don’t really wanna make a joke about a committee going around shutting down things.
Judas was not thinking about the relationships, but about the results I don’t even want to think about what Judas is gonna do during holy week, but just right here.
What Judas says here comes down to a utilitarian argument that is best pronounced by Commander Spock in the second Star Trek movie, the Wrath of Khan, when, spoiler alert, Spock sacrifices himself at the very end to save the ship and he says, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one.
This is what Judas is saying: the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. We should be doing the most good with what we have. We should be efficient with our resources and not wasteful. This seems like a reasonable argument to make.
Then Jesus says, we’ll always have the poor, but you won’t always have me. Is Jesus making an economic argument here? I don’t think so. I don’t think Jesus is trying to make an argument about economic inequality in Roman Palestine. What I think Jesus is pointing out here is that the world will not stop smashing people. There will always be people rejected by this world, this cruel and broken world. The meat grinder of existence is not going to stop unless the God who created everything does something about it. That is why Jesus came to the earth as a child, why he came to save us until all will be made well and all will be made well.
In this Season of Lent, our call is that when we encounter Jesus, we need to give, to anoint, to offer, to not think of the efficiencies, to not think of the externalities because you know what Jesus does when he sees us, he gives. He offers. He loves. He anoints. He walks that journey, that long, dark road, he walks it for us.
So let us not be afraid to receive gifts. To offer others the opportunity for a mitzvot. And may we have the faith to see Jesus as Mary does. Let us take the opportunity to be extravagant in our faith, to go over the top like Mary, to love Jesus so much it makes the Judas’s of this world uncomfortable.
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.