Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Mark.
Chapter 14 is where we're at Newchapter.
Here we go.
Who knows how long it'll be,we're not sure, but it'll be
okay.
Alright, we're standing here atthe door to verse one of
chapter 14.
And really, in so many ways weswitch back to more of a
(00:33):
narrative, right, just adifferent flow.
In chapter 13, we had a lot ofteaching.
Jesus has addressed somequestions from his disciples
about the last days and thefulfillment of all things, and
we spent a good amount of timeon that because Jesus spent a
good amount of time on that.
There you go and uh and uh.
(00:56):
That was great.
And here now we are back in theswing of the narrative.
We're very close to the cross.
We're only days away from thecross, but time is kind of going
slowly here as every momentkind of counts, and we're going
(01:17):
to swing back into the narrativeand really see something of
beauty surrounded by somethingthat's not so beautiful Mary's
worship.
You know the story probablywe'll see it today, but I was
really trying to think of a wayto illustrate, kind of what this
(01:38):
is in a physical form.
It reminded me a little bit ofa geode, right, I meant to grab
a geode from my kid's collection.
But you know what it is?
Right, it's just rocks.
They're just rocks.
They look like plain rocks onthe outside and then you split
them open and inside there's allthese crystals and colors and
(01:58):
bright things to look at.
And that really is kind of whatthis is.
We see Mary here, this act ofworship, in chapter 14, verses 1
through 11.
And it's surrounded by a bunchof ugly.
Right, I mean, we can picturethat in our minds, a bunch of
ugly in that geode, not sospectacular on the outside, but
(02:19):
when you get to the center of it, when you get to the middle of
it, it's beautiful and sparkly.
So we're going to look at thiskind of as a whole.
Right, we're going to take thatgeode and turn around and look
at it as a whole, but then we'regoing to look at the ugly and
get the ugly out of the way.
We're going to look at the uglyof this story and try to end
(02:40):
with the pretty stuff.
Right, the beautiful stuff,mary's worship.
So I just kind of want to putthat out there so you know where
we're going with this.
Let's read verses 1 through 11.
Not a whole lot to read, but 11verses.
After two days it was thePassover and the Feast of
(03:00):
Unleavened Bread, and the chiefpriests and the scribes saw how
they might take him, that'sJesus, by trickery and put him
to death.
But they said not during thefeast, lest there be an uproar
of the people.
And being in Bethany, at thehouse of Simon the leper, as he,
jesus, sat at the table, awoman came having an alabaster
(03:24):
flask of very costly oil ofspikenard and she broke the
flask and poured it out on hishead.
And there were some who wereindignant among themselves and
said just that, that's in there.
Why was this fragrant oilwasted?
(03:45):
For I have been sold for morethan 300 denarii and given to
the poor.
And they criticized her sharply.
But Jesus said let her alone,why do you trouble her?
She has done a good work for me, for you have the poor with you
always and whenever you wishyou may do them good, but me you
(04:09):
do not have.
Always she has done what shecould and she has come
beforehand to anoint my body forburial.
Assuredly, I say to you,wherever this gospel is preached
in the whole world, what thiswoman has done will also be told
as a memorial to herfulfillment here today, by the
(04:30):
way, verse 10,.
Then Judas Iscariot one of the12, went to the chief priest to
betray him to them, and whenthey heard it they were glad and
promised to give him money.
So he sought how he mightconveniently betray him.
(04:52):
That's Jesus.
So here we read, kind oflooking at it as a whole, back
in verse one it's two days andit will be the Passover and the
Feast of Unleavened Bread.
So we're creeping up on thePassover.
Passover was a day, a day offeasting, and it's a day of
(05:12):
remembrance.
It's kind of their independenceday.
You know the deliverance frombondage is what it's celebrating
.
You remember the story thereback in Exodus, as the people
were in bondage to Egypt, mosesis sent to Pharaoh with God's
message let my people go.
And Pharaoh is stubborn andresistant.
(05:35):
And God sends plagues to well,you would think it'd be to
soften Pharaoh's heart, but inso many ways it's to harden
Pharaoh's heart and break hiswill.
Sends plagues there in the bookof Exodus.
And the ultimate deliverancecomes when God says now I'll get
(05:57):
you.
I'm sending death through theland, death to all, the
firstborn, firstborn fromPharaoh's house, to the servant
of Pharaoh, everyone.
The firstborn will be taken inone night and you remember God
to preserve his own people saysbut if you sacrifice a lamb and
(06:21):
you should sacrifice a lamb andput the blood of the lamb on the
door of your house, death willpass over.
So all in one night, goddelivers his people through the
death of the firstborn andPharaoh.
He's so upset about this, forgood reason, he pushes the
people out, says just get out, Idon't want to see you ever
(06:42):
again.
For today.
And yet God preserves hispeople through that last and
final plague of death.
He preserves his people.
And death.
Now listen, death passes overthe house where the blood of the
lamb is on the door.
Lamb is on the door and it'sgoing to be a perfect picture of
(07:03):
what Jesus would be for us thelamb of God who takes away the
sin of the world, that all of usunder the power of sin,
deserving death because of theblood of the lamb on our hearts
and our lives.
Death passes over and that'swhat Jesus is going to fulfill
on the cross on that very day ofPassover.
But here we're told it was twodays and it would be the
(07:27):
Passover.
It would be the Feast ofUnleavened Bread.
Now, right from the Feast ofPassover you go into a week of a
feast called the Feast ofUnleavened Bread and it is kind
of like spring cleaning in apractical sense.
You were to wipe down all yourcabinets and all these things
and find any bit of leaven, anybit of yeast.
(07:48):
There was a lot of symbolism inthis right, Because when they
left Egypt they didn't have timeto let their dough rise, so
they ate unleavened bread for atime because of the quickness of
how they were leaving.
But the Bible shows leaven andyeast as a picture of sin in our
lives.
It spreads right, yeast spreads.
(08:09):
It's kind of this thing thatjust absorbs and just eats up
things and expands.
It's a picture of sin in ourlives.
