Philippians 3. 4b – 14
John 12. 1 – 8
Fr Alex
Today marks a turning point in our Lenten journey, as Passiontide begins. We turn in our liturgy, readings and music away from the wider Lenten themes of prayer, fasting and repentance, and now begin to focus in on the details of Christ’s passion.
You’ll notice a few changes around the church, as images have been veiled with purple cloth. I’ve written a little paragraph about the symbolism of this old custom in the front of the order of service.
But it’s a strange word, isn’t it, for describing this holy season: ‘passion.’ We often use the word to describe intense emotional excitement; we might say someone is passionate about things like football teams, or food, or a person. It’s usually a positive feeling.
But the word ‘passion’ comes from the Latin ‘passio,’ which means to suffer or endure. Certainly, if you love someone passionately, but they don’t love you back, you know all about the tension that is inherent in that word.
And that tension is what characterises this holy season: the love of God in Jesus, demonstrated through suffering. And it is there at the heart of our Gospel reading today.
On Passion Sunday we’re not actually given an account of the passion, but in fact the part of the story that comes immediately before it. The very next day after today’s passage, Jesus rides into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday and begins the great events of Holy Week.
But before we take up our cross and follow him to the climax of his divine mission, as we will next Sunday, we are asked to dwell upon this very human scene.
I find it very beautiful. Soon after Jesus has raised Lazarus from the dead, he goes back to his friends and shares a dinner with them. You can imagine the joy at his return, after what he has done for that family: Lazarus, who was dead for four days, brought back to life and now sitting at table with his Saviour. No doubt laughing and celebrating, setting all the cares of the world aside and delighting in each other’s company, as you can only do with your closest friends
But then this stunning moment of great tenderness; Mary anoints Jesus’ feet with precious oil, and massages them with her hair. It’s deeply intimate, and highly symbolic: not just a demonstration of her devotion to him, but the same sort of anointing that will be done to his body for burial, after it is broken on the cross.
But there’s a fly in the ointment, as it were. In the midst of this beautiful scene, the harsh voice of Judas breaks in: “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?”
And it’s a real problem, isn’t it; because even with John’s accusation that Judas only wanted to take the money for himself, Judas is sort of right. Why waste this oil on Jesus when it could be sold and help many out of poverty?
One denarius was the daily wage for a labourer at the time, so three-hundred denarii is nearly the average wage for a year. If we think about today’s average yearly wage in this country, we’re looking at something like £30,000.
But of course in St John’s Gospel, there are the details of the story on one level, and behind it the greater truth that the story points to. Jesus never performs any miracles, according to St John – they are referred to as signs. And these signs always point us to something profound about who God is, in Jesus.
What we’re being pointed to today is the same truth that’s been revealed to us in all our Gospel readings, in different ways, all the way through Lent. That is the incredible abundance of God’s love.
Mary shows us, in her colossally wasteful and extravagant act, how God deals with us. She is an icon of God’s own colossally extravagant love, poured out like costly oil on an undeserving creation; wasted on people who will mock it, and reject it, or tear each other apart over how to understand it.
Does God regret that extravagance? Shouldn’t he have done something more practical with it, created something better and more deserving of his love?
When Judas questions what Mary is doing, he is right; but he is also completely wrong. Jesus rebukes him because to criticise Mary in her devotion to him is to criticise God in his devotion to us.
Jesus defends Mary because he is realistic about our human ways: because of our selfishness, and the way we squander and fight over God’s creation, there will always be the poor; we will always revert to unjust and oppressive systems, because we think that’s what keeps us safe.
But Jesus comes to do more than just make things a little better for a short while. He comes to bring in a kingdom of justice and truth; and just as the fragrance of Mary’s oil “filled the room” as she poured it out, he seeks to fill the world with the fragrance of God’s extravagant love, and the peace that comes from life in him.
The only way to true freedom from poverty and all that diminishes life, is the love demonstrated in the incarnation and consummated in the passion. Jesus pours out this love for us on the cross; and he calls us to pour out ourselves in turn, in his service, and the service of one another: to fill the world with his love. May that be our prayer, this Passiontide. Amen.