Extravagant Love

What a beautiful story (John 12:1-8)!

-What an amazing collection of stories we have in this book we call the Bible!

Picture this scene:

• Jesus has come back to Bethany to visit his close friends: Lazarus (raised from the dead), Mary & Martha (sisters)
• They give a dinner for him - perhaps there were invited guests; likely there was special food; and time to relax, to honour their dear friend, spend time with him….a really nice gathering…
• They author doesn’t say much about who else was there, except Judas, but it doesn’t seem likely that he was the only one … he’s not listed anywhere else as being part of the inner circle - like Peter, James and John who sometimes went somewhere with Jesus on their own …
• And in front of the guests, in the middle of this lovely time together, Mary takes out some very expensive perfume oil or lotion, and pours it on Jesus’ feet! Wow! And then she wipes them with her hair! This is a very sensual scene … washing, massaging someone’s feet is a very intimate act …
• Imagine the perfume filling the whole house - it would be hard to ignore that something special was going on!
• And we’re told that Judas was not at all happy about this - he criticized Mary’s act and said that the perfume should have been sold and the money given to the poor… We don’t hear anyone else’s reaction …

What would your reaction have been, I wonder? How would I have felt to be another guest at that dinner party?

Would you be embarrassed, do you think?

• embarrassed at the extravagance, in front of one who lived so simply and taught about the importance of justice and equality and caring for the poor?
• might you be embarrassed for Mary, about what Jesus’ reaction might be to her act?
• would you find it embarrassing to be present at such an intimate act? I wonder if it broke up the party? Do you suppose the conversation could ever go back to ‘normal’ after this incident and Jesus’ response? ….

Perhaps you would have been annoyed…

• annoyed that Mary was always taking the place or the role of being close to Jesus ...remember on another occasion she was sitting at his feet and Martha chastized her for not helping with the serving? Jesus took her side then too, and said she had chosen the right role…
• would you be annoyed at the ‘wastefulness’ of her act - using a whole container of expensive perfume like that?
• or perhaps you would share Judas’ reaction that it should have been sold and put into the common purse for the poor, or at least some practical need…

Perhaps you would have been a little jealous that you hadn’t brought Jesus a special gift … or that he always seemed to say nice things about Mary.

We each have our reactions to situations like this … if we let ourselves get into the story and really be part of it…really feel it inside us...

As I look back over the gospel stories of the last 4 weeks, I see that they have all been about extravagant love, in some form or another.

• last week we had the celebration with the fatted calf, and the ring and the best robe for the prodigal son - the outpouring of the father’s love on one who seemed (by worldly standards) not to deserve it.
• the week before we heard the gardener begging the vineyard owner to let him try for another year to bring the fig tree into production - offering more tending, more encouraging, more love… after anyone would have said it was time to cut it down and get rid of it.
• and before that we heard Jesus’ sadness over wayward Jerusalem - wishing he could have gathered the people like a mother hen gathers her chicks under her wings for protection -

stories of extravagant love!

Everywhere he went, Jesus represented extravagant generosity:

180 gals of new wine at the wedding - far more than the guests could drink!

feeding the 5000 - and 12 baskets left over!

153 large fish in the net when the fishermen had been fishing all night and caught nothing on the other side of the boat!

Abundance! and not just abundance, but over-the-top extravagance! Jesus’ ministry was not one of scarcity - just enough healing for one more person; just enough fish for supper...

What could be more extravagant than giving up his life for the love of us?

But I want to suggest this morning that we have a hard time accepting, understanding, appreciating the extravagance of that love. I want to suggest that we often have the same reactions to it as we have to the story of Mary anointing Jesus’ feet with the precious perfume:

we’re embarrassed - we can’t really believe it’s true - we make excuses for why we’re not worthy: we’re afraid to accept and enjoy the beauty of it - the real gift that is God’s unconditional love.

we’re annoyed - that salvation could be possible for even the really bad sinners!

Surely there’s no salvation for Saddam Hussein or pedophiles or the perpetrators of genocide...why would God waste love on those people?

or we’re jealous - We think that perhaps God loves someone else more than me - after all, she seems to have a better or easier life…

In these last couple of weeks leading up to Easter we’re being prepared to come face-to-face with the real extravagance of God’s love!

A love so vast, so mysterious - that Jesus would give his life for us - for all of us and for each of us...and that wouldn’t even be the end! God’s love would then reach out even farther to offer Resurrection - new life, new beginnings, more mystery ….. more LOVE.