Episode Transcript
CONSECRATE
Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.
Jesus, I belong to you.
I lift up my heart to you.
I set my mind on you.
I fix my eyes on you.
I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice.
Jesus, we belong to you.
Praying in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.
HEAR
Matthew 26:6–9 ESV
Now when Jesus was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, a woman came up to him with an alabaster flask of very expensive ointment, and she poured it on his head as he reclined at table. And when the disciples saw it, they were indignant, saying, “Why this waste? For this could have been sold for a large sum and given to the poor.”
CONSIDER
We have come to a hard stop today on the itinerary of our hot air balloon journey through Gospel #1. We will stay on the ground here in Jerusalem for a few days before reboarding for the next leg of the pilgrimage.
Matthew 26 must be among the most consequential chapters in the whole Gospels. Consider what is covered here.
1. The plot of the religious leaders to kill Jesus
2. The Passover celebration and the institution of the Lord's Supper
3. The garden of Gethsemane
4. Judas Iscariot betrays Jesus to the religious authorities for thirty pieces of silver
5. The arrest of Jesus
6. The trial of Jesus before the High Priest
7. Peter's disowning and denial of Jesus
And yet given all of these catastrophic and cataclysmic events, Jesus lifts up another event and identifies it as among the most significant events in the history of the world.
An unnamed woman at the home of a named leper (Simon) engages in an unfathomable act of unreasonable love and mercy. She breaks open an alabaster jar of perfume—the cost of which another Gospel writer will tell us equaled an entire year's wages—and pours it out on Jesus's body.
Notice what his "indignant" followers said: “'Why this waste?' they asked. 'This perfume could have been sold at a high price and the money given to the poor'” (vv. 8–9).
Notice what Jesus said: “Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me. When she poured this perfume on my body, she did it to prepare me for burial" (vv. 10–12 NIV).
How do the people closest and most committed to Jesus completely lose the plot? It's a serious question. We think the gospel is one thing and it turns out to be something completely different. We think it is doing good things for God. It turns out to be risk-taking affection for Jesus and an unreasonable abandonment of our lives to him. That is the plot.
"Truly I tell you, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.” (v. 13)
Isn't that fascinating? Of all the stories, it is this one Jesus most closely associates with the gospel. Why? This woman's unreasonable and even inappropriate public display of affection foreshadowed the unreasonable and unfathomable public display of affection Jesus would offer on the cross.
The gospel is not a message nor can it be reduced to one. The gospel is an unreasonable, unfathomable, incomprehensible, and inappropriate display and demonstration of the affection of God for sinners.
We will behold this story again when it comes back around in the fourth gospel. There, we will get this poignant line: "And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume" (John 12:3b).
This is what the gospel does—it fills the world with the fragrance of love.
"Truly I tell you, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her” (v. 13 NIV).
Maybe the bigger question is—if this story is not being told, is the gospel even being preached?
PRAY
Lord Jesus, first thank you for going to the home of Simon the leper. Thank you for this woman and for making sure we would hear this story. Train us to tell this story with our very lives. Show me what it would mean to break open the jar of costly perfume that is my life and to pour it out on you—wastefully and worshipfully. It will be for your glory, for others' gain, and for my good. Praying in your name, Jesus, amen.
