Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] I'm going to have us turn in our bibles to the Gospel of John. We're going to continue our series.
[00:00:05] We're in chapter twelve. And of all the chapters, I'm going to call this a hinge chapter, because it's moving away from the first eleven chapters, and it's introducing us into the last week now of what we'd call the Passion of Christ.
[00:00:22] Many of us are well acquainted with the story of apartheid in South Africa, and it came to an end eventually.
[00:00:31] Nelson Mandela, who had been incarcerated for many years, eventually became the president, and they created a thing called Truth and Reconciliation Commission. And so at the end, there was a certain police officer, a white guy by the name of Vanderbroeck, who was put on trial. And the reason he was put on trial was because he was found to have come to a woman's home, had murdered her son, shot him at point blank range, and then burnt his body while he and some other officers were partying nearby. The woman's husband was also killed by the same man, and his body was also destroyed. So what was rather unfathomable in the surviving woman's response, the mother of the son and wife to the husband that was murdered, and it was burnt. I'm not advancing here.
[00:01:23] What must she have thought and felt that she sat in the courtroom being burdened and re traumatized by the evidence.
[00:01:33] So the court asked her, what do you want? Speaking to the woman now who had gone through this, how should justice be done for this man?
[00:01:42] That is the right question, isn't it? And this is what she said.
[00:01:47] What is justice, and how can it be achieved, and how does it look different from mere retribution and punishment?
[00:01:53] So she basically said, there's three things I would like to have done. Number one, first, I want to be taken to the place where my husband's body was burned so that I can gather up the dust and give his remains a decent burial. She said, my husband and son were my only family members. Number one, she said, secondly, for Mister Vanderbilt to become my son, I would like him to come twice a month to the ghetto and spend a day with me so that I can pour out on him whatever love I still have remaining. In other words, I have love in my heart. I want to share it, and I want him to be my son, and I want to share that love to him.
[00:02:37] How many know? That's kind of a powerful request? That's probably something most of us probably wouldn't have asked for, but maybe we could have filled in the blanks differently. Because maybe we would have said, yeah, I want him to come to the ghetto so that I can let him feel the crushing poverty I've had to live with. Or maybe I want him to come to the ghetto so I can have him feel the void of the loss that I'm experiencing without husband and son. Or maybe I could have him come to the ghetto so that every distrusting eye could scrutinize him as a minority now in the community in which he's in. But that's not how she finished her request.
[00:03:13] She said, so that I could pour out on him whatever love I still have.
[00:03:18] And how much love does she still have? Well, finally, in her third request, she said, I would like Mister Vanderbilt to know that I offer him my forgiveness because Jesus Christ died to forgive. And that was also the wish of my husband, that, you know, he was a forgiving person.
[00:03:35] And so I would kindly ask someone to come to my side and lead me across the courtroom so that I could take Mister Vanderbilt in my arms and embrace him and let him know that he's truly forgiven.
[00:03:48] Now, how many know that's an unusual request?
[00:03:54] Anybody say that would be an unusual request?
[00:03:57] Okay, I would say that would be a little bit extravagant on the side of forgiveness and love, would you not? Did not God, our father, do the very same thing for you and me while we crucified his son? God reached out to us to love us, forgive us, and show kindness to us, despite how we treated him. And I want you to think of Jesus as he's hanging on the cross, the very people that had crucified him. He looks down upon them, not in anger, not in bitterness, not in resentment, but he looks at them in pity and in grace and in love. And he says, Father, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing.
[00:04:40] God's desire is to make us, his sons and daughters in order to love us despite all the things that we've done wrong. God's love continually is extended. As a matter of fact, Paul says, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
[00:04:59] This incredible act of forgiveness, I think, by the south african woman, is really an expression of that extravagant love that the father gives towards you and I. It comes from the very heart of God. It's not human. It's his divine love being poured out through a human agent. In John twelve, we turn to another such expression of love and devotion. And in our text today, Jesus, who is now going to be crucified within that week, is returning basically to Jerusalem to become the paschal lamb. In other words, he's going to become the lamb of God at this particular Passover so that he can take away the sin of the world. Jesus self giving, extravagant love inspires devotion in hearts all around him. And one such person who expressed that same kind of love was Mary from Bethany, which was a little village 2 miles just on the outskirts of Jerusalem.