So this feast is kind of a coolpicture too, because after God
saves us, he begins to clean usup and pick the sin and the
practical sanctification in ourlives.
(08:29):
Right, the great thing is thatwe're not the person we were a
year ago.
Hopefully.
He takes sin and differentthings in our heart, he takes it
out of our life and he purifiesus.
So that's what this feast ofunleavened bread represents is
this cleaning up that God doesin our life and this purifying
that God does.
Well, we're coming up on thatin real time here.
(08:52):
And notice verse 1,.
The chief priests and thescribes sought how they might
take Jesus by trickery and puthim to death, but not during the
feast.
They said so the plan here.
We've already seen the chiefpriests, the scribes, the
(09:12):
religious leaders, kind of allof them.
They want to kill Jesus Out ofenvy.
They don't want him around,they don't like what he's saying
, they don't like his oppositionto their leadership.
And so they go.
We've got to get rid of himMore and more and now finally
get rid of him.
But notice in verse 2, theirplan right, not during this
(09:36):
feast.
And it's really hypocritical,isn't it?
It's really hypocritical whenyou look at this.
They're like we want to killhim, but not during the feast,
because that would just be kindof tacky.
You know what I mean the peoplewho really accepted, those that
accepted Jesus.
They might riot and rebelagainst this if we do it during
(09:57):
the feast.
So notice their plan We'll doit anytime, but not during the
feast.
And you look at it and you gothat was their plan.
And then you consider Godsitting off to the side, perhaps
in a sense saying you know whatthis is going to go down on the
feast.
Oh no, not during the feast,yes, on the feast.
(10:17):
And notice, contrary to theirplans it would happen.
That way God's plan wouldprevail.
And here we see God'ssovereignty in our lives.
We can make our plans, butGod's plan ultimately prevails.
And I think that's somethinggood to file into our hearts,
(10:41):
this comfort that no matter whatugly life brings us, god's plan
prevails.
God's plan is good in the end.
Now notice here we see just kindof, in fact, in verse three,
this is the pretty stuff inverse three, down to verse nine,
(11:03):
well, not even so much that,but actually it's just verse
three.
Right, this is the pretty stuff.
This is Mary's worship.
In the midst of all this ugly,mary at the center of this
offers beautiful worship.
Now, here in our account, versethree, we see a few famous
(11:27):
Bible characters.
What is Simon the leper?
He's named here Simon the leper.
Now he's known as a leper, butwe realize that he's probably
not a leper anymore.
Leprosy.
Being a leper meant you had theskin disease that separated you
from people, and it was ugly,right, you would get the skin
disease and it was so contagiousthat they were by law forced to
(11:50):
the outside of society.
They couldn't be around theirfamily anymore.
They couldn't be around theirfamily anymore.
They couldn't be around theirfriends.
They lived outside of the cityand when they passed by, people
threw rocks at them because theydidn't want to catch what these
people had.
Well, simon, he was known as aleper.
He had leprosy, but obviouslybecause he's having a party at
his house, he didn't haveleprosy anymore.
(12:13):
Jesus had obviously healed himand so Simon is throwing this
party in honor of Jesus at hishouse and he still goes by Simon
the leper.
It's his testimony of where hewas and where God took him.
Pretty beautiful stuff.
But here we see other residentsof the city of Bethany Mary,
(12:37):
martha, lazarus, a group ofsiblings.
It seems they were all justliving together, a group of
three siblings, and we find theylive in Bethany.
John chapter 11 gives usanother perspective of this
anointing I think there's somedebate, but the same anointing
(12:59):
down the backside of the Mountof Olives in the tiny village of
Bethany.
You remember, I'm sorry, theaccount of this is in John 12.
Chapter 11 of John is thefamous story about these
siblings.
Now, remember, lazarus was sickwe find in John chapter 11, and
(13:23):
he died.
You know, jesus waited to cometo him and he died.
Lazarus is dead for several daysand Jesus comes to him.
The sisters are distraughtthere at the funeral.
They're distraught.
Oh Lord, if you had been here,this wouldn't have happened.
And Jesus comes and youremember the story.
(13:46):
He has the stone rolled awayfrom Lazarus's tomb and he calls
out Lazarus, come forth.
And Lazarus, after four days ofbeing in the tomb, he stumbles
out in his grave clothes, right,and everybody is in awe.
The people are rejoicing.
(14:08):
Who can imagine such a thing?
The dead raised, the religiousleaders are distraught, right?
What are we going to do now?
We've got to get rid of Lazarus.
What a silly thing.
And so God has worked thisamazing thing in this group of
siblings Mary, martha, lazarusand here we get the picture, by
(14:29):
putting all the Gospels together, that this is in fact Mary who
comes and worships Jesus.
And picture it.
She's so grateful for whatJesus has done for her, so
grateful.
And I just think we ought topicture Lazarus too, right,
(14:51):
lazarus, he's been dead andrisen again, and we go.
Oh, he must have been soexcited.
I don't think that's where wepicture him.
I personally picture Lazarus onthe outside going.
I was there, I was there.
I'm here.
Why am I here?
Why am I here?
You know he's staring off intooblivion going.
(15:12):
I got to get back, you know.
But by God's grace for Mary andMartha he's back right and
they're celebrating this.
And Mary comes with this amazingact of worship.
Now notice how it all goes downin verse three.
She has an alabaster flask ofvery costly oil.
(15:33):
Now we're going to find outlater that that oil, that
perfume, was worth 300 denarii.
And you know the story there Adenarii is a coin that was seen
as a day's wage in the RomanEmpire.
A day's wage, so 300 denarii,six days a week.
We're looking at about a year'swage In modern terms.
(15:56):
What is that?
Like 30 to 50,000, depending onwhere you're at.
You know this is a massivelyexpensive bottle of perfume.
And she comes and she justdumps it on his head.
She comes and she just dumps iton his head and John lets us
(16:23):
know that there was so much ofit that it ran onto his feet and
she also poured it on his feetand that the house was filled
with the scent of this verycostly oil.
And we'll look at that more ina second, but that's how it all
goes down.
Now, notice verse four.
