Devotional from Holy Week 2011

Today’s lectionary text is John 12:1-11. However, I think that verses 1-8 are very powerful for us as we begin to make our way through Holy Week. In this text John writes, “Six days before the Passover Jesus came to Bethany, the home of Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. ²There they gave a dinner for him. Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those at the table with him. ³Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard, anointed Jesus’ feet, and wiped them^* with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. ⁴But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (the one who was about to betray him), said, ⁵‘Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii^* and the money given to the poor?’ ⁶(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.) ⁷Jesus said, ‘Leave her alone. She bought it^* so that she might keep it for the day of my burial. ⁸You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me”

          Nard is a hardy herb, a member of the Valerian family, and grows in the high altitudes of the Himalayas. In Jesus’ day, it was exported in the form of a dry rhizome or macerated oil extract, and it was very expensive. This costly offering, historically, was given to a daughter by her Jewish parents for her dowry. On her wedding night, the perfume was to be poured out upon her husband’s feet. So, with this in mind, we have to ask ourselves, why in the world would Mary use such an expense oil to anoint Jesus’ feet?

          In the chapter before today’s reading, Mary’s brother Lazarus died. Mary and her sister had sent for Jesus to come and save Lazarus, but he waited two days before he went to check on Lazarus. When he arrived he found that Lazarus had been dead for four days. He also found Mary greatly upset, and openly weeping. John says that when Jesus saw Mary weeping, He was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. Jesus then raised Lazarus from the dead. It was this act that led the Chief Priests to plan to put Jesus to death.

          I imagine many of you have experienced death. Grieving makes people do the strangest things. However, many of us often find ourselves grieving someone’s death before they have even died. We sit by their bedside saying our goodbyes, and sometimes when it is a parent or grandparent, we get our last bit of instruction from them. Through the experience of Lazarus’ death, Mary fully understood the grief that she was about to endure as Jesus set out in His last week of life. In fact, I suspect, like us, she was beginning to grieve before He was gone.

There is often such a Holy exchange of love and compassion between those who are about to die and their loved ones, and I think that is the story of Mary and her nard. Although she couldn’t find the words, her spirit led her to take the extravagant nard around her neck and anoint Jesus’ feet, to show her worship and adoration for Him.

So, what does this say to us about Holy Week? Well, I think this story helps us understand the reactions of those around Jesus during the last week. Not because we read the stories every year, but because we have likewise experienced death and grief. Somehow, for me, being able to identify with the grief of Jesus’ loved ones helps me understand His death in a “real” way. For watching someone endure an agonizing death will never leave you, and quite frankly, the loved ones of Jesus are the only people in the stories we hear this week that we could ever identify with. None of us have been crucified and died, and none of us are Jesus.

But even as we walk this road of death and grief that is Holy Week, we must keep our eyes upon the glorious hope that is Easter. Jesus rises again. He lives, and thus we live. So, this week let us remember His death, proclaim His Resurrection, and await His coming in glory.