It was just an ordinary dinner party. Martha was in the kitchen cooking, Jesus was at the table with the guys, Lazarus was there. He was telling a joke that he’d heard earlier that day at work- “A Pharisee and a priest go into a bar…” And then Mary walks in.
Mary kneels at the feet of Jesus, the honored guest. She takes his feet in her hands, she caresses them. The room falls silent. Now, that would stop conversation in a modern-day dinner party, but in that day, women weren’t even supposed to talk to men in public, not even their husbands, and here is Mary, caressing Jesus’ feet, in the middle of a dinner party. By the standards of the day, that’s just wrong.
This is the same Mary that, just a month ago, a month before this dinner party, was kneeling at Jesus’ feet and weeping. She said through her tears, “Lazarus, my brother, is dead. Jesus, if you had been here, you could have saved him.” It was Mary who was kneeling at Jesus’ feet weeping, and it was Mary’s tears that moved Jesus to weep. It was Mary’s tears that moved Jesus to enter into Lazarus’ death, to bring new life.
It was Martha who, when the stone was being rolled away from the mouth of the tomb, said, “That’s a bad idea. The body’s been in there four days, it’s going to stink.” But it was Mary who prayed.
It was this same Mary, a month later, and this is perhaps the first time that they’ve been able to sit down together. Jesus has been out of town, is now back in Bethany, they sit down for a dinner party, and Mary is overwhelmed with gratitude. She can’t help herself. This is Jesus, who brought her baby brother back to life. And in gratitude, she kneels at Jesus’ feet. But I think it’s more than gratitude, because not only is she kneeling at his feet, but she’s taking oil and pouring the oil on Jesus’ feet; she’s anointing the feet of Jesus.
If you were to anoint a King or a Messiah, you would pour the oil on the head. You start at the feet when you are anointing a body for burial. Mary gets something- Mary understands something about Jesus that nobody else in the room perceives. In less than a week, Jesus will be dead. Mary understands that when Jesus entered into the death of Lazarus to bring him alive, that was just the beginning.
They’re in Bethany, two miles outside of Jerusalem. The next day Jesus is going to be asking for a donkey, to begin the final series of events leading to his death. Mary understands that Jesus is going to go to Jerusalem, that he’s going to be killed, that he’s going to be entering into the deaths of all of us, to bring all of us to life.
Mary is overwhelmed. She can’t keep this extravagant gesture from flowing out. She rushes to Jesus’ feet and starts anointing them with oil. And not just any oil—this nard, this large liter jar of nard that she’s pouring on his feet, costs $15,000. It was extravagant; it was insane. She was pouring this insane amount of oil on Jesus’ feet. This is an incredibly extravagant gesture, over the top; she can’t help herself.
I am certain there were plenty of towels in the house. She unbinds her hair, which is also just wrong for that time, because women weren’t supposed to have their hair down in the presence of men. She unbinds her hair, and she uses her hair to wipe this oil off Jesus’ feet. And it’s not to clean Jesus’ feet; she could have used a towel for that. But rather, this beautiful aroma that is filling the house—
Imagine a liter of perfume that’s usually sold in little tiny vials; an entire liter of it is poured on Jesus’ feet! The sweet aroma is filling the house, and it is representing the aroma of life, the aroma of resurrection, the aroma of love that Jesus is going to pour out. This aroma that is filling the house—and Mary wants it. She wants it with her; so she wipes Jesus’ feet with her hair. In this amazing overabundant gesture, she wipes the oil with her hair, to keep that aroma with her.
Imagine in the days to come, when Jesus enters Jerusalem, when he gets arrested, when he is being beaten; when things become scary— Mary has that aroma, that aroma of love, that aroma of resurrection, still with her. And so does Jesus.
When Jesus is struggling through the last week of his life, the last days of his life, the last hours of his life, the aroma of Mary’s love is still with him. He knows that someone loves him. This abundant gesture of love is shared both ways. There’s something beyond words that is going on in this dinner party. Mary gets it; Judas doesn’t.
Judas, for me, represents the practical side of life. You know how impractical it is to pour $15,000 worth of oil on someone’s feet? What a waste that is? Come on, we could have sold that and given it to the poor! Think of the good that money could do! Now, Judas isn’t really interested in serving the poor; that hasn’t really been his passion. He has just used “serving the poor” as an excuse to distract himself from loving Jesus. Jesus knows this, and Jesus knows there is only a few days left for Judas.
Jesus says, “Judas, you will always have the poor with you. But you won’t always have me. Wake up!” It’s not that Jesus doesn’t care about the poor; people miss this about the passage, “the poor you will always have with you.” It’s not that Jesus is dismissing caring for the poor; he just knows that, for Judas, that concept is his excuse. That concept is his own distraction to prevent him from comprehending Jesus. It’s sort of like, for me, at three o’clock in the afternoon, when I know I need to pray, I’m running on empty, and there’s this voice calling inside- “go into the Cathedral, shut your eyes, and pray.” But my brain says, “I’ve got all these emails! I have all these phone calls to return!” In reply, Jesus says, “The emails you will always have with you.”