At this beautiful thing ofworship, there are some who are
(16:44):
indignant among themselves.
When you're indignant, that's abig word.
When you're indignant, the ideais that it's that thing that
makes your lip curl, right,don't you hate that when you see
something you don't like andjust by instinct, you know,
involuntarily, your lip kind ofyou know, maybe it's a food you
(17:05):
don't like and your lip justkind of starts to curl and you
go.
You know, well, they saw thisact of worship and there were
some there that it just itturned their stomach, Right, and
they say, notice.
They say to themselves, why wasthis oil wasted?
(17:26):
It was absolutely wasted.
Now, all the disciples seem tohave a little bit of part in
this when you look at Matthew'sgospel.
But Judas seemed to be thedriver of this.
Right, he was the accountant,the one who kept the treasury,
as John lets us know, who knewthe street value of this stuff.
(17:48):
You know what I mean.
And they all just are in theregoing oh, what a waste.
Oh, my goodness, as she breaksthis vial open.
It was opened up so that itcould just be poured quickly
over him and they go.
What a waste.
What a waste of 50, 40, I don'tknow a lot of money, you know.
(18:11):
And notice, in verse five theycriticized her sharply.
King James says they murmuredagainst her this just kind of
instinctive displeasure this.
And notice that ugly.
We don't want to be that.
We'll see that in a second.
We don't want to be that.
(18:32):
But in verse six I love it.
But Jesus said let her alone.
You can kind of picture italmost like a parent here.
Right, boys, cut it out, knockit off.
And Jesus stands up for her.
What a man, right, I want to be, you know, I want to be a rude
(18:54):
man, you know.
But Jesus is just so tough herehe stands up against the crowd
and he says guys, quit it, knockit off.
It reminds me of him in John,chapter 8, the woman caught in
the act of adultery.
You remember everybody wasready to kill her.
Right, they drag her in frontof Jesus and Jesus doesn't say
(19:16):
anything at first.
He just gets down in the groundand he starts drawing or
writing and writing stuff in thedirt.
We don't even know what it is,but whatever he wrote in the
dirt, it was so powerful that hecould say whoever's without sin
throw the first stone andeverybody just kind of backs up
and creeps away and Jesus standsup for that lady it's so sweet,
(19:41):
what a man, what a guy you knowstands up.
But here's the thing.
This is good for us to take toheart because we all need a
defender in our lives.
Satan, he's known as theaccuser of the brethren.
That's what he does, right?
He goes around just findingways to accuse us.
(20:02):
Oh, you saw that attitude.
Oh, you saw that was not thetruth, that was a lie.
Wrong again.
That was a lie, wrong again.
And Satan accuses us.
Our own conscience accuses us,the things that we do, our guilt
accuses us and we can be justsquished into the ground by our
(20:23):
own guilt.
And Jesus stands up for us.
I think it's really good to seeJesus as that in our life.
He stands up for us, he pullsus up when we're down.
That's what he does.
Take that to heart.
Well, there's Jesus, who's ourdefender, who says leave her
(20:46):
alone.
Then there's Judas in verse 10.
Judas, one of the 12, went tothe chief priest to betray him
to them.
So Judas here.
We've known it since thebeginning.
We've been told so many timeswhen his name comes up.
He was the one who would betrayJesus.
(21:07):
He agrees to go sell Jesus out,to betray his friend, for 30
pieces of silver.
We read Now 30 pieces of silverstill sounds like a bit of
something.
Silver sounds neat.
Right, that was weak Neat, butyet it's possibly only a month's
(21:29):
wage.
So because of this year's wagepoured out on Jesus, judas goes.
That's it.
I'm through.
I am through with you.
And he agrees to go sell Jesusout for a twelfth of the value
of that perfume and to sell himto the religious leaders.
(21:53):
Now this would fulfillZechariah, chapter 11, a
prophecy that said that Jesuswould be valued, the Messiah
would be valued at 30 pieces ofsilver, the price of a slave.
And we could look at Judas' lifeand go.
What in the world drives aperson to betray his friend, to
(22:17):
betray Jesus?
Judas had been with Jesus forlike three years in ministry,
day and night with Jesus.
Jesus called his disciples hisfriends, right Jesus.
Jesus called his disciples hisfriends, right, judas it would
seem like all the disciples wasinvolved in ministry, going out
(22:38):
and praying for people, andpeople got healed, we like to
think, even under Judas'ministry.
He saw it and he experienced it, but all in the end he sold
Jesus out.
Now John, in John there, chapter12, he lets us know that Judas
(23:00):
kept the treasury and oftenwould steal money from it.
That can happen to anybody,right?
Anybody can get involved inthat kind of embezzling or
whatever you call it.
It could happen to anybody.
But not only did he do that,but you realize that something
got into his heart.
It was a love of money.
(23:22):
I think as he saw this, he'slike what a waste.
We could have sold this andgiven it to me.
I mean the poor, you know.
And you go, judas, how did youget here?
And we don't know exactly howhe got there, but I think it was
a little out of time.
I think that's important torealize in our lives.
(23:43):
It's a little bit out of timethat things like this get into
our hearts.
And he's changed.
He's controlled by a lesserthing and it's ugly.
And we see that he goes toreligious leaders and agrees to
betray Jesus to them, somethingeven uglier.
(24:05):
Verse 11 maybe when they heardit they were glad, right?
How can you be glad?
They were so happy.
Oh, the best day of my life.
I'm so glad, and that's wheretheir hearts are at.
They promised to give him moneyso he saw how he might
(24:26):
conveniently betray him.
Now that's all the ugly, right?
There's so much ugly in allthis and we certainly don't want
to be part of the ugly rightthose who just critique worship
and stand on the side.
We sure don't want to be likeJudas who, even after so much
(24:47):
experience with God, his heartis taken away by a silly thing
like money.
But notice this beautifulworship here.
Just a couple things realquickly.
Like this beautiful worship isfirst, precious.
We haven't read that exact wordthere.
Well, no, it's costly oil, it'sprecious oil.
(25:09):
We already saw the value ofthat.
But it did cost her.
