Day of the Church Year: 5th Sunday of Lent
Scripture Passage: John 12:1-8
Jesus will die. Sooner rather than later. The very next day after our gospel reading, Jesus will enter Jerusalem where crowds will hail him as king with palm branches. But today, Jesus sits at the table with Mary, Martha, and their brother Lazarus whom Jesus raised from the dead. Lazarus will one day die again, but for now, he is at the table reminding his dinner guest and the readers of John’s gospel that Jesus will die. And because Jesus will die, Mary anoints his feet with pure nard, a costly oil, and wipes them with her hair. At a time and place when bodies were left to decompose naturally, relatives and friends would commonly anoint the body of their loved one with perfume, oil, or spices at the time of burial. A last ritual to honor the loved one. A last act of love. And especially here, an act of intimacy with a dear friend as Mary wipes Jesus’ feet with her hair.
Judas Iscariot, the disciple who will eventually betray Jesus, questions Mary’s use of the nard for it is costly. Wouldn’t it be better to sell this oil and give the money to the poor? He asks. But the gospel writer John lets his readers in on a secret: that Judas keeps the common purse, steals from it, and does not care about the poor. Perhaps Judas’ question makes sense to us. Perhaps we think he raises a good point. But Judas’ motive in asking the question is not pure. And Jesus agrees with Mary, that her act is appropriate for he will die. Sooner rather than later. In the remaining time she has to honor him, she does so—with great love.
Three years ago, we gathered on Wednesdays in Lent to discuss death. I don’t know if you remember, if you were here, but I recall hospital chaplain AmarAtma saying that death teaches us how to live. In walking with countless families through many kinds of death—sudden and unexpected, gentle and accepted, chaotic and filled with questions—in walking with all these families, AmarAtma saw clearly that the greatest gift of death was clarity about life: about what and who matter, about how this precious little time should or could be spent. To speak of death is almost anathema in our culture where we rarely acknowledge death even when to do so would be prudent. When a relative, a friend, a neighbor, or we ourselves are diagnosed with cancer or another condition that compromises not only our quality of life but perhaps its quantity, we take comfort in focusing on the daily fight, the small wins and losses, the sweetness of ordinary moments. Leaving the possibility of death unspoken seems gracious. Likewise, the suffering of the world and the death that accompanies it is so difficult to watch in Ukraine and Syria, in Afghanistan and Congo, on our own streets and in our own homes, senseless and horrific violence. Perhaps it is understandable that we avoid death, that we turn away from the news.
Yet death teaches us how to live—and Jesus’ death in particular. Mary does not avoid death. In anticipating Jesus’ death, she learns from it, learns what matters, and she honors Jesus, loves Jesus, provides the tiny bit of comfort she can to the One who knows everything that will happen.
Sometimes, while playing a game or getting to know new people, we are asked questions like: If you knew you only had three months to live, what would you do? Would you live differently than you are right now? These questions clarify for us what matters, and so, most of us, in response to these questions, list things we are not currently doing but things we would do were we to know the time of our death: spending more time with people we love, forgiving someone who wronged us, discovering something new in the world, sharing words of appreciation or affection we currently hold back, working for justice or giving of ourselves in ways we’ve been scared to or just never thought we had the time for.
Or as poet Mary Oliver writes in her poem The Summer Day:
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
With your one wild and precious life?
I have often wondered how it is that the disciples left everything and followed Jesus. I have wondered if they were foolish or naive. I have wondered about the women who left their families, who defied social norms, who risked alienation to travel with Jesus and provide for him. Who does that? Who leaves home and family and employment to fish for people, to travel without particular destination, following a man who preaches and teaches, heals and feeds, befriends and forgives sin? And it occurs to me this week that perhaps, in their particular historical moment, under Roman occupation, with lifespans short and life itself gritty and hard, perhaps they understood with greater clarity than we do in the relative security of our digital, scientific age the urgency of now. For death was not a distant reality, relegated to hospitals or hospice homes, but a commonplace event in homes, in city streets, part of the general cultural milieu. The disciples and Mary, they knew death as a constant companion, and so they knew, also, the urgency of now.
Just yesterday, I heard on the news that President Biden signed into law this past week legislation that names lynching a federal hate crime. The legislation bears the name of Emmett Till who was tragically lynched in 1955. Though, apparently, 46 states and the district of Columbia stipulate lynching as a hate crime in their state law, it is astonishing to me that it took this long to pass a federal law of this nature. And I am reminded that the death of Emmett Till was not safely relegated to a hospital or hospice home. Rather, he and the many who came before him and after him lived and still live in the urgency of now, in the knowledge that life is short and for some, shorter than others, due to hatred and bigotry. In 1963, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King spoke of the fierce urgency of now, an urgency that led many to acts of civil disobedience, to active non-violence, to questioning the norms of culture. In the wake of this action, Congress passed the 1964 and 1968 civil rights acts, and our whole culture began to shift.
On the eve of Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem, after hearing Jesus talk about his own death in that city, Mary anoints Jesus’ feet with pure nard and wipes them with her hair. Judas’ implied accusation of waste might seem relevant to us, but Jesus responds: You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me. Indeed. Every day of Jesus’ life was filled with preaching and teaching, healing and feeding, befriending and forgiving the sins of the poor. Every day. “The poor” of whom Judas speaks are the very people who follow Jesus, who crowd around to be healed, who are vulnerable to acts of violence from the Roman Empire. Jesus’ words do not release Judas and the disciples from service to and love for all those who are part of their community; rather, Jesus’ words confirm the necessity of their continued ministry—even beyond his death.
Everything dies at last and too soon, including Jesus. With Jesus’ one wild and precious life, he preached and taught, healed and cured, fed people and ate with them, forgave and befriended them. And as for us, what is it we plan to do with our one wild and precious life? Dr. King and many others embraced non-violence and advocated for change. Archbishop Oscar Romero spoke of the disappearances and torture of his people and loved them. The disciples left everything to fish for people. Mary honored and loved Jesus by anointing his feet. What will we do? Amen.