It’s not that the email isn’t important, it’s not that the phone calls aren’t important; but I just use that busyness, the practical stuff that I have to get done, as a distraction from seeing this overwhelming love, to seeing what’s really going on in the world around me. This extravagant love, that I could drown in…
In John’s Gospel, the love is so extravagant! In the first miracle in John’s Gospel, where Jesus turns water into wine so the party could keep going, it wasn’t a bottle of water; it was 120 gallons! You could swim in that much wine. It’s more wine than you can drink in a year of parties. The point is that this love is so extravagant, it’s overwhelming! And I don’t see it because I’ve got all these emails to answer. Jesus is saying, “You’ll always have the email, the phone calls, the busyness-- that will always be there. Wake up to this extravagant love that is flowing right now!”
Easter is in two weeks; Palm Sunday is next Sunday. This amazing drama is going to unfold in front of me—I need to wake up, and not just so that I can understand or “get” this extravagant love that is going to be displayed in Holy Week. I need to wake up so that I can understand that that extravagant love flows every day. God is overflowing with extravagant love!
We were talking about this during our Thursday staff Bible study, and someone described the extravagance of God in this way: Imagine a huge field of wildflowers. Beautiful, all colors, on some mountain plateau, that no one will ever see. It’s just flowing all the time, this beauty and this extravagant love. And, it’s there every day. There are some people, like Mary, who get it. There are some people, like Mary, who get it so grandly that they just can’t help themselves; it just has to flow, and they have to do bizarre things during dinner parties, walking up to people and pouring oil on their feet and massaging and wiping with their hair-- it’s just crazy! But there are people that get it, and have to share it.
I think that one of those people who got it was Roberta Moody. Yesterday we did a memorial service for Roberta Moody. Roberta was one of those saints out of whom God’s light just shone constantly. There was one thing I knew about Roberta Moody. I didn’t know her that well, I hadn’t been here all that long; but I knew that Roberta Moody loved me. I knew that in her eyes, I was special.
I was stupid, though, because I thought I was the only one. I thought, I’m special because Roberta Moody thinks I’m special! At yesterday’s memorial service, the first person who spoke to give a remembrance was Roberta’s granddaughter, Ariana. Ariana began her comments by saying that when she was growing up, Roberta always called her her “little Cyprus,” because she grew up in Cyprus. And Ariana knew that Roberta thought she was special. She thought she was the only one, that she was Roberta’s special grandchild, until she went to visit her grandmother when she was older, and Roberta introduced her to her friends. “This is my special friend Susan. This is my special friend Joe, this is my special friend…” That was when Ariana realized that everyone was special in Roberta’s eyes. The love just flowed. It was Roberta who started our Transept Prayer ministry, where people go to be prayed with after receiving communion. Roberta wrote poems all the time, for every occasion, and sent them to people. Roberta was just someone who “got” this love of Jesus’, and had to share it extravagantly. People who got it back had to respond.
The last few weeks Roberta was dying, and we had the luxury of knowing that she was dying. It was like Mary understood that Jesus was only going to be there a few days, and it was a time to pay attention. We knew Roberta was dying. As she was dying, she lost the use of her voice, which made visits special in a way because you had to pay attention to things that you normally didn’t have to notice—eyes, the squeeze of a hand—things had added meaning. There was extravagance in little gestures. And as she was dying, a member of the congregation, in order to return this extravagance that Roberta had always given, tried to give back the extravagant gift of a poem.
Yesterday there was an extravagant service, with remarkable speakers, and then an extravagant reception. Then towards the end of the reception, people started getting up to a microphone and started telling stories about Roberta. It was overwhelming how lovely and beautiful they were. One of the people who went up to the microphone was Shelley Mydans, and she read a poem that she had written for Roberta:
The Lord is my Shepherd, the Lord is my steed
If I rely on him I’ll have all that I need.
The Lord is my Shepherd, the Lord is my guide
If I reach out to him he’ll be right at my side.
To him we are grateful, to him we give praise;
He has opened the gates to Heaven ablaze.
For this is the faith that Roberta gave me;
By example and prayer she made sure that I see
That the Christ-light shines bright for all to behold
A beacon of safety for the meek and the bold.
Now rejoicing we pray at transept and rail
For the healing we know is bestowed without fail.
So my dear Roberta, now rest in God’s love
Surrounded by angels and brought peace from above.
For the Lord is your Shepherd, the Lord is your rest;
Put you whole trust in him, in the Lord you are blessed.
Love, Shelley Mydans
Now, days before Roberta died, Shelley anointed Roberta’s feet with this poem. The sweet aroma of this gift filled the room, and stayed in the room. I know that Roberta held onto that anointing; and it wasn’t just the anointing from this one poem, from this one person; but was the anointing she received from person after person after person during her last days with us.
But that’s not all. A couple of days later, Shelley got a letter in the mail. “Dear Shelley, I love your poem. Donald read it for me. May Jesus bless you for the love in this poem. Roberta.” At the bottom of the letter was a little sticky note: “Dear Shelley, Anita says Roberta insisted on dictating this thank-you to you this morning. You know that it is done with many questions, some head-nods, and some raised eyebrows. Love, Hazel.”
With this note, Roberta anointed Shelley. The aroma has filled the room, and this extravagant love has become more real, and more present, and flows from person to person to person. It does not stop. Amen.