Isa. 43:16-21
Psalm 126
John 12:1-8
The story
we hear from John is one that I find filled with challenges for all of us as
people who strive to follow Jesus on the Way.
Jesus himself feeds people, heals people, comforts people. He tells us that whenever we feed, visit,
care for, or provide clothing or shelter for the least of these we do it for
God. He calls us to follow in his path
of caring for and loving others completely.
And yet in this story a woman has just spent an extraordinary amount of
money to celebrate Jesus, who he is, what he has done and what he will do. She recognizes that his path is one that will
lead to his own destruction and yet to life for so many, and she comes to
celebrate and honor that choice. This is a story that is told in all four of
the gospels, though slightly differently. In Luke, the woman is not Mary but a
“woman of ill repute”, someone who is seen as unclean, unworthy and
untouchable. In that version especially,
there are parts of the story that we recognize as the way that Jesus always
behaves: Jesus is not afraid to talk to or even be touched by a woman that
others reject and condemn as sinful and unclean. Jesus honors and lifts up a person whom
others would not see except to harm, and would not ever approve of. Jesus empowers, supports, and LOVes a person
others saw as the dregs of society. We
get that. That is the Jesus I love. That is the Jesus I follow. That is the Jesus I want to be like. But I have to admit, Judas had a point here,
too. The nard with which she anointed
Jesus represented a great deal of money.
And it could have been used for the poor. John discounts Judas’ motives saying that he
wanted that money for himself. In the
other gospels, it is all of the disciples who are upset at this use of the
money, and it is for exactly the reason they say: they think, as any of us
might, that this extravagance was a huge waste of money, money that could have
served many people.
I
preached on a similar passage before when I talked to you about how in the
midst of suffering and struggle, God is not only the God of comfort and
healing, God is also the God of celebration, of abundance, of JOY. And that is true. We see it in the overflowing of food when he
fed the 5000. We see it in the
overflowing of wine when he turned the water into wine. We see it in the two old testament passages
we read for today. And we see it here as
well… “This woman has done a wonderful thing for me! Let her alone.” I shared with you before the story of Dorothy
Day, founder off the Catholic worker making a very similar choice when given an
expensive diamond ring that she chose to give to a poor woman. The other volunteers at the center condemned
her saying that she could have sold that ring and helped many, many people with
the money. Dorothy Day responded by
saying, “Do you believe Diamonds were only made for the rich?” and we recognize in her words the Jesus who
did not condemn the woman who celebrated him with this expensive nard.
But I
think Jesus was about something very different in this story.
As I
have said before, even God’s celebrations are about lifting up those who are
downtrodden. We have Luke 14:13-14 in
which Jesus says, “But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled,
the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you,
you will be repaid (at the resurrection of the righteous).” In today’s story, Jesus is lifting up the
woman who has been scorned and rejected.
Every time there is a celebration, those who previously have not had the
opportunity to celebrate and “party” are given that chance. But this story is more, even, than that. While the woman in the story was honoring
Jesus, she was also being given the opportunity to give something back. In Jewish practice it is considered a
blessing, a Mitzvah, to allow someone to serve you. It is considered an act of service to allow another to serve you,
to give something back to you. This is a
woman, again, who was rejected by society, according to the other gospels. She would not have been allowed to touch
others, to serve others, in any way. But
Jesus gives her the gift of allowing her to serve him, to give to him. And he honors that, says her actions will be
remembered, and raises her gifts and her offerings up for all to see.
We know from psychological studies
that when people are allowed to contribute to what they are given, it impacts
them very differently than when they are only served and not allowed to give
anything back in exchange. It was for
this reason that one of the soup kitchens where I volunteered “charged” those
who came a quarter for their meal. This
was a token amount and did not begin to make any difference financially for the
soup kitchen. But in terms of the esteem
and sense of worth of those who came, it made a huge difference. The guests no longer felt they were receiving
charity. Instead, they felt that they
were paying for something, contributing to their own nourishment, participating
in their own lives in a different way than when they were just given food for
free. It changed the way they saw the
exchange, and we found that many asked to volunteer to prepare and serve the
food as well and to give back in other ways, too. They saw themselves as worthy and able enough
to contribute when we asked them to “pay” for their meals in some small way. They came to the table as equals: people who had paid for what they were given. And that equality allowed them to offer more, to contribute and care more about what they were giving and doing.