[00:05:55] Because Mary, the sister of Martha and the sister of Lazarus, is so overwhelmed by what Jesus had previously done for her brother, who had raised him back to life after being dead for four days, now, she doesn't realize that this extravagant expression of love and devotion actually becomes a prophetic picture of Christ's upcoming death. She's not aware of it. Do you know, I'm going to say things. A lot of times, some of our actions, we don't even wear. God is using them and they're more profound than we recognize. So in a parallel account, because this is one of the stories that's utilized in more than one gospel, we find this dinner is actually hosted by Simon the Leopard. And we pick it up in Mark, chapter 14 and verse three. He says, while he was in Bethany reclining at a table in the home of Simon the Leper, a woman came with an alabaster box of very expensive perfume made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on his head. So now we pick up the same story from John's perspective. And I want you to notice there's going to be a little different expression of the story. And I'll talk about maybe why that is where we discover some of the people in the incident. John, chapter 1212. One six days before the passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived and whom Jesus had raised from the dead. By the way, John is the only person that tells us the story of Lazarus resurrection. He's the only one.
[00:07:29] So now he's going to frame this whole incident in light of what had happened there. Here, a dinner was given in Jesus honor and Martha served. What's new? While Lazarus was among those who were reclining at the table with him. Then Mary took out a pint of pure nard and an expensive perfume. She poured it on Jesus feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. Now, how many know the actions of Martha and Mary? Very consistent with what we know about them, because in Luke, chapter ten, we read the same thing, remember? Actually, Martha was busy serving once before, but she was a little bit uptight about Mary not doing her part. As far as Martha was concerned and she had a lot of choice words to say to Jesus about getting Mary moving. And Jesus talked to her and said, listen, martha, you're anxious about all kinds of things, but Mary has actually chosen the better part. Which was what? Sitting at the feet of Jesus and actually listening to what he had to say. In other words, once again we have here Mary serving and Mary, sorry, Martha the servant. And Mary is now the attentive worshiper.
[00:08:42] But here we see a beautiful demonstration of her worship. Ff. Bruce says the meal may well have been intended in part to celebrate the recent recovery of Lazarus from death. So Lazarus was treated as one of the guests of honor alongside the Lord to whom he owed his new life.
[00:08:58] So the question I'm raising today is, how do we inspire extravagant love? In other words, how can this love actually be expressed in us and through us? How can we experience and demonstrate this kind of love? Because I am really convinced that the only way our society is ever going to be impacted is when they see the love of God being demonstrated to them through the lives of you and me. That's the key way of reaching people. It's through love that's the most powerful agent in the world. As a matter of fact, as we were praying this morning, this man, it was interesting. One of them quoted first corinthians 13, and it talks about, even if you could do all these amazing things, you had the faith can move mountains, but you have not love. It means nothing. All the things that we do without a motivation of love is not going to affect really transformation in people's lives. And finally, it comes to the conclusion of chapter 13 where it says, and these three things remain, faith, hope and love. And love is the greatest.
[00:10:02] It's powerful.
[00:10:04] It really is. So, you know, we're going to look at this nature of love and why it's so critical. Maybe one of the reason is because God himself is love and that the end result of a maturing faith is love that you and I have to develop in this realm in our lives. And that's part of our growing up. So how can that happen? I think there's a number of things we need to understand. I'm going to focus just on two of them in light of the story. And the first one is the cost of this kind of love. How many know there's a price to be paid in terms of what a person is willing to give up in order to express love? You know, love is actually laying down your life for another. That's really what it's about.
[00:10:44] It's giving rather than getting. And, you know, we could tell somebody, I really love you. But we need to demonstrate that words can be very cheap sometimes. It's what we do to demonstrate it that tells people that we truly love them. And so I think there's a personal, emotional, and often a financial and social aspect of this kind of love. And as we're going to see, we're going to certainly be misunderstood by some, criticized by others, but ultimately influence and impact those we lavish this kind of love upon. It's going to affect something in people's lives. What made this meal so memorable is the moment when Mary walks in. Nobody's expecting this. This is like, you know, just having dinner with a bunch of people from Bethany. Everyone's honoring Jesus. They're looking at Lazarus, been raised from the dead. Mary walks in and takes this alabaster box, breaks it and starts pouring oil over Jesus and then lets down her hair and starts wiping his feet with her hair. Now, how many know? That probably got everybody's attention.
