The Wonderous CrossSample

Mary a True Worshipper

The conversation around Simon the Leper’s dinner table was endlessly fascinating. Between Simon’s story of Jesus healing him of his leprosy and Lazarus’ story of being raised from the dead, everyone around the table was captivated by their stories. So no one noticed when Mary quietly slipped away from the table.

Moments later, she returned with an alabaster flask of very costly spikenard and knelt down at Jesus’ feet. She broke the long neck of the flask, and the fragrant oil began to spill over the jagged top. The conversation stopped, and all eyes turned toward her as she poured the oil over Jesus’ head and feet.

Jesus sat still as the oily perfume cascaded down his hair, pooled on top of his eyebrows, and dripped down into his beard. Mary unfastened her hair and as she knelt over his feet, her long locks tenting her face from the bewildered stares of the supper guests.

The musky perfume filled the air when Judas broke the silence. “Why was this fragrant oil wasted? For it might have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor?”

Like a window had been opened that sucked all the air out of the room, the mood changed instantly. Mary, suddenly embarrassed, sat back on her heels and stared at the floor. Several disciples chimed in their support for Judas’s noble-sounding objection.

It did seem like an over-the-top and wasteful thing to do.

But Jesus knew Judas’ motives. He cared nothing for the poor and had been embezzling from the group for years. Jesus rebuked him and affirmed Mary’s actions and priorities. He said, “Let her alone; she has kept this for the day of my burial. For the poor, you have with you always, but me you do not have always.”

This extravagant act wasn’t a waste, it was worship, and it revealed everything about what both Mary, and Judas, treasured.

Nothing given to Jesus in worship is ever wasted! How can a life poured out in sacrificial love to the one true Treasure, ever be lost? The preciousness of the Treasure is displayed for all the world to see in what we’re willing to “waste” for it.

Are you “wasting” your life on what is truly valuable? If we pour out our lives and our worship for the all-surpassing Treasure that’s found in Jesus Christ, we’ll never be left wanting.