I think
this is a practice we need to consider whenever we give someone a gift of our
service. During the many years that I
have visited people who are “shut ins” or who are in the hospital and
convalescent homes, the comment I have heard the most often, and which I hear
again and again and again, is that the people in these situations feel useless,
pointless. I try to explain to them that
they are giving a gift by allowing others to serve them. They have served others many times, and now
it is their turn to receive. And while I
believe that deeply, I find it is not satisfying for those listening to what I
am saying. They often would rather die (and they express this to me in phrases such as "Why am I still alive? There is no reason for me to still be here!") than to live without purpose or meaning. And I have found myself
wondering, isn’t there instead a way that we can help even those in the
hospital and those who are shut in to “give back”? We can bring those whose hands and arms are
still functioning yarn and invite them to knit hats or scarves for various
programs and projects. We can bring in
birthday cards and ask them to send them to those in the church who are having
birthdays this month. We can ask them
for advice and listen to their wisdom.
We can bring them small hand sewing projects.
Again,
the studies show that when people are given the opportunity to be useful, they
recover much more quickly and much more fully.
When they have a purpose, meaning, a reason – no matter how small – to
continue, they make a fuller effort to do exactly that.
I invite
you to think for a moment about your own experiences and ask if this isn’t true
for you as well. Personally, I am
reminded of a time when my church was invited to join other congregations in
serving a monthly community meal. We
were already serving a monthly community meal in an inner city Presbyterian
church, but our local Ecumenical group also served one just down the street and
we were encouraged to be part of that as well, to join with our brothers and
sisters of all faiths in serving people in our own neighborhood. About ten of us showed up to help, only to
find that the woman in charge of the kitchen would not allow any of us to help. She kept saying kind things, “Oh, you all do
so much already! Just sit back and let
me serve you!” and these words were sweet, sounded generous and helpful, they
seemed good and right. But I’ll tell
you, all of us left feeling useless, frustrated, pointless in that
situation. And none of us returned to
help again.
In
contrast, when I have visited people in prison, I often hear stories of even
the prisoners’ needs to serve in some way, to help, to GIVE in some way. One person told me he would not eat
everything from his meal but take the morning bread he was given to feed the
birds. He needed that opportunity to
give and found it in his own way. He
told me that he noticed that several of the other prisoners were feeding the
local skunks in the same way, calling “Here kitty, kitty” each morning as the
skunks came by – incorporating laughter with their “service”. And while at some level this was just funny,
it was also necessary. They found their
spirits lifted immensely by this simple act of giving to something else.
I think
we get stuck in an ideology of either serving or being served. But this doesn’t help us. We all need to give as much, if not more,
than we need to receive. It doesn’t
matter how old we are, it doesn’t matter what we have been through, it doesn’t
matter what we have done or failed to do, how much we have given or been given
in the past. Having purpose, giving to
others, serving others, and receiving care – all are vital to our well-being. But
sometimes we get stuck in an ideology of competition which serves no one.
"There
was a farmer who grew excellent quality corn. Every year he won the award for
the best grown corn. One year a newspaper reporter interviewed him and learned
something interesting about how he grew it. The reporter discovered that the
farmer shared his seed corn with his neighbors. “How can you afford to share
your best seed corn with your neighbors when they are entering corn in
competition with yours each year?” the reporter asked.
“Why sir,” said the farmer, “Didn’t
you know? The wind picks up pollen from the ripening corn and swirls it from
field to field. If my neighbors grow inferior corn, cross-pollination will
steadily degrade the quality of my corn. If I am to grow good corn, I must help
my neighbors grow good corn.”
So it is with our lives. When we deny education, for example, so some
people, all of us are lessened in our wisdom, our insight, our ability to grow
and learn more fully. When we deny food
to our neighbors, all of us are lessened by not connecting with these others
who would bless our lives. And when we
deny others the ability to give and to serve, we take away a collective sense
of purpose, of meaning, and of true community. The fact is, none of us truly
wins, until we all win!
In
today’s story, Jesus served the woman, whoever she was, by allowing her to do a
good thing for him, by honoring that service and by celebrating it. We are called to do the same. We are not called to just serve others, but
to see them for the full humans they are, people in need not only of our love,
but people in need of loving as well; people not only in need of being served
and cared for, but people in need of serving and caring for others as
well. It is a gift to allow another to
serve you, whoever they may be. Jesus
saw that and recognized that in allowing the woman in today’s story to offer
him care. Let us pray to be just as
generous in allowing ourselves to be served as well. Amen.
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