[00:11:44] That was not a normal action. I'm going to show you why it was so abnormal.
[00:11:49] It was shocking, it was startling, it was unexpected, and it was extravagant, to say the least. As we're about to see, ff. Bruce goes on to say the outpouring of all this expensive perfume was extravagant. But for a woman to let down her hair and wipe a man's feet with it would have been at least as extraordinary in the eyes of that company as it would be for us on a comparable occasion. If somebody did that right now, you'd all be shocked, right? But he said in that day, it would even be more shocking because of the mores of that society.
[00:12:23] Now, what's interesting in the parallel account is that Matthew and Mark's gospel say that the oil was poured over the head of Jesus, while John seems to mention the feet of Jesus. Now, sometimes we read these kinds of things and we're saying, well, is this kind of a contradictory report, or do we need to understand it in a more fuller way? Now, I think what's happening is Matthew and Mark are making a point and John is making a different point. But da Carson points out in Mark, chapter 14 and verse eight. Here it says, she did what she could. She poured perfume on my body beforehand to prepare me for burial. Now, she had enough oil there so that when she poured it on his head, it not only went on his head, it went all over him. So Jesus literally got bathed with this perfume, okay? It went all over him.
[00:13:09] So the question is, why are these gospel writers focusing on different things? Because I think there's a different emphasis. Da Carson says Matthew and Mark have thematic reasons for referring in particular to Jesus head. They wish to show that he is being honored or anointed as a king, and that's kind of their theme, especially Matthew's gospel. Jesus is the king, so he's being anointed here.
[00:13:35] It would not have been inappropriate for John to make the same emphasis. But by mentioning the anointing on Jesus feet, there's injected into the description a sense of a number of things. One, the woman's self perceived unworthiness. In other words, she was humbling herself.
[00:13:50] Number two, she became a foil. Now she's going to be used as a picture, a contrast, first of all, not only of the religious authorities who are actively plotting Jesus death, but of the disciples who in the very next chapter have to be taught to wash one another's feet by Jesus himself. So she is actually a model of how we should behave, where in the next chapter we're gonna see a model of how we should not behave. And the Bible does this a lot. It shows contrast for us, so we have a visual picture. This is what we should do. This is what we shouldn't do. And if you remember that story in John chapter 13, those guys, nobody wanted, there was no servant in the house. Nobody wanted to get up and wash the dirty feet of everybody else, because that was considered the lowest of the lowest of the lowest job. And who gets up and does it? Well, Jesus does. Then he says, now, you guys, you have to learn something here. This is what you should be doing, you know, you should be loving each other, because they were bickering all the time. Who's going to be the greatest? Who's number one? Blah, blah, blah. Jesus said, you want to be great in my kingdom? Be the servant of you, of them all. That's how you have greatness in my kingdom. Boy, he's really straightening these guys out, isn't he? Mary's behavior is in stark contrast of the hatred of those who desire to kill him, and to the disciples, pride and not willing to humble themselves and wash each other's feet. Mary's extravagant love is expressed in her humility and unabashed expression of devotion, which really is shocking. This company of diners.
[00:15:29] True worship comes to God with a deep sense of humility and gratitude rather than a self confident attitude or defiance. We're going to see some defiance in here. How do we approach God?
[00:15:45] How are you approaching God today? Are we overwhelmed like Mary, regarding his grace and goodness, it just overwhelms us. You ever have those moments where you're overwhelmed by God's goodness? You're overwhelmed by his love? Or like the disciples in the next chapter, we're busy fighting for position. You know, we're trying to get our way. We want our rights met. You know, as a Christian, where are we at? You know, are we walking in humility, or are we walking in pride and arrogance? That's the question. You know, I think the real test is seeing how we treat others. If you want to know how good you're doing in your christian life, take a hard look at how you treat people around you. Do we demonstrate deep love and concern for our brothers and sisters in Christ, or do we make all sorts of judgments regarding them? You know, what's wrong with this person? Why are they doing that? Why can't they be like this? You know, we make these statements, or do we come alongside of people? Instead of criticizing people, we come alongside of them and we help them and we encourage them and we comfort them and we instruct them. Isn't that what we should be doing? I think so.