Now check it out.
There's no way that, like in ourday, she just went down to like
Macy's or Belk's or somethingand picked this perfume up.
You just don't do that.
This was most definitely aninvestment of some kind, a
(25:34):
family investment.
Perhaps you didn't just pick itup from the corner store.
It was an investment.
Some people think that this washer dowry.
This was what would be passedon for her to be married.
Maybe we're not really sure,but it was precious, right, we
get it.
Even the bottle was precious,you know.
(25:56):
It was built in such a way thatit had, like this really thin
neck so that when you poured itit didn't just all gush out, it
kind of dripped out and you gotjust a drop at a time and she
just breaks this precious thingand pours it out.
Seems like she doesn't give awhole lot of thought to it.
It's beautiful worship, though.
(26:16):
It's responsive we'll see in asecond.
But it was also prophetic hereJesus says notice, verse eight
she has come beforehand toanoint my body for burial.
So Jesus ties it into this kindof embalming idea that you
(26:37):
would do when somebody would die.
And the ladies come later on,there after the cross, and they
come to embalm Jesus.
But using this kind of oilwould be outrageous for
embalming.
But Jesus says what she'sreally talking about here, what
this really points to, is whatI'm going to do.
(27:00):
I'm going to die, I'm going tobe buried for three days, I'm
going to rise again.
But she's doing thisprophetically.
We don't exactly know what hermotivation was, but this is
where it took her to point toJesus' burial.
Now that's something thatnobody else really understood.
(27:20):
I'm pretty sure she didn'tunderstand.
But just in simple worship,responsive worship, she points
to that it was a spiritual kindof offering and I think the
biggest thing of all we can seethat it was a spiritual kind of
offering and I think the biggestthing of all we can see is it
was a response.
Right, if you're looking atMary in her life, right, it
(27:40):
seems shortly before this thatLazarus has died and been risen
back to life by Jesus and inresponse to that amazing thing,
you gave me my brother back.
I just don't know what to say.
She loved Jesus before that.
Right, we see her sitting atJesus' feet, martha working.
(28:04):
God bless Martha working andserving Mary's, sitting at
Jesus' feet, just taking in hiswords, always this picture of
just sweet fellowship andworship.
But then, when this trial comesinto her life and Jesus is not
just the teacher, he's like theresurrector, you know gets her
(28:28):
through that situation, shelooks and it's like worship, is
just like.
I don't know how long shelooked at this and thought about
doing this.
As far as we know, she justpopped into her head.
She went into her room, got theyou know, got the oil and just
poured it on him and said youknow what?
(28:49):
Here's my whole life, here'severything and here's my future.
Maybe here's the most preciousthing that I own and I
absolutely don't care if it'sall yours, it's just all yours.
And it really applies there toRomans 12, where Paul points out
(29:10):
let's go there.
I mean, we go there often atthe end of a study, but it
really is a great punchline forthese things.
Paul kind of gives us anafter-the-fact picture of this
kind of worship.
Chapter 12, verse 1, a versethat we should probably get
(29:32):
filed away in our hearts.
Paul says this I beseech you, Ibeg you, therefore, brethren,
by the mercies of God, presentyour bodies a living sacrifice,
holy, acceptable to God, whichis your reasonable service.
So, paul, here it really fallsinto the book of Romans.
(29:56):
Chapters 1 through 11 are allabout salvation, it's what God
has done for us.
And chapter 12, he stops and hegoes.
Look, in light of all thisstuff that we've been talking
about chapters 1 through 11, inlight of all that God's done for
you, offer your bodies a livingsacrifice.
And notice it says it's yourreasonable service.
(30:17):
Some translations I think goodtranslations say this is like
your reasonable act of worship,right Service, worship, all kind
of the same.
And Paul says because of whatGod's done for you give him your
whole life.
It just makes sense, it'sreasonable and we really see
(30:39):
that.
You know, mary only knows thehalf of the salvation at this
point, but she just goes Jesus,in light of all you've done for
me, man, I give you everything.
I'm holding nothing back.
Here's my life and that'sreally worship.
You know we sing songs andmaybe you've had a great time
(31:00):
driving in the car listening tosome worship, music worshiping.
But real essence of worship isGod.
Here's my life, here's all ofit.
Here's the stuff I understand,here's the stuff I don't
understand.
Here's what I want.
Here's all the hurts.
Take it all, god, it's all yours, you know, and just to say it's
(31:23):
yours, and Mary doesn't haveany problem doing that and she
becomes this wonderful pictureof just life, totally given over
to God, a wonderful place to be, and we can look at the
benefits of that being your life, hidden there with God, amazing
benefits.
But it just makes sense in thatresponse and we see this
(31:48):
beautiful worship as an examplehere.
I certainly don't want to endon it, but when you take the
ugly and the good, we want to bein the good side of things, the
pretty side of things, theheart of worship, not the heart
of judgment and being criticalof others who are worshiping.
That would be the disciplesdoing that, not like Judas, who
(32:13):
had other things creep into hisheart and what an ugly story his
story became.
But this act of just God,here's my life.
It just makes sense in light ofall you've done for me, so
natural and so sweet, god.
It's easy to talk about worshipand then go into a song and
(32:36):
think that somehow that's justwhat worship is, singing a
little louder maybe, and yet,god, I know that's not it True,
worship is our life and our week, our desires, all given to you.
God, we actually need you.
We need you to be doing that inour hearts.
(32:59):
It's not just something we canmuster up to be more worshipful
or give you more.
But, god, we pray that you'dhelp us to see for who you are,
to see what you've done for usas so amazing and so wonderful.
God, I pray you'd help us tosee for who you are, to see what
you've done for us as soamazing and so wonderful.
God, I pray you'd work thosegood things into our hearts and
make us worshipers of you.
(33:20):
In Jesus' name, we pray, amen,thank you.
Mark.
Chapter 14 is where we're at Newchapter.
Here we go.
Who knows how long it'll be,we're not sure, but it'll be
okay.
Alright, we're standing here atthe door to verse one of
chapter 14.
