For the last couple of weeks, we looked at the last miracle that Jesus did which is recorded in the book of John, which was the raising of Lazarus from the dead. And now we have come to the final week of Jesus’s ministry before His crucifixion. And in anticipation of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross 6 days later, John presents us with this dinner that is being held in Bethany to honor Jesus and Lazarus. It’s now been a few months since Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, and as He heads back to Jerusalem to meet His predetermined destiny, He stops in to visit His friends Mary, Martha and Lazarus. And the other gospels tell us that a man named Simon, who was formerly a leper, hosted a dinner at his house for Jesus and invited many people there who wanted to both see Jesus and see Lazarus as well. The fame of this miracle had by that time reached all through the surrounding countryside, and so there would be many people that wanted to see Jesus, and to see Lazarus as well, knowing that he had been dead and was now made alive.
Now as I indicated, John uses this event to point to Jesus’s impending death which was foreordained by God, which would coincide with the Passover, just 6 days later. But at the same time, John is illustrating the nature of true worship of Jesus Christ as the Son of God. Mary, the sister of Lazarus, is illustrative of the heart of worship that God desires. And Judas illustrates the opposite of worship, which is self righteousness. So let’s get into the story and see how this contrast is illustrated in the actions of these two people.
This man Simon hosts a dinner in his house for Jesus, presumably to honor Jesus and Lazarus as well, as he had become somewhat of a celebrity due to being raised from the dead. As vs.9 says, “The large crowd of the Jews then learned that He was there; and they came, not for Jesus’ sake only, but that they might also see Lazarus, whom He raised from the dead.”
So there was a good sized crowd that showed up at this man’s house to see Jesus and Lazarus. The indication is that Simon himself had at one time been healed from leprosy by Jesus, and that is why he hosted the event. But it also may be because he had a large home to accommodate everyone. Because we know that in addition to Simon, Mary, Martha, Lazarus and Jesus, there were also the 12 apostles. So there were at least 17 people in attendance, but as vs.9 indicates, there were possibly dozens more that showed up.
You know, when we have our worship services on Sunday mornings, I always pray that we will have a good attendance for our service. But more important than the numbers of people that come, is that Jesus Himself is here in Spirit. Jesus said, where 2 or 3 of you are gathered together in my name, there will I be in your midst. Without the Spirit of Christ here, there is no worship, there is no church. It doesn’t matter if you have a building that you call a church or not, Jesus does not dwell in temples made with hands, but in the hearts of His people. So we come together to worship Jesus, believing that He is here, and we are His body.
But as this story illustrates, people come to worship the Lord having various motivations. We see a number of people in this story, no doubt drawn by the excitement about the recent miracle, yet it’s interesting to notice the various responses of the people involved. But out of all of them, only Mary receives the commendation of Jesus. In Matthew and Marks parallel accounts of this event, Jesus says, “Truly I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be spoken of in memory of her.” (Matt.26:13)
There are obviously many people who have come there because of the notoriety of Jesus. There is a lot of excitement in the community at that point due to this miracle. Jesus was at the height of His popularity with the people in Bethany and the surrounding areas right at that time.
So there is this outpouring of response to the miracle that Jesus did. The town hosts a dinner party to honor Jesus. But even so, we have to wonder if those in attendance were there to worship Jesus, as much in hopes of reaping some sort of benefit. Be it social, material, financial, or otherwise. The point being being that there can be a lot of motivations to coming to a celebratory event, presumably to worship the Lord, but that is not always what is really going on underneath the surface.
And John doesn’t tell us about everyone’s motivation. But he does tell us about Judas. And Matthew and Mark tell us that the disciples seemed to side with Judas. So to some extent we can gauge from their response where their hearts were. He tells us what some of the Jews response was who either were there or who heard about the supper. John mentions that Martha as usual she is working in the kitchen. Lazarus is sitting with Jesus, perhaps somewhat overwhelmed by his celebrity status. Simon the Leper’s response was to hold a dinner party for the community, and we might wonder if he had ulterior motives in hosting the dinner at his house because of the celebrity status of the miracle. I don’t know, and perhaps we shouldn’t speculate too much. But I guess what I want to point out here is that we can come to worship God, perhaps out of some religious excitement or enthusiasm, and yet our hearts can still be far away from the Lord. I read somewhere recently a theologian who said that it was a good thing for a person who was right with God to be in church, but it was a dangerous thing for someone who was not right with God to be in church. It’s a dangerous thing to come to worship before God in public, without having a right heart before God in private.