[00:16:50] Touching the feet of someone, as Gerald Bouchard relates, was regarded by Jews as a very degrading experience and was normally reserved for slaves and others to whom little honor was due. Those were the only people that did that kind of thing.
[00:17:06] The fact that Mary was willing to do this act at a meal in the presence of other communicates volumes about her elevated regard for Jesus. So what prompted Mary to do this? Well, I think part of it was the fact that her brother had just been raised from the dead. How many would be overjoyed if someone you love was brought back to life within a few days and you knew it was Jesus, and you're just going, how can you not love Jesus?
[00:17:33] You know, she was overwhelmed. I mean, she already loved Jesus. She already knew the love of Jesus. The Bible said in chapter eleven that Jesus loved Mary, Martha and Lazarus. She knew that love. But when Jesus did this for her, it just overwhelmed her with his goodness. I think there was another reason as well. Ronald points. Whitaker says jewish women. Yeah. He says jewish women did not let their hair in public. This is an expression of devotion that would come across in their minds is extremely improper, as indeed it would in most cultures. As indeed, the humility of her act prepares us to be all the more scandalized when Jesus himself washes his disciples feet in the next chapter. So again, commenting on that contrast between Mary and the rest of the disciples, she is showing us the way to worship. She's showing us the way to show love and devotion. She's showing us how to express this extravagant kind of love in opposition to what's about to happen.
[00:18:38] So what we may not understand, though, is the cost that this devotion had to Jesus. Jill Boshard suggests that this may have been her dowry, because the price of the perfume, as we're going to read, was actually the amount of.
[00:18:57] It was a year's salary, a salary of a daily worker.
[00:19:03] It would take a year to pay for this kind of perfume. Now, I just want just take for a moment, I don't know what the average salary is today in our city, but can you imagine a perfume bottle costing your annual salary?
[00:19:17] Does that give you a little idea what she's doing? And this was like, you know, this is kind of her future. This is the dowry she would be using to get married. And what she's doing at this moment is it's almost a reckless action. It's so extravagant to nature what she's doing.
[00:19:35] She's also.
[00:19:37] He goes on to say here, sociologically, Mary was literally depleting her potential of gaining a husband. In other words, she was giving up her future. In her mind, the move is not to be understood as merely some nice act of honoring the Lord, but as a tremendous demonstration of her commitment to him. In other words, basically what she, in essence, is communicating, that she was simply expressing her love and entrusting her future to Jesus. Because there was a sense, I believe, that she knew that Jesus was the messiah, that Jesus was, you know, he was the son of God. He was more than just an ordinary person. She already had figured that out, and she was coming to honor and worship him. Do you know what's amazing? You know, we read that story today, and Jesus basically tells us that we're to remember this act of her give self giving love. It's going to be remembered for all of eternity, you know, what are you going to be remembered for in life? Mary is remembered for being a wholehearted, devoted, loving worshiper of Jesus that expressed extravagant love. Let me move on to the second thing we need to understand about extravagant love. It's the response. How did the people gathered at that meal respond to Mary's behavior? Okay, a little scandalized, maybe little shocked, startled.
[00:21:09] You think that love is always going to produce a positive response, but not necessarily. Some became indignant, critical, sensuous, at what seemed to be this extravagant action, at pouring out of this expensive perfume. But as we've already said, this was an act of deep devotion. Whenever we express this kind of love, you know, it will have a positive and life shaping influence upon the recipient. Whoever we're doing this for, they will be impacted, which brings also glory and honor to God. But it can also produce a profound negative reaction. You go, why? Because I think sometimes it's misunderstood and it's very threatening. You know, people are very jealous. There's a lot of envy in our world. And when somebody does something like that, you know, they're showing us up, really, right? Here's a person that acts like this. You go, wow, yeah, I have a ways to go in expressing my love and devotion to God. There's not too many Marys out there, is there, that respond this way.
[00:22:15] It can be.
[00:22:17] This action, I think, demonstrates a greater divine love flowing through that person. To behave like that south african woman, to behave like Mary, you have to have something greater working inside of you. You have to have the love of God controlling you. You have to have God's love flowing through you to do these things. I don't believe that kind of love comes from human beings. You know, to sin is human, to forgive is divine. It takes God's nature, God's spirit, God's love to do these kinds of things.