And really, in so many ways weswitch back to more of a
(00:33):
narrative, right, just adifferent flow.
In chapter 13, we had a lot ofteaching.
Jesus has addressed somequestions from his disciples
about the last days and thefulfillment of all things, and
we spent a good amount of timeon that because Jesus spent a
good amount of time on that.
There you go and uh and uh.
(00:56):
That was great.
And here now we are back in theswing of the narrative.
We're very close to the cross.
We're only days away from thecross, but time is kind of going
slowly here as every momentkind of counts, and we're going
(01:17):
to swing back into the narrativeand really see something of
beauty surrounded by somethingthat's not so beautiful Mary's
worship.
You know the story probablywe'll see it today, but I was
really trying to think of a wayto illustrate, kind of what this
(01:38):
is in a physical form.
It reminded me a little bit ofa geode, right, I meant to grab
a geode from my kid's collection.
But you know what it is?
Right, it's just rocks.
They're just rocks.
They look like plain rocks onthe outside and then you split
them open and inside there's allthese crystals and colors and
(01:58):
bright things to look at.
And that really is kind of whatthis is.
We see Mary here, this act ofworship, in chapter 14, verses 1
through 11.
And it's surrounded by a bunchof ugly.
Right, I mean, we can picturethat in our minds, a bunch of
ugly in that geode, not sospectacular on the outside, but
(02:19):
when you get to the center of it, when you get to the middle of
it, it's beautiful and sparkly.
So we're going to look at thiskind of as a whole.
Right, we're going to take thatgeode and turn around and look
at it as a whole, but then we'regoing to look at the ugly and
get the ugly out of the way.
We're going to look at the uglyof this story and try to end
(02:40):
with the pretty stuff.
Right, the beautiful stuff,mary's worship.
So I just kind of want to putthat out there so you know where
we're going with this.
Let's read verses 1 through 11.
Not a whole lot to read, but 11verses.
After two days it was thePassover and the Feast of
(03:00):
Unleavened Bread, and the chiefpriests and the scribes saw how
they might take him, that'sJesus, by trickery and put him
to death.
But they said not during thefeast, lest there be an uproar
of the people.
And being in Bethany, at thehouse of Simon the leper, as he,
jesus, sat at the table, awoman came having an alabaster
(03:24):
flask of very costly oil ofspikenard and she broke the
flask and poured it out on hishead.
And there were some who wereindignant among themselves and
said just that, that's in there.
Why was this fragrant oilwasted?
(03:45):
For I have been sold for morethan 300 denarii and given to
the poor.
And they criticized her sharply.
But Jesus said let her alone,why do you trouble her?
She has done a good work for me, for you have the poor with you
always and whenever you wishyou may do them good, but me you
(04:09):
do not have.
Always she has done what shecould and she has come
beforehand to anoint my body forburial.
Assuredly, I say to you,wherever this gospel is preached
in the whole world, what thiswoman has done will also be told
as a memorial to herfulfillment here today, by the
(04:30):
way, verse 10,.
Then Judas Iscariot one of the12, went to the chief priest to
betray him to them, and whenthey heard it they were glad and
promised to give him money.
So he sought how he mightconveniently betray him.
(04:52):
That's Jesus.
So here we read, kind oflooking at it as a whole, back
in verse one it's two days andit will be the Passover and the
Feast of Unleavened Bread.
So we're creeping up on thePassover.
Passover was a day, a day offeasting, and it's a day of
(05:12):
remembrance.
It's kind of their independenceday.
You know the deliverance frombondage is what it's celebrating
.
You remember the story thereback in Exodus, as the people
were in bondage to Egypt, mosesis sent to Pharaoh with God's
message let my people go.
And Pharaoh is stubborn andresistant.
(05:35):
And God sends plagues to well,you would think it'd be to
soften Pharaoh's heart, but inso many ways it's to harden
Pharaoh's heart and break hiswill.
Sends plagues there in the bookof Exodus.
And the ultimate deliverancecomes when God says now I'll get
(05:57):
you.
I'm sending death through theland, death to all, the
firstborn, firstborn fromPharaoh's house, to the servant
of Pharaoh, everyone.
The firstborn will be taken inone night and you remember God
to preserve his own people saysbut if you sacrifice a lamb and
(06:21):
you should sacrifice a lamb andput the blood of the lamb on the
door of your house, death willpass over.
So all in one night, goddelivers his people through the
death of the firstborn andPharaoh.
He's so upset about this, forgood reason, he pushes the
people out, says just get out, Idon't want to see you ever
(06:42):
again.
For today.
And yet God preserves hispeople through that last and
final plague of death.
He preserves his people.
And death.
Now listen, death passes overthe house where the blood of the
lamb is on the door.
Lamb is on the door and it'sgoing to be a perfect picture of
(07:03):
what Jesus would be for us thelamb of God who takes away the
sin of the world, that all of usunder the power of sin,
deserving death because of theblood of the lamb on our hearts
and our lives.
Death passes over and that'swhat Jesus is going to fulfill
on the cross on that very day ofPassover.
But here we're told it was twodays and it would be the
(07:27):
Passover.
It would be the Feast ofUnleavened Bread.
Now, right from the Feast ofPassover you go into a week of a
feast called the Feast ofUnleavened Bread and it is kind
of like spring cleaning in apractical sense.
You were to wipe down all yourcabinets and all these things
and find any bit of leaven, anybit of yeast.
(07:48):
There was a lot of symbolism inthis right, Because when they
left Egypt they didn't have timeto let their dough rise, so
they ate unleavened bread for atime because of the quickness of
how they were leaving.
But the Bible shows leaven andyeast as a picture of sin in our
lives.
It spreads right, yeast spreads.
(08:09):
It's kind of this thing thatjust absorbs and just eats up
things and expands.
It's a picture of sin in ourlives.
So this feast is kind of a coolpicture too, because after God
saves us, he begins to clean usup and pick the sin and the
practical sanctification in ourlives.
(08:29):
Right, the great thing is thatwe're not the person we were a
year ago.
Hopefully.
He takes sin and differentthings in our heart, he takes it
out of our life and he purifiesus.
