Soli Deo Gloria

506 years ago, Martin Luther, a Catholic priest, posted 95 theological protests the way the Catholic Church was doing things. He wanted the church to reform. In the end, a great schism occurred resulting in a new main branch of Christian communities – the Protestants. Luther’s protests boiled down to 5 principles that should guide Christian life and community. Scripture only is our authority on the Will of God. Christ fulfilled the law, and our justification before God is only possible because of Christ. We can only receive that justification by faith in Christ, and not in ourselves and not because of anything we have done or not done. Our salvation is by grace and grace alone, only because of what Jesus freely did for us. Therefore, Soli Deo Gloria – To God only be the Glory – We respond to God’s grace by living lives poured out in gratitude. Let us listen to the Word of God, as recorded in Mark’s Gospel about one who poured out her gratitude and love.

Mark 14:3-9

What we do tells a lot about who we are and what we care about. Mark doesn’t tell us much about her, but Jesus told us that anywhere the Gospel is proclaimed, anywhere people talk about God’s love shown to the world by sending his Son Jesus, this woman’s story will be told. So, of course, she is included in our sermon series on people’s encounters with Jesus on Reformation Sunday. This woman didn’t hold back on her love for Jesus – she only had one focus – and she poured it out.

So who was she? Mark doesn’t tell us her name, or where she’s from, or how she knows Jesus. We don’t know if she travels with Jesus or has just heard about him. What Mark does tell us is that Jesus is staying in Bethany in the days leading up to Passover, just two miles outside of Jerusalem, from Bethany they would walk to the Mount of Olives, go down and past the Garden of Gethsemane and across the Kidron Valley, and then back up to the Temple Mount.

He was having dinner at a man named Simon’s house, and Mark tells us Simon is a leper, a perfect character to describe just before Halloween. Leprosy was a general term for skin disease – pretty common, and highly contagious. It wouldn’t kill you, but it would linger for years and your skin would break down. It could cause your tumor-like growths under your skin. And over the years, it could affect your nerves and people’s limbs would twist and their hands would draw up. Having leprosy was considered a curse from God, people sometimes thought it might be a punishment for sin. For sure, a person who was a leper was unclean. So lepers were not just ostracized – they were thrown out of the community. Sent out by themselves into the desert, they tended to group up and live in a colony together. There was an oil from the seed of the Chaulmoogra tree that could be injected and sometimes cured leprosy. Maybe Simon was healed that way. Maybe Jesus healed him. We don’t know. What we do know is that he was a leper and now he has been restored to community and is the host of Jesus and his followers for dinner two days before Passover begins. So, on our calendars that would be Tuesday of Holy Week.

And it is as Jesus is reclining at the table, remember they didn’t have chairs, they reclined with their upper body close to a low table and their feet out behind them, supporting themselves on their left arm and ate with their right. So, there they all are, talking and eating around the table and this woman comes in with a bottle of luxury perfume, made from nard and imported from India. I can order a small jar of it for about $60 today on Amazon, and I can get it here by Friday without paying for shipping, or Thursday if I’m willing to pay an extra $28.50. It was much more difficult to acquire then. Someone working minimum wage would have to spend a whole year’s salary for it. We don’t know this woman’s financial situation, but regardless, this was the good stuff. If it was for her to wear as perfume, she would only wear it on special occasions. Perhaps a gift of love from her husband, she would wear it only for him. Or maybe it was her family’s burial anointment. Remember, their tombs were rooms, caves dug into the side of a hill. A family would share the cave. When you entered, there were beds of stone carved for the recently deceased, and once the flesh was gone the bones would be transferred to a burial box and inserted into a niche in the tomb wall. While the body lay out on the bed of stone, strong perfume was helpful any time you had to open the tomb and go back in. It didn’t take much, which was good, since it was so expensive.

But this woman, breaks the bottle – the alabaster bottle. She breaks the stone bottle. She’s not saving any of it. And she pours it on Jesus’ head – all of it. The fragrance fills the whole house.

It’s a waste. It’s almost Passover, the time of year that faithful Jews make sure that the poor have a good meal – like us at Thanksgiving or Christmas, they had special collections to make sure everyone had a good Passover.

And Jesus responds, “You will always have the poor with you. You can help them any time you want. But you will not always have me.” Now, Jesus said these words. Remember I said last week that any time Jesus said something that could be taken harshly, those words are more likely to be the actual words Jesus said because over time as they copied the scrolls, scribes smoothed over things that could be confusing or misunderstood or seemed like there had been an error in copying before. The key to understanding what Jesus is saying is when Jesus is saying it. It’s like a family celebrating a huge last Christmas with a loved one who is on hospice, and everybody flying in regardless of how much the tickets cost to be there. Could they have bought gifts for a child in need? Could they have sponsored a Christmas dinner for the homeless? Yes, and they still can do that later. It was important that they gathered and expressed their love now.

That is what she is doing and why Jesus defends her. “What she had, she did.” I love the literal translation, not “She did what she could.” “What she had, she did.”

Wherever the gospel is preached, this woman’s story will be told. Maybe Mark doesn’t tell us anything about her so we could imagine what we would have done if we had been her. Would you have broken the jar and poured it all out, or figured how much you had and used just enough? Whenever we receive the gospel – the good news that our salvation does not depend on us, but on Christ. It is all grace, only grace. When that good news saturates our soul, all we can do is be grateful. We can hold nothing back. Break the jar and pour it all out. Soli Deo Gloria – to God be the glory. May our hearts forever respond, “What I have, I do.” Amen.