[00:22:53] This was how the true nature of a disciple of Christ is to be revealed. What should be occurring in our lives is that as we mature, our love for God, another should be increasing. You know, we should basically be saying, is my capacity to love people growing? That's what we should be looking at, you know, am I maturing as a Christian, the test is, how do I treat people? And if I'm treating people in a more gracious way, a more loving way, a more forgiving way, a more understanding way, a more comforting way that tells me I'm growing up, I'm maturing, and that's part of what maturity is all about.
[00:23:31] Just before Jesus was crucified. We're going to find this out in the next chapter. He left a command. I call this an identity marker. Now, give me an understanding of what I mean by an identity marker. If you're a jewish person today, when you're a male, you receive circumcision on the 8th day. That's called an identity marker that identifies you with a group of people. Okay, so what is an identity marker for the Christian? And it's real simple. It's found in John, chapter 13. Jesus lays it down. A new command, I give you. Love one another as I have loved you, so you must love one another. So as Jesus loves us, how does Jesus love you and me?
[00:24:16] He loves us unconditionally.
[00:24:19] He loves us extravagantly.
[00:24:23] He says, I'm giving you this command.
[00:24:26] This is really actually a hard command, guys. You know, some people think, oh, it's easy. You know, we think the Old Testament's a challenge to keep. Try keeping the New Testament. This is a high call.
[00:24:38] This is the highest call possible to love people like this, to love each other like this. He says, by this will everyone know you are my disciples if you what?
[00:24:49] Love one another? You know, Tuesday night, I'm going to just say, this was a very moving night.
[00:24:55] I asked people to come and fast and pray last Tuesday night. There's a lot of needs in our church. There's people, you know, that I know right now, if Jesus doesn't undertake for them, they will pass away shortly. They need a miracle. I know that there's a lot of people in our congregation. They live with pain every single day. I know who they are.
[00:25:15] There's a lot of people walking through a season of grief right now. They've lost a precious loved one, and it's very grievous. And some are struggling with that grief in their life. I know that. And so I felt like there was so much crisis in the church, like at a level I'd never seen before. I felt the only thing we could do is to pray for one another. And many of you came on Tuesday night, and some of you who were unable to come, but you prayed at home, whatever way you did it, I'm going to tell you what happened Tuesday night if you were not here. We had well over 100 people here, well over. And I had all these people come forward that had great needs in their lives. In the front here was just packed with people with needs. And then I said, I turned around and it was all these people out there. And I said, listen, guys, there are no spectators. The family of God, we're all participants. And I had them all come forward. And for the next, I don't know, quite a long time, people were in little groups, praying, praying over people. They were praying. It was so beautiful, everybody. I saw people crying. I saw people praying. I saw people hugging. I saw people, I said, this is what it's about. This is the heart of the church right here, you know? And when people are starting to walk beside each other and walk with each other, and it was neat, too, because the young adults, you know, they canceled their meeting and joined us. And it was beautiful to see them join us and pray with us and pray for people that were in need. And I think it's great when you and I, maybe our lives are going well, that we are sharing in the sorrows of the people that are struggling. That's love. That's what it's all about. And we need to understand that. And I believe God's going to. I think I was watching, I stepped back for a minute, looked at this, and they said, lord, you have to be loving this. Because I think this is what it's all about right here. This is where we're moving towards, where we really understand that.
[00:27:04] Then we notice this criticism that was directed at Mary's action. She was criticized for this behavior. You know, it's really tough when you. I can understand that when I do the bad thing, I'm being criticized, but when I'm doing the right thing and I'm doing it at a high level and I'm being criticized, that's a little harder to handle. Right? But you know what? Mary didn't focus on that. And I noticed what happened in verse four. But one of the disciples, Judas Iscariot, who was later to betray him, objected, why wasn't this perfume sold? And the money given to the poor? It was worth a year's wages.
[00:27:37] You go, yeah, well, that's Judas. You know, I always tell people, you always gotta pay attention to the source of the criticism. Yeah. Judas wasn't noted for being a good guy, so don't worry too much about it.
[00:27:51] When we do something in extravagant love, it may surprise us who criticizes us, because in Mark, it tells us it wasn't. Judas wasn't the only one criticizing her. Listen to what it said. Some of those present were saying indignantly to one another.