So that's what this feast ofunleavened bread represents is
this cleaning up that God doesin our life and this purifying
that God does.
Well, we're coming up on thatin real time here.
(08:52):
And notice verse 1,.
The chief priests and thescribes sought how they might
take Jesus by trickery and puthim to death, but not during the
feast.
They said so the plan here.
We've already seen the chiefpriests, the scribes, the
(09:12):
religious leaders, kind of allof them.
They want to kill Jesus Out ofenvy.
They don't want him around,they don't like what he's saying
, they don't like his oppositionto their leadership.
And so they go.
We've got to get rid of himMore and more and now finally
get rid of him.
But notice in verse 2, theirplan right, not during this
(09:36):
feast.
And it's really hypocritical,isn't it?
It's really hypocritical whenyou look at this.
They're like we want to killhim, but not during the feast,
because that would just be kindof tacky.
You know what I mean the peoplewho really accepted, those that
accepted Jesus.
They might riot and rebelagainst this if we do it during
(09:57):
the feast.
So notice their plan We'll doit anytime, but not during the
feast.
And you look at it and you gothat was their plan.
And then you consider Godsitting off to the side, perhaps
in a sense saying you know whatthis is going to go down on the
feast.
Oh no, not during the feast,yes, on the feast.
(10:17):
And notice, contrary to theirplans it would happen.
That way God's plan wouldprevail.
And here we see God'ssovereignty in our lives.
We can make our plans, butGod's plan ultimately prevails.
And I think that's somethinggood to file into our hearts,
(10:41):
this comfort that no matter whatugly life brings us, god's plan
prevails.
God's plan is good in the end.
Now notice here we see just kindof, in fact, in verse three,
this is the pretty stuff inverse three, down to verse nine,
(11:03):
well, not even so much that,but actually it's just verse
three.
Right, this is the pretty stuff.
This is Mary's worship.
In the midst of all this ugly,mary at the center of this
offers beautiful worship.
Now, here in our account, versethree, we see a few famous
(11:27):
Bible characters.
What is Simon the leper?
He's named here Simon the leper.
Now he's known as a leper, butwe realize that he's probably
not a leper anymore.
Leprosy.
Being a leper meant you had theskin disease that separated you
from people, and it was ugly,right, you would get the skin
disease and it was so contagiousthat they were by law forced to
(11:50):
the outside of society.
They couldn't be around theirfamily anymore.
They couldn't be around theirfamily anymore.
They couldn't be around theirfriends.
They lived outside of the cityand when they passed by, people
threw rocks at them because theydidn't want to catch what these
people had.
Well, simon, he was known as aleper.
He had leprosy, but obviouslybecause he's having a party at
his house, he didn't haveleprosy anymore.
(12:13):
Jesus had obviously healed himand so Simon is throwing this
party in honor of Jesus at hishouse and he still goes by Simon
the leper.
It's his testimony of where hewas and where God took him.
Pretty beautiful stuff.
But here we see other residentsof the city of Bethany Mary,
(12:37):
martha, lazarus, a group ofsiblings.
It seems they were all justliving together, a group of
three siblings, and we find theylive in Bethany.
John chapter 11 gives usanother perspective of this
anointing I think there's somedebate, but the same anointing
(12:59):
down the backside of the Mountof Olives in the tiny village of
Bethany.
You remember, I'm sorry, theaccount of this is in John 12.
Chapter 11 of John is thefamous story about these
siblings.
Now, remember, lazarus was sickwe find in John chapter 11, and
(13:23):
he died.
You know, jesus waited to cometo him and he died.
Lazarus is dead for several daysand Jesus comes to him.
The sisters are distraughtthere at the funeral.
They're distraught.
Oh Lord, if you had been here,this wouldn't have happened.
And Jesus comes and youremember the story.
(13:46):
He has the stone rolled awayfrom Lazarus's tomb and he calls
out Lazarus, come forth.
And Lazarus, after four days ofbeing in the tomb, he stumbles
out in his grave clothes, right,and everybody is in awe.
The people are rejoicing.
(14:08):
Who can imagine such a thing?
The dead raised, the religiousleaders are distraught, right?
What are we going to do now?
We've got to get rid of Lazarus.
What a silly thing.
And so God has worked thisamazing thing in this group of
siblings Mary, martha, lazarusand here we get the picture, by
(14:29):
putting all the Gospels together, that this is in fact Mary who
comes and worships Jesus.
And picture it.
She's so grateful for whatJesus has done for her, so
grateful.
And I just think we ought topicture Lazarus too, right,
(14:51):
lazarus, he's been dead andrisen again, and we go.
Oh, he must have been soexcited.
I don't think that's where wepicture him.
I personally picture Lazarus onthe outside going.
I was there, I was there.
I'm here.
Why am I here?
Why am I here?
You know he's staring off intooblivion going.
(15:12):
I got to get back, you know.
But by God's grace for Mary andMartha he's back right and
they're celebrating this.
And Mary comes with this amazingact of worship.
Now notice how it all goes downin verse three.
She has an alabaster flask ofvery costly oil.
(15:33):
Now we're going to find outlater that that oil, that
perfume, was worth 300 denarii.
And you know the story there Adenarii is a coin that was seen
as a day's wage in the RomanEmpire.
A day's wage, so 300 denarii,six days a week.
We're looking at about a year'swage In modern terms.
(15:56):
What is that?
Like 30 to 50,000, depending onwhere you're at.
You know this is a massivelyexpensive bottle of perfume.
And she comes and she justdumps it on his head.
She comes and she just dumps iton his head and John lets us
(16:23):
know that there was so much ofit that it ran onto his feet and
she also poured it on his feetand that the house was filled
with the scent of this verycostly oil.
And we'll look at that more ina second, but that's how it all
goes down.
Now, notice verse four.
At this beautiful thing ofworship, there are some who are
(16:44):
indignant among themselves.
When you're indignant, that's abig word.
