Dinner With The Dead

March 24th:
John 12:1-8
1Six days before the Passover, Jesus arrived at Bethany, where Lazarus lived, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. 2Here a dinner was given in Jesus' honor. Martha served, while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with him. 3Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus' feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

4But one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, who was later to betray him, objected, 5"Why wasn't this perfume sold and the money given to the poor? It was worth a year's wages." 6He did not say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.

7"Leave her alone," Jesus replied. "It was intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial. 8You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me."


This is a lunch that is rich with symbolism.

On the surface this seems like an ordinary gathering. Jesus was in town and was invited to a luncheon in his honor that was being held at the home of a man known as Simon the leper. Simon was known as “the leper” because he had been a leper but Jesus had healed him. So, this was an “ordinary” lunch being hosted by a man who had for years been considered dead to the world but was now alive again.

Attending this dinner were the 12 disciples and Jesus’ good friends Mary, her sister Martha and their brother Lazarus, who had been dead for four days and was called out of his tomb by Jesus. So, it was just an ordinary lunch being hosted by a man who had been socially and emotionally dead and attended by a man who had been physically dead and had been raised to life by the power of God. OK, so it’s not so ordinary, but it is interesting.

And then, somewhere during their time together, Mary decided to offer Jesus a very expensive gift. She took a bottle of perfumed oil, about the size of a ½ liter bottle of water, and poured it on Jesus’ feet. This was oil that was extracted from the roots of a plant which grew in the Himalayan Mountains. It had to be processed and imported and so it was very expensive to buy. Some people even bought it as an investment. This oil (nard) was so precious that it was used to anoint “kings” and, in her mind, that may have been exactly what Mary was doing. She saw the kind of impact Jesus’ ministry had on people. She knew that they were on the verge of something big. She could very well have been anointing her king for his triumphal entry into Jerusalem.

And this was the next event in the life of Jesus. After this “ordinary” dinner Jesus would be riding into the city of Jerusalem on the back of a colt (which, by the way, was how conquering kings entered a city) and people would stand on the side of the roadway and wave palm branches in the air.

Mary may have been anointing her king, but Jesus knew that she was anointing him for his burial. Jesus knew that he was going to Jerusalem to die.

Against this backdrop we have Judas Iscariot complaining about money.

Simon and Lazarus recognized Jesus to be the Lord of life. Mary recognized Jesus as her king. Jesus was preparing to ride into Jerusalem to sacrifice his life for the sin of the world and all that Judas cared about was a few dollars.

Judas was sitting in the presence of a man who had healed Simon the leper and called Lazarus from his grave. Judas was sitting in the presence of a man who had walked on water, healed the blind, multiplied loaves and fish and forgave sin and all that Judas could see was that someone was being overly generous with some perfume.

It struck me that we often struggle with this same kind of “blindness.” Judas saw but he did not see because he was so focused on temporary things that he missed all of the really important things that were unfolding around him.

How many people do you know whose lives have been changed by their relationship to Jesus? If you haven’t seen them yet, then you need to start paying attention because they are all around you. How often have you paused to admire the complexity of a leaf or marveled at the birth of a child and missed seeing the hand of God at work in these amazingly “ordinary” things? It is time for us all to open our eyes so that we might see what has been right in front of us “hiding in plain sight.”

Lent is supposed to move us to look at things we rarely see and recall things we have forgotten. Easter is supposed to remind us again of a God who loved us too much to leave us alone, but instead came into our lives to save us from ourselves. Judas wasn’t seeing what was right in front of him. We should never make that mistake.