The Lord made it clear in Isaiah that He did not desire ceremonies and rituals and worship that did not come from a right heart. Isaiah 1:11-17 "What are your multiplied sacrifices to Me?” says the LORD."I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fed cattle; and I take no pleasure in the blood of bulls, lambs or goats. When you come to appear before Me, who requires of you this trampling of My courts? Bring your worthless offerings no longer,Incense is an abomination to Me. New moon and sabbath, the calling of assemblies--I cannot endure iniquity and the solemn assembly. I hate your new moon festivals and your appointed feasts,They have become a burden to Me; I am weary of bearing them. So when you spread out your hands in prayer,I will hide My eyes from you;Yes, even though you multiply prayers, I will not listen.Your hands are covered with blood. Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean;Remove the evil of your deeds from My sight.Cease to do evil, Learn to do good;Seek justice,Reprove the ruthless,Defend the orphan,Plead for the widow.” What this is telling us is that God doesn’t want empty praise or adulation from men. This idea that all that God requires is for us to praise Him in public worship, when our hearts are far from Him is not what the Bible teaches us that God requires.
Well, the example of how we should come to worship the Lord is seen in Mary’s example. John says Mary took a pound of ointment, a costly perfume and anointed Jesus head with it, and then washed His feet with her hair. Now let’s consider what this represents. First of all, Judas tells us that this perfume was worth 300 denarii. Now a denarius was considered a day’s wage. So this perfume was extremely valuable. It was worth 300 days wages. If we estimate that a laborers wages are $100 a day in our currency, then we might say that this perfume was worth $30,000 in todays money. That’s a lot of money.
But there is more to it than that, I believe. In those days, it was customary for a young woman to receive a dowry from her family to be used to help her acquire a husband. Now this worked both ways. On the one hand the bridegroom gave gifts to the parents, but the woman also had a dowry which was used as a financial gift to the groom from the brides family. Women were not considered in those times as we think of them today. Marriage was many times a financial as well as a social arrangement. And so the dowry would sometimes be a financial incentive for a woman to get a husband. And without a husband, a woman was very limited in terms of owning property or having any sort of income that would provide for her living.
So I believe that this alabaster vial of very expensive ointment was Mary’s dowry. In those days, they didn’t have banks such as we have today where you could put your money. So these vials of expensive perfume acted as a sort of savings account for the woman which would become her dowry which was given to her husband. And in the case that she didn’t find a husband, she could sell this perfume and it would help provide financially for her.
Now if that is the case, then we can see Mary’s worship of Jesus in a new light. Not only was it a very rich offering, as Judas indicated, but it was indicative of her sacrificial love for Christ. Her act showed her willingness to give all that she had to Christ, and give up all that she had hoped for in this world, all for the sake of knowing Christ. And I would quickly add, that this was not romantic love. It was sacrificial love.
I think sometimes we fail to understand that love should be our response to Christ. And perhaps part of that is that we fail to understand what love should be. I’ve said before many times that love is not just sentimentality. And I would even go so far as to say that is not the type of love that is necessary in marriage either. We tend to believe the Hollywood stereotype about love, that it is head over heels, love at first sight, and love conquers all sort of romantic love. And there can be that kind of romantic love in marriage. And perhaps it should be. But marital love is much more than just romantic love. It is also sacrificial love. It is putting the needs of the other mate above your own needs. I was counseling a lady some time ago who was considering leaving her husband because she said he did not love her enough, and my advice was that you are using the wrong equation. The question should not be how much does he love you, but how much do you love him? You are responsible for your love to be pure and unrestrained and fully committed first and foremost.
Ephesians chapter 5 says that husbands are to love their wives even as Christ loved the church and laid down His life for her. So that sacrifice defines marital love. It is sacrificial love. And our love for God is to be the same kind of love as that which He had for us. He laid down His life for us, and our response is that we should lay down our life for Him. There is a lot of talk in the church today about the love of God. Many contemporary Christian songs have substituted “Love” for God’s name because of this emphasis. But I want to tell you that love is not a one way street. The Christian’s relationship to the Lord is pictured as that of a bride and her husband. And in order to have a healthy marriage, love needs to be fully expressed by both parties. God’s love for us has been unquestionably established by Jesus dying for us on the cross. It is our love for God that we must focus on.
In fact, when Jesus was asked to name the most important, foremost commandment, He said in Mark 12:30 that it is “YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH.” That kind of love, all consuming love, all encompassing love is what God desires. He is not talking about sentimentality, or emotion that ebbs and flows depending on the circumstances. But He is talking about a sacrificial love, putting Him first. And if we are truly the bride of Christ, then that is what we will want to do.