When you're indignant, the ideais that it's that thing that
makes your lip curl, right,don't you hate that when you see
something you don't like andjust by instinct, you know,
involuntarily, your lip kind ofyou know, maybe it's a food you
(17:05):
don't like and your lip justkind of starts to curl and you
go.
You know, well, they saw thisact of worship and there were
some there that it just itturned their stomach, Right, and
they say, notice.
They say to themselves, why wasthis oil wasted?
(17:26):
It was absolutely wasted.
Now, all the disciples seem tohave a little bit of part in
this when you look at Matthew'sgospel.
But Judas seemed to be thedriver of this.
Right, he was the accountant,the one who kept the treasury,
as John lets us know, who knewthe street value of this stuff.
(17:48):
You know what I mean.
And they all just are in theregoing oh, what a waste.
Oh, my goodness, as she breaksthis vial open.
It was opened up so that itcould just be poured quickly
over him and they go.
What a waste.
What a waste of 50, 40, I don'tknow a lot of money, you know.
(18:11):
And notice, in verse five theycriticized her sharply.
King James says they murmuredagainst her this just kind of
instinctive displeasure this.
And notice that ugly.
We don't want to be that.
We'll see that in a second.
We don't want to be that.
(18:32):
But in verse six I love it.
But Jesus said let her alone.
You can kind of picture italmost like a parent here.
Right, boys, cut it out, knockit off.
And Jesus stands up for her.
What a man, right, I want to be, you know, I want to be a rude
(18:54):
man, you know.
But Jesus is just so tough herehe stands up against the crowd
and he says guys, quit it, knockit off.
It reminds me of him in John,chapter 8, the woman caught in
the act of adultery.
You remember everybody wasready to kill her.
Right, they drag her in frontof Jesus and Jesus doesn't say
(19:16):
anything at first.
He just gets down in the groundand he starts drawing or
writing and writing stuff in thedirt.
We don't even know what it is,but whatever he wrote in the
dirt, it was so powerful that hecould say whoever's without sin
throw the first stone andeverybody just kind of backs up
and creeps away and Jesus standsup for that lady it's so sweet,
(19:41):
what a man, what a guy you knowstands up.
But here's the thing.
This is good for us to take toheart because we all need a
defender in our lives.
Satan, he's known as theaccuser of the brethren.
That's what he does, right?
He goes around just findingways to accuse us.
(20:02):
Oh, you saw that attitude.
Oh, you saw that was not thetruth, that was a lie.
Wrong again.
That was a lie, wrong again.
And Satan accuses us.
Our own conscience accuses us,the things that we do, our guilt
accuses us and we can be justsquished into the ground by our
(20:23):
own guilt.
And Jesus stands up for us.
I think it's really good to seeJesus as that in our life.
He stands up for us, he pullsus up when we're down.
That's what he does.
Take that to heart.
Well, there's Jesus, who's ourdefender, who says leave her
(20:46):
alone.
Then there's Judas in verse 10.
Judas, one of the 12, went tothe chief priest to betray him
to them.
So Judas here.
We've known it since thebeginning.
We've been told so many timeswhen his name comes up.
He was the one who would betrayJesus.
(21:07):
He agrees to go sell Jesus out,to betray his friend, for 30
pieces of silver.
We read Now 30 pieces of silverstill sounds like a bit of
something.
Silver sounds neat.
Right, that was weak Neat, butyet it's possibly only a month's
(21:29):
wage.
So because of this year's wagepoured out on Jesus, judas goes.
That's it.
I'm through.
I am through with you.
And he agrees to go sell Jesusout for a twelfth of the value
of that perfume and to sell himto the religious leaders.
(21:53):
Now this would fulfillZechariah, chapter 11, a
prophecy that said that Jesuswould be valued, the Messiah
would be valued at 30 pieces ofsilver, the price of a slave.
And we could look at Judas' lifeand go.
What in the world drives aperson to betray his friend, to
(22:17):
betray Jesus?
Judas had been with Jesus forlike three years in ministry,
day and night with Jesus.
Jesus called his disciples hisfriends, right Jesus.
Jesus called his disciples hisfriends, right, judas it would
seem like all the disciples wasinvolved in ministry, going out
(22:38):
and praying for people, andpeople got healed, we like to
think, even under Judas'ministry.
He saw it and he experienced it, but all in the end he sold
Jesus out.
Now John, in John there, chapter12, he lets us know that Judas
(23:00):
kept the treasury and oftenwould steal money from it.
That can happen to anybody,right?
Anybody can get involved inthat kind of embezzling or
whatever you call it.
It could happen to anybody.
But not only did he do that,but you realize that something
got into his heart.
It was a love of money.
(23:22):
I think as he saw this, he'slike what a waste.
We could have sold this andgiven it to me.
I mean the poor, you know.
And you go, judas, how did youget here?
And we don't know exactly howhe got there, but I think it was
a little out of time.
I think that's important torealize in our lives.
(23:43):
It's a little bit out of timethat things like this get into
our hearts.
And he's changed.
He's controlled by a lesserthing and it's ugly.
And we see that he goes toreligious leaders and agrees to
betray Jesus to them, somethingeven uglier.
(24:05):
Verse 11 maybe when they heardit they were glad, right?
How can you be glad?
They were so happy.
Oh, the best day of my life.
I'm so glad, and that's wheretheir hearts are at.
They promised to give him moneyso he saw how he might
(24:26):
conveniently betray him.
Now that's all the ugly, right?
There's so much ugly in allthis and we certainly don't want
to be part of the ugly rightthose who just critique worship
and stand on the side.
We sure don't want to be likeJudas who, even after so much
(24:47):
experience with God, his heartis taken away by a silly thing
like money.
But notice this beautifulworship here.
Just a couple things realquickly.
Like this beautiful worship isfirst, precious.
We haven't read that exact wordthere.
Well, no, it's costly oil, it'sprecious oil.
(25:09):
We already saw the value ofthat.
But it did cost her.
Now check it out.
There's no way that, like in ourday, she just went down to like
Macy's or Belk's or somethingand picked this perfume up.
You just don't do that.
This was most definitely aninvestment of some kind, a
(25:34):
family investment.
Perhaps you didn't just pick itup from the corner store.