[00:28:07] You know, they're at the table, they're talking. It wasn't just Judas, guys, John's just picking on Judas here. But it was a whole bunch of them talking and saying, why this waste of perfume? You know, these are the practical people, right? They're going, look, we could have done something a lot better with this than that, right? You know, it could have been sold for more than a year's wages and the money given to the poor. And they rebuked her harshly.
[00:28:37] They weren't even nice about it. They were mean about it. It wasn't just Judas that said it. It was a bunch of them that said this. And they're rebuking poor Mary for doing this amazing, loving, devoted act towards Jesus. Hmm.
[00:28:55] Wow.
[00:28:57] You know, when we do something in extravagant love, it may surprise us who will criticize us?
[00:29:03] You know, it may come from people closest to us.
[00:29:06] They may question the wisdom of our investment, moved by such love that we are willing to sacrifice for another. They might say, you know, that was nice to be a dude, but that was stupid, or that was over the top, or, you know, you should have thought this thing through, or, you know, you're not thinking about your future. Come on, Mary, what are you going to do now? You just gave up your dowry. You know, I don't know what was going on in that conversation.
[00:29:27] Though. Others criticize based on this extravagant John reveals why Judas was so offended. He kind of gives us an insight which gives us a little glimpse into the heart of greed that actually led to the betrayal of Jesus.
[00:29:44] Here we see the contrast between Mary's costly devotion to Jesus and Judas greed, which leads to that betrayal. He did not say this because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief. As keeper of the money bag he used to help himself to what was put in it. In other words, this is a lot of money. I could have been skimming a lot more money off the bag, right? Gerald Bouchard points out that John is revealing the character of the man who would betray Jesus. The story in John, however, makes a slightly different point. It certainly picks up the burial symbolism because Jesus defends her and says, hey, she did this for my burial. But it refocuses the picture from the misunderstanding of the disciples to Judas. And he was not merely mistaken in this story. John makes it plain that Judas was not an unfortunate, misguided person.
[00:30:37] You know, that's a portrayal that we get today. He was inherently an evil thief who had no concern for the poor. Thus, John would never agree with some modern portrayals of Judas as a tragic hero who merely misunderstood Jesus. By the way, that's how he's portrayed in some of these modern shows. I've seen it where they made Judas appear to be a misguided person, a patriot who thought Jesus was going to help and he was so disappointed that he betrayed Jesus. But he wasn't that bad of a guy. Well, no, John doesn't paint him that way. That's not what he's doing in his gospel. As a matter of fact, for John, Judas is a devil man. He's a diabolos.
[00:31:18] It says he was filled with Satan. That's not a nice statement there in chapter 13, the son of doom and destruction. For John, he was the unforgivable betrayer who stood with the enemies of Christ.
[00:31:31] That's pretty strong. John paints Judas says, totally giving himself over to evil. You know, there's a tragedy in life. Yes, we're to love people, but Jesus is telling us to love one another, the believers. And we do love people outside of the household of faith. But here's the problem. Sometimes it's difficult because they're evil, and eventually they give themselves up to evil. That's the great tragedy.
[00:31:56] Matthew, you know, warns us. He's warning the multitudes on the danger of loving money. And I'll tell you what the danger of loving money is. And putting money as a priority in our life, because eventually it will cause you to betray your faith.
[00:32:10] That's why Jesus warns against it. He says, don't store for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and vermin destroy, where thieves break in and steal, but store up for your treasures in heaven. In other words, put God's kingdom first. Seek God's kingdom first. God will take care of your needs. Do you know what the tragedy is? If you think of this life as just journeying through the wilderness like they did in the Old Testament, to get to the promised land, and that's all this life is. We're just going through. We're passing through, folks. We're pilgrims passing through this life. And if we're focusing in on building our little mansion in this wilderness, I'm going to tell you, be deeply disappointed because you're not taking it with you into eternity. We need to be actually storing up treasures in heaven. Heaven, by the way, we invest our lives and time in the lives of other people. Jesus said, for where your treasure is, that's where your heart also will be. So whatever you give your heart to whatever. And it's a choice we're making. That's why it says, guard your heart. Who's responsible for doing that? We are. We have to make choices in this life. And the choice should be, I'm putting the things above at the highest priority in my life and trusting that God will take care of my needs. But I'm not focusing in on this other thing. I am literally locked into this. And then Jesus says this. No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.