God is a jealous husband. He desires first place in our lives. He says in Matt.10:37-38 "He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me.” There it is again, the sacrificial quality of our devotion to God.
Let me show you a great Old Testament example of that. There is a principle in biblical hermeneutics which is called the principle of first mention. Which means that if you want to understand a word in the Bible, find the first time it is mentioned and see how it is used in that example. And that will provide the basis for your subsequent interpretations. And so in the word “worship” for example, the first usage of it is found in Genesis 22:5, when Abraham is going to offer Isaac on the altar at Mount Moriah. And Abraham said to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey, and I and the lad will go over there; and we will worship and return to you.” Now that is a powerful illustration of what it means to worship. Abraham was talking about an act of sacrifice. The most important person in the world to Abraham was his son, and yet God called him to offer Isaac up as a sacrifice to God. And Abraham called this worship.
What do you call worship? How do you worship God? How much do you love God? How do you express that love? What are you willing to give to God? What are you holding back from God? I dare you to ask yourself these questions honestly this morning, and examine your worship in light of what Mary did. She gave up her hope of a husband for Christ. She gave up her hope of financial independence for Christ. Mary didn’t just pour a few drops out of her bottle, she broke it, and poured everything she had out in love for Christ.
And notice what effect this sacrificial love had. First of all, it pleased God. As I pointed out earlier, Jesus said in Matthew 26:13, “Truly I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be spoken of in memory of her.” In essence what the Lord says is, “This example of worship is going to be a permanent, everlasting memorial to the love of this woman for the Lord.” And seeing that, we should ask ourselves this question, how all encompassing is your sacrificial love for Christ? How much will your love of Christ speak for you in eternity?
Notice one other effect of Mary’s worship. It says the whole house was filled with the fragrance. Mary poured out a pound of this expensive perfume. I’m sure that not only did Mary smell like that fragrance for days afterwards, but Simon the Leper and his whole house smelled like Mary’s fragrance for probably a week or more. I’m sure that the disciples all smelled like that fragrance for days. And I would submit to you that when you truly love the Lord and worship Him with an all encompassing, sacrificial love like Mary had, then it’s going to start affecting others in your house. You live with a husband who is a bum, and who doesnt’ care about things of the Lord? The answer is not to nag him to death, but to so love the Lord with an all encompassing, sacrificial love that he cannot help but be affected by it. Your kids don’t seem interested in the things of God? The answer is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength and with all your mind. And when you are consumed with the genuine worship of God, that fragrance is going to affect everyone in your house. Every marital problem, every family problem, every sin problem, finds it’s solution by putting Christ first and foremost in every place in your life. When you get worship right, then those other things are going to start to fall into place.
Well that is the example of genuine worship. Mary is the premier example of true worship. But let’s look quickly at what worship is not. And for that we need look no further than this text, in the example of Judas. I would point out first of all, that proximity to the Lord does not necessarily equate to preeminence in relationship. Judas had been part of Jesus’s inner circle for 3 years. And yet we know that his heart was far from the Lord. He was only interested in what material benefit could be gained from the Lord.
Couple of other points to make about Judas. He was the only disciple from Judea. Judeans were the educated people of Jewish society. They were the aristocrats, especially in comparison to the uneducated Galileans who made up the bulk of Jesus’s disciples. So it’s interesting to note that Judas was probably considered above reproach by the others. That’s why they made him treasurer. He was considered the most trustworthy of all of them. That’s why on the night of his treachery the disciples didn’t realize Jesus was speaking of him being the traitor.
I think that this example in our text shows that Judas’s sin was that of self righteousness. Self righteousness is anything but righteous. It is the sin of pride. And yet many times it looks to others as if such a person is extremely pious. But Judas’s self righteousness is apparent in his indignant response to Mary’s true worship. He said in vs 5, “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and given to poor people?” And John after the fact, gives us insight saying, “Now he said this, not because he was concerned about the poor, but because he was a thief, and as he had the money box, he used to pilfer what was put into it.”