It was an investment.
Some people think that this washer dowry.
This was what would be passedon for her to be married.
Maybe we're not really sure,but it was precious, right, we
get it.
Even the bottle was precious,you know.
(25:56):
It was built in such a way thatit had, like this really thin
neck so that when you poured itit didn't just all gush out, it
kind of dripped out and you gotjust a drop at a time and she
just breaks this precious thingand pours it out.
Seems like she doesn't give awhole lot of thought to it.
It's beautiful worship, though.
(26:16):
It's responsive we'll see in asecond.
But it was also prophetic hereJesus says notice, verse eight
she has come beforehand toanoint my body for burial.
So Jesus ties it into this kindof embalming idea that you
(26:37):
would do when somebody would die.
And the ladies come later on,there after the cross, and they
come to embalm Jesus.
But using this kind of oilwould be outrageous for
embalming.
But Jesus says what she'sreally talking about here, what
this really points to, is whatI'm going to do.
(27:00):
I'm going to die, I'm going tobe buried for three days, I'm
going to rise again.
But she's doing thisprophetically.
We don't exactly know what hermotivation was, but this is
where it took her to point toJesus' burial.
Now that's something thatnobody else really understood.
(27:20):
I'm pretty sure she didn'tunderstand.
But just in simple worship,responsive worship, she points
to that it was a spiritual kindof offering and I think the
biggest thing of all we can seethat it was a spiritual kind of
offering and I think the biggestthing of all we can see is it
was a response.
Right, if you're looking atMary in her life, right, it
(27:40):
seems shortly before this thatLazarus has died and been risen
back to life by Jesus and inresponse to that amazing thing,
you gave me my brother back.
I just don't know what to say.
She loved Jesus before that.
Right, we see her sitting atJesus' feet, martha working.
(28:04):
God bless Martha working andserving Mary's, sitting at
Jesus' feet, just taking in hiswords, always this picture of
just sweet fellowship andworship.
But then, when this trial comesinto her life and Jesus is not
just the teacher, he's like theresurrector, you know gets her
(28:28):
through that situation, shelooks and it's like worship, is
just like.
I don't know how long shelooked at this and thought about
doing this.
As far as we know, she justpopped into her head.
She went into her room, got theyou know, got the oil and just
poured it on him and said youknow what?
(28:49):
Here's my whole life, here'severything and here's my future.
Maybe here's the most preciousthing that I own and I
absolutely don't care if it'sall yours, it's just all yours.
And it really applies there toRomans 12, where Paul points out
(29:10):
let's go there.
I mean, we go there often atthe end of a study, but it
really is a great punchline forthese things.
Paul kind of gives us anafter-the-fact picture of this
kind of worship.
Chapter 12, verse 1, a versethat we should probably get
(29:32):
filed away in our hearts.
Paul says this I beseech you, Ibeg you, therefore, brethren,
by the mercies of God, presentyour bodies a living sacrifice,
holy, acceptable to God, whichis your reasonable service.
So, paul, here it really fallsinto the book of Romans.
(29:56):
Chapters 1 through 11 are allabout salvation, it's what God
has done for us.
And chapter 12, he stops and hegoes.
Look, in light of all thisstuff that we've been talking
about chapters 1 through 11, inlight of all that God's done for
you, offer your bodies a livingsacrifice.
And notice it says it's yourreasonable service.
(30:17):
Some translations I think goodtranslations say this is like
your reasonable act of worship,right Service, worship, all kind
of the same.
And Paul says because of whatGod's done for you give him your
whole life.
It just makes sense, it'sreasonable and we really see
(30:39):
that.
You know, mary only knows thehalf of the salvation at this
point, but she just goes Jesus,in light of all you've done for
me, man, I give you everything.
I'm holding nothing back.
Here's my life and that'sreally worship.
You know we sing songs andmaybe you've had a great time
(31:00):
driving in the car listening tosome worship, music worshiping.
But real essence of worship isGod.
Here's my life, here's all ofit.
Here's the stuff I understand,here's the stuff I don't
understand.
Here's what I want.
Here's all the hurts.
Take it all, god, it's all yours, you know, and just to say it's
(31:23):
yours, and Mary doesn't haveany problem doing that and she
becomes this wonderful pictureof just life, totally given over
to God, a wonderful place to be, and we can look at the
benefits of that being your life, hidden there with God, amazing
benefits.
But it just makes sense in thatresponse and we see this
(31:48):
beautiful worship as an examplehere.
I certainly don't want to endon it, but when you take the
ugly and the good, we want to bein the good side of things, the
pretty side of things, theheart of worship, not the heart
of judgment and being criticalof others who are worshiping.
That would be the disciplesdoing that, not like Judas, who
(32:13):
had other things creep into hisheart and what an ugly story his
story became.
But this act of just God,here's my life.
It just makes sense in light ofall you've done for me, so
natural and so sweet, god.
It's easy to talk about worshipand then go into a song and
(32:36):
think that somehow that's justwhat worship is, singing a
little louder maybe, and yet,god, I know that's not it True,
worship is our life and our week, our desires, all given to you.
God, we actually need you.
We need you to be doing that inour hearts.
(32:59):
It's not just something we canmuster up to be more worshipful
or give you more.
But, god, we pray that you'dhelp us to see for who you are,
to see what you've done for usas so amazing and so wonderful.
God, I pray you'd help us tosee for who you are, to see what
you've done for us as soamazing and so wonderful.
God, I pray you'd work thosegood things into our hearts and
make us worshipers of you.
(33:20):
In Jesus' name, we pray, amen,thank you.
Popular Podcasts
Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club
Welcome to Bookmarked by Reese’s Book Club — the podcast where great stories, bold women, and irresistible conversations collide! Hosted by award-winning journalist Danielle Robay, each week new episodes balance thoughtful literary insight with the fervor of buzzy book trends, pop culture and more. Bookmarked brings together celebrities, tastemakers, influencers and authors from Reese's Book Club and beyond to share stories that transcend the page. Pull up a chair. You’re not just listening — you’re part of the conversation.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com