John 12: 1-8 You can tell, if you pay attention, that Mary and Martha and Lazarus – three siblings – are close to Jesus. They are important people in his life. and that matters. Even at that time, Jesus sort of belonged to everyone. Crowds followed him wherever he went, they all wanted to touch him, talk to him, receive something from him. Everybody wanted a piece of Jesus. It was exhausting for him, as it would be for any of us. He needed to be able to get away now and then, for the sake of his own well-being. And when he did, Mary, Martha, and Lazarus were there for him. Maybe you remember the other time he was at their house for dinner. This is told in Luke’s gospel. Martha bustles around preparing refreshment for him, Mary sits at his feet to listen to him. Even though I […]
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The Scent of Sacrifice
Philippians 3:4b-14 John 12:1-8 You may recall that this scene made it into the rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar. Judas, growing increasingly outraged at the direction things are going, just loses it here. He sings essentially the same words that are in the text. Meanwhile, Mary and a chorus of women are singing a soothing song to Jesus, urging him to relax: try not to get worried; don’t you know everything is alright now, everything’s fine. We want you to sleep well tonight. Let the world turn without you tonight. In the play, Jesus needs soothing because he has become overwhelmed by the masses coming to him for healing. But in the actual biblical text in John’s gospel, if he needs soothing, we can probably attribute that to what has happened just before this text. In the previous chapter, Jesus has raised Lazarus from the dead. And for Lazarus and […]
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