John 12:1-8
A Tale of Two Disciples
What is the most extravagant thing you ever did? Think about that for a moment. Try to recall a time when you lost all restraint, all worry about budgets or paying bills and engaged in wild extravagance. Most of us have occasionally splurged on a car or a vacation or a gift. But I’m talking beyond that. I’m talking about forgetting all prudence, all worry about tomorrow, about uninhibited extravagance.
Truth is, I can’t really recall ever engaging in that sort of extravagance. I’m too careful, too frugal, too practical. Oh, I’ve sometimes been more extravagant than usual. I’ve given a gift I couldn’t afford or bought something costly I didn’t need. But that’s not what I mean by extravagance. It’s not the sort of thing we see from Mary in our reading this morning.
Extravagance of this sort unnerves us just a bit. Our extravagances are rarely so uninhibited and they often have ulterior motives. I think of most of the really big gifts I’ve seen made to churches over the years, and more often than not, they have strings attached.
We’re not always sure how to respond to genuine, extravagant generosity. If a person of modest means gives $100,000 to her church, asks for anonymity, and doesn’t care what happens with the money, the discussion in the church governing board will be very interesting. There will be a lot of suspicion. There will be a hunt for ulterior motives. And then there will be a lot of fighting over what to do with the money.
In a commentary on today’s gospel, I read an interesting story about extravagance. It happened at a stewardship conference attended by a group of pastors. A conference leader spoke of making an offering directly to God, eliciting little excitement among the attendees. But then he pulled a $100 bill out of his wallet and set it on fire. Now he had everyone’s attention, and everyone seemed a bit nervous. Someone commented on the legality of burning US currency, and someone else joked that if he was throwing away money that perhaps he had a few more hundreds.
But the speaker responded, “Do you not understand? I am offering it to God, and that means it is going to cease to be useful for the rest of us.”[1]
My giving tends to be more utilitarian. I would prefer my donations fund missions and help to the poor rather than buy toilet paper or vacuum cleaner bags. And I will keep a record for my taxes, and I will carefully consider whether or not I can afford such a donation in the first place.
But in our reading today, Mary throws such caution to the wind. She pours out an incredible amount of extremely costly perfume onto Jesus’ feet. It cost 300 denarii which is something on the order of 30, 40, maybe even $50,000 by today’s standards.
Surely everyone in the house that evening was stunned. In the similar stories in Matthew and Mark, the utilitarian objection comes from all the disciples, but in John, Judas alone speaks. “Why was this perfume not sold… and the money given to the poor?” But the narrator lets us know that Judas in not motivated so much by concern for the poor. He’s the treasurer, and he’s not above taking some for himself.
Bad Judas! But then again, if someone showed up at the church and dropped off a $75,000 piece of religious art that looked stunning in our new chapel, I know that I might be inclined to wish she had sold it and given us the money instead. Think of all the good we could do with $75,000, including paying my salary.
I’ve heard this story of Mary and her costly perfume many times. I preached from it on a number of occasions. But I don’t think I had ever noticed before how Mary and Judas, despite how differently they come off in this episode, are both depicted as disciples, and besides Jesus, as the primary actors in the story.
Our reading occurs shortly after Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead. That event has drawn so may cause the Romans to crack down. And so they devise a plan to have Jesus arrested and killed. This causes Jesus to withdrawn from public view, but Passover is approaching. Will Jesus come into the open for the festival? Now, only six days out, five days before the Passover lambs are slain, Jesus comes to Lazarus’ home for a dinner.
Mary is there. She isn’t listed as one of Jesus’ official disciples, but she seems to understand what the others do not. Before Jesus ever teaches his disciples to wash one another’s feet, she washes Jesus’ feet. And though the twelve have not yet grasped that Jesus will soon die, Mary anoints him for burial.
Her act is extravagant beyond measure. We are not told how it was she had this expensive perfume. How many years had she saved to buy it? And what had she originally planned to do with it? Was it an investment of some sort? Or was it something she was saving for some unknown special event, like a hundred year old bottle of French wine awaiting a moment that justified uncorking it.
Whatever her original plans, the perfume is now used up in one fell swoop. Out of gratitude to this one who raised her brother, out of an overwhelming sense of love for this man, as the only way she can think of to appropriately say what may be her last goodbye, she willingly expends it all in one great act of extravagant love. Mary never speaks in the passage, but her actions bespeak a discipleship deeper than that of any of the others.
And then there is Judas. Yes, he is the bad guy. He is even announced by the narrator as the one who was about to betray him. And yet he is also called, one of his disciples. Perhaps this is so obvious that I’d never noticed it before. But despite what Judas will do, he remains one of Jesus’ disciples. Jesus rebukes him, but he has rebuked Peter and others in similar fashion. The gospel of John speaks of Satan entering Judas when he goes to betray Jesus. Judas will move away from the light and be caught up in darkness, and yet he is presented to us here, despite that darkness, as one of Jesus’ disciples.
The fact is, there are only two disciples depicted in our reading for this morning. One is Judas, this tragic failure of a disciple, and one is Mary, who though not a member of the twelve, comes across as the ideal disciple, totally committed to Jesus, understanding what is about to happen, yet still giving her all to Jesus.
All of us here today are disciples, or at least considering becoming one. In some way we’ve felt a pull toward Jesus. In some way we’ve heard him calling us to follow. Given that, I suppose we are all seated at the table between Mary and Judas. I like to think that I am a bit closer to Mary. But my life with Jesus is not nearly so extravagant, and I can’t help wondering what it is that separates these two disciples. What is it that accounts for their very different behavior?
There’s all sorts of speculation about why Judas betrays Jesus. Perhaps it was simply the money. Others assume Judas was forcing Jesus’ hand, hoping that when he was arrested he would employ his power to overthrow the Romans. In either case, Judas would seem to view Jesus as a means to an end… which would make him like a lot of modern Christians who hope Jesus will give them “their best life now,” or will get them into heaven.
Mary, on the other hand, simply seems to be in love with Jesus. She gives herself to him with an extravagance that can only be motivated by love. Perhaps her love springs from Jesus’ bringing her brother Lazarus back from the dead, but whatever the reason, she has moved far beyond any calculations about what she can get from Jesus. In gratitude and in love, she gives extravagantly.
For a lot of people, Christianity is about belief, about morality, about being good, about helping others. Nothing wrong with any of those things, but you’ll never fall in love with morality. I’m not sure you can fall in love with any concept. But if we actually encounter God’s love in the person of Jesus, perhaps we could fall in love with him, and give ourselves to him with an extravagance that can be born only of love.
[1] William Carter in Feasting on the Word: Year C, Volume 2 (
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