What we see in Judas is a self righteous indignation, not only because he was a thief, but because he wanted to take the focus off of Jesus and put it on himself. Worship is focused on the Lord only, but self righteousness takes that focus off of the Lord and directs it to one’s self. And notice that is exactly what Judas does. There is nothing wrong with taking care of the poor. In fact, we are instructed to do so. But as Jesus said, the poor you always have with you, but you do not always have me. Christ must always have the preeminence. I see a lot of churches today that are involved in a lot of social projects, but they have failed the gospel because they have left out Christ. They do not preach Christ crucified, they do not preach the need for repentance and faith in Him as your Savior, they do not preach the Lordship of Christ. We cannot substitute anything, no matter how noble the cause might seem, for the immediacy and the urgency and the priority of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
And I will say that this attitude of self righteousness manifests itself quite often in the church today, masquerading as worship. But it is not true worship. It’s self serving. It’s self righteousness that is taking away the honor due to the Lord and putting it on individuals, who are perhaps in positions of leadership, positions of worship leaders, or even pastors. They focus attention on themselves and away from true devotion to the Lord. I will tell you what Mary’s example shows; that true worship is humble. You can’t wipe someone’s feet with your hair unless you are practically prostrate on the ground. Humility is the beginning of worship. And yet Judas is the exact opposite of that posture. He is indignant. He is haughty. He is looking down at Mary. And his worship is self directed. Any so called worship that brings undue attention to oneself is not of God. No matter how pious it may seem on the surface, or how noble the acclamations of the participants. Genuine worship magnifies the Lord, not people.
Let me tell you one more attitude we see represented here. And that is the worship which is based on reciprocality. What I am talking about is that kind of attention we show the Lord when it serves our purposes to do so. The kind of worship we give the Lord when we want something from the Lord. And I believe that many of us are guilty of this kind of worship. Judas wanted something from his relationship to Jesus. He was looking for money and material gain from his relationship. And so he feigned spiritual concern. I’m sure none of us think we could ever steal from God like Judas did.
But I think what is a more common attitude is that we only get focused on the Lord when we want something. When things are going great in our lives, we have very little interest in the things of the Lord. We lose our diligence in church, we don’t read our Bibles, we fail to pray. but when we want God to do something, especially when some sort of crisis hits our lives, now we become all fervent in our faith.
I think the lesson we need to take from this example is that we should love the Lord for who He is, rather than for what you want Him to do for you. You know, we talked about the relationship between a husband and wife earlier, and maybe that is a good illustration of how our relationship with the Lord should be. How would you like it if your mate only showed you any attention when they wanted something, or wanted you to do something? I don’t know about you, but I know that I want my wife to love me for who I am. I want her to love me for me. I want her to want to spend time just with me.
I think we sometimes only come to the Lord with a long list of what we want him to do. And we rarely come with just a desire to know Him and to love Him. To listen to Him. To talk to Him. To have a time of intimacy with Him. I think that is genuine worship. A time to tell Him what you think of Him. A time to tell Him how thankful you are that He is in your life. To tell Him how thankful you are for all that He has done for you. Not just a relationship based on what you can get Him to do for you.
Let me just mention one final point in closing. I don’t have time to touch on everything here in this passage, but I do want to mention this final point. And that is, even though Jesus was all knowing, and He knew that Judas was pilfering from the money box, yet Jesus never rebuked him, never had that “I caught you!” moment with Judas. Right up to the very end, even when Judas was betraying Christ with a kiss, Jesus was giving Judas the opportunity to repent. The Bible says that the kindness of God draws you to repentance. Jesus was very patient with Judas.
That reminds me of the scripture which says, that in the days of Noah, the patience of God was kept waiting, waiting for men to repent of their wickedness. This idea that God is hiding around the corner with a baseball bat ready to whack you over the head if you get out of line is not biblical. God is patient, not willing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance. Judas never did repent. He kept hardening his heart, until it says that Satan himself entered into him and he went out from the Lord. And as a result he never found forgiveness and hung himself in a fit of despair.
I hope that there is no one here today like Judas. I hope that this message has perhaps shown the light of truth upon your relationship to the Lord. Perhaps you have seen in yourself this morning a self righteousness that you know is not pleasing to the Lord. I hope that you have seen in Mary’s example the kind of humility and response to the Lord that is to be expected in genuine worship. I hope you have seen the standard for the love of God as exemplified in Mary’s sacrificial gift of her vial of perfume. That as Eph. 5:2 says, we might imitate God and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.”
The Lord wants all of you this morning. Only you know if you are holding back something from the Lord. On the outside, you all look like earnest worshippers of God. I can’t tell the ones who are sincere from the insincere. But God looks at the heart. I hope you will examine your heart today in light of this scripture and take this opportunity to commit to love the Lord with all your heart, soul mind and strength, even as Christ loved the church and gave Himself for her, and may your love and genuine worship of the Lord be a fragrant aroma which is pleasing to God, and which will affect all that is in your house.
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