What A Waste

Sermon-5 Lent-March 21, 2010
The Cloud of Unknowing, "O God, our great companion, lead us ever more deeply into the mystery of your life and ours, that we may be faithful interpreters of Life to each other, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen
I was telling Deborah last night that today’s sermon is very odd for me, for an unusual reason-in 30 years I have never ever preached on this gospel. You see, the lessons we use every Sunday were always proscribed by the lectionary in the Book of Common Prayer (the red book in your pew racks). And this gospel was always assigned for the Monday of Holy Week-a day when I never preached. But now we are using the Revised Common Lectionary that most mainline churches use. So I get to preach on it for the first time. But there’s so much more to this gospel than how seldom it’s heard. The reason that it was assigned to Holy Monday before Easter, is that it supposedly takes place 6 days before Jesus was crucified.
Let me give you a short Bible study before I tell you some things. In the gospel of John, which is so different than Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Jesus is summoned to his friend’s house in Bethany, because he was told that his good friend Lazarus was gravely ill. He arrives, and even though it’s been 4 days since he died, he revives him and brings him back to life. This happens in chapter 11 of John. It says (verse 53) 53So from that day on they planned to put him to death. You all remember this, I’m sure.
In the gospel of John, it was the raising of Lazarus that was the reason the authorities wanted Jesus dead. Some time later Jesus returns to Bethany, where Mary, Martha, and Lazarus live. Jesus has returned to the home of the family where he had brought a loved one back from the dead.
That’s where we are. It’s six days before the Passover-6 days before Jesus will be killed-for saving the life of this man, Lazarus. Remember this.
We are living in a world that is starting to realize that we can’t live like we used to. The world is limited. We don’t have to convince people that we have to conserve-$4 gas does that. Global warming does that. Shrinking resources shows us that. What do we say now-DON’T BE WASTEFUL. Recycle, reuse, don’t squander, don’t throw things away. Downsize, smaller footprint, economize, cut back, reduce, trim, pare, MODERATION. And here we have a gospel story of a woman who pours a whole pound of expensive fragrance on Jesus’ feet.
Many years ago I was serving in a tiny church in the UP. 20 people. On a good Sunday. No one under 70. But, years before they had been left millions of dollars. So they saved it. And one day they had a key parishioner that couldn’t make it down the steps to the parish hall in the basement. And someone said, “let’s spend some of that money to put in an elevator.” Someone else said, “let’s renovate the basement-it hasn’t changed in 40 years.” So, they decided to spend many thousands of dollars making changes in their building. About that same time there was clergy conference and word had leaked out that this tiny little parish was going to spend a lot of money-on itself. And many of the clergy were outraged. “THIS CONGREGATION IS ON IT’S LAST LEGS!” They told me. “WHY ARE THEY WASTING ALL THAT MONEY SO ONE PERSON CAN GET TO THE BASEMENT?” They asked me. “DON’T THEY KNOW HOW MUCH GOOD THAT MONEY WOULD DO ON IMPORTANT DIOCESAN PROGRAMS,” they exclaimed. Here’s what they really wanted to say, “DON’T THROW AWAY MONEY ON A BODY THAT’S DYING!” It could do so much more good on the living. That’s what they wanted to say.
Think back to a moment in your life, where you spent wastefully, extravagantly. I don’t mean just money. Maybe it was time. Maybe you sat by a bedside for months with someone who was ill. Maybe it was emotionally, where you trusted and felt and committed so deeply that there was almost nothing left. Maybe it was money, where you spent lots of money on something or someone for one brief shining moment-a wedding maybe, a party, a gift. Can you remember a time where you gave extravagantly, lavishly, expensively- wastefully, because of love? Maybe it was money, maybe it was time, maybe it was your feelings. To an outsider watching, your gift, your giving, your “offering” was a waste. It didn’t make sense. You didn’t act prudently. No one, watching from the outside, understood. But you did it for love-and you didn’t care what anyone else thought. When you love, we will give anything, everything. It is wasteful, extravagant, and it is an enormous sacrifice-but you did it for love. The other day I was talking to a single parent who sacrificed mightily for her child. And her daughter, no grown, “woke up one day and realized it. And she said, “mom, I can’t believe how much you had to do, all that you had to give up for me.” And this parent, this hero, looked at me and said, “I told her it was nothing, it’s what you do for someone you love.”
Why would Mary have a pound of expensive perfume at her home? Nard came from India, high up in the Himalayas. It was only used at two very important times in life-on the bride at her wedding, on a loved one at a funeral. Was this left over from Lazarus’ death? Was this set aside for Mary’s wedding some day?
You think the nard, this perfume was the great sacrifice, the great gift? You think it was the money spent on this fragrance that was the sacrifice. Mary loosens her hair. A decent woman never ever did that except with her husband. Privately. On at the funeral of a family member. She pours this expensive ointment all over Jesus’ feet. No one ever wastes “the good stuff” on someone’s feet. Their hair, MAYBE, but not their feet! Then she wipes his feet dry with the only thing in the home that could be spared-her hair. The people watching this must have been so embarrassed. This was so excessive, so over the top.
There is an Alcoholics Anonymous group that meets here every Monday night. We always tell groups not to use our Sunday School rooms. Let our kids destroy them, I always tell them. So one Monday night I was here and this guy comes in from the meeting and says, “I understand that we’re not allowed to use the nursery.” I said, “yeah, we’d prefer you didn’t.” He said, “my 4 year old daughter is here, and she has no place to go during the meeting-I have no child care, I have to attend this meeting.” I said, “oh, ok, sure, let her use the nursery.” Then he started crying. Then he knelt in front of me and sobbed. I said, “hey, come on, it’s no big deal.” And he said, “you’ll never know how big a deal it is.” To an outsider, it doesn’t make sense.
Kate Huey , a commentator from the United Church of Christ writes:
Think about this: in the Gospel of John, at his last meal with the disciples, in the very next chapter after this one, Jesus doesn't take bread and bless and break it and say, Take this and eat…no, he gets up and ties a towel around himself and pours water in a basin and washes the disciples' feet. That is what he wants his followers to do, but he doesn't just tell them, he shows them, too. Do as I say, he says, and do as I do. Mary, our teacher for today, anticipates that lesson beautifully, acting from her heart, responding to all that Jesus has been in her life.” There are only 3 times this Greek word ekmasso meaning “to wipe” is used in the New Testament-twice here in chapter 12, and when Jesus washes his disciples’ feet in chapter 13.
Wiping, washing, anointing, cleaning the feet of those you love. Here is Mary, sister to the man Jesus raises from the dead-showing her great love, her devotion, to Jesus. John the gospel writer includes this story in his book for a reason. There is another story coming, a story of Jesus wiping the feet of his friends. John wants us to know what extravagant, wasteful, sacrificial love looks like. He wants us to understand what’s coming. John knows that the crucifixion will make no sense to others- so he’s including these stories so we will understand that what Mary does here in Bethany, what Jesus will do in that upper room-and why. John the evangelist, the gospel writer, wants to make sense out of a crucifixion that will happen in 6 days in his gospel--a wasteful, sacrificial, extravagant act that made no sense to outsiders. That’s why John includes this odd story. This kind of events, this extravagant, wasteful, sacrificial act only makes sense to someone you love. Amen.