[00:33:34] And that is a powerful warning to us, because Judas actually loved money. And at that point, it caused him eventually to betray Christ. Eventually, he lost everything. And I'm going to say this as nicely as I can, but if we put Christ first and we seek his kingdom first. What will happen to you is that God will take care of you in this life. You'll be fine.
[00:33:57] You know, God's not against money. He's against, the root of evil is not money. It's the love of money.
[00:34:04] And so for some people, money becomes their master. And for other people, money is just their servant. And we need to understand that.
[00:34:12] We need to get that. Otherwise it will cause us grief like it did Judas. Jesus defense of such love was directed toward him.
[00:34:21] This love was directed towards Jesus. And here's what he says. Leave her alone. Jesus stands up for her. It was intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial. You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me. Now Jesus now interprets her action in light of what he knows is about to come. He's about to be crucified and buried. Okay? It's a prophetic action. Rodney Whitaker explains how the action of others are all a part of God's design. Though often they don't understand the significance of what they're doing at the time. Whereas Mary's intentions and reason for her action, Jesus sees it in reference to his coming death, Jesus sees cryptic significance in another person's actions instead of making his more usual cryptic explanation of his own activity. There's no reason to think Mary knew the full import of what she was doing. She didn't understand what she was doing was actually for his burial. She didn't understand all of that. But what she did was actually prophetic and significant of that caiaphas, when he said that it must be that one man dies for the sake of the nation, when he said that, he was just thinking he's getting rid of an evildoer. But reality was, caiaphas was prophesying that this is what was going to save the nation, and not only that nation, but all nations. So the people around Jesus and the story are caught up in this climax of a bigger story. And I think you and I need to understand something, that your life and my life is actually caught up in a bigger story. It's not just our little story. God is using all of our lives in a bigger picture.
[00:35:55] Is that amazing? And so sometimes we look at our little picture and we go, well, I'm not really doing that much. And I'm saying, yeah, but you're caught up in a bigger picture. You don't know what you're actually contributing. It's far greater than you realize. We're doing something together that's far richer and far more significant than we realize.
[00:36:15] And when you get into eternity, one day you're going to be blown away when people from all over the world are going to walk up to you and say, do you realize that I'm here because of what you and your fellow believers here in Red Deer did?
[00:36:31] Do you know that's true?
[00:36:33] There'll be thousands of people from India thanking you, and from Cuba, and from Myanmar and from Laos and from all over the world will be thanking you. And you'll be going, I don't even know you guys.
[00:36:45] They'll say, yeah, but you sent these people, supported these people, you did this and you did that.
[00:36:51] And some of the people you helped in your own community, they left the community and went out and did these things. You have no idea the extent to what you are impacting the people around you.
[00:37:04] Rodney Whitaker relates that Jesus is pointing out the practical reality and the proper perspective of priority.
[00:37:14] He goes, Mary and her devotion unconsciously provides for the honor of the dead. Judas in his selfish unconsciousness, brings about the death. Isn't that amazing?
[00:37:24] The fact that Jesus is about to die justifies Mary's action. But on another level, the identity of Jesus also justifies her action. Why?
[00:37:37] Because in the synoptics, even the bearing of one's father is put second in response to Jesus on the call of the kingdom, Jesus said, no, let the dead go bury their dead. First. You come and follow me. The kingdom is the priority. And so this anointing also makes sense given who Jesus is and the awesome events unfolding in salvation history. Jesus is saying, you guys are criticizing here, but you have no idea what's going on here. This is far bigger than you understand. See, you're caught up in your own little world. Do you know, a lot of our decisions are made with a very small viewpoint in mind.
[00:38:10] We need to have a broader viewpoint than that. That's what we're getting. That's what he's getting at here. You don't realize that some of the things you do, you know, sometimes giving a cold cup of water in Jesus name, you get a prophet's reward. Jesus said that you don't realize your little acts of kindnesses actually has deeper ramifications down the road.
[00:38:31] It's very powerful.
[00:38:33] The crowds gathered to see both Jesus and Lazarus, the man who was raised to life.
[00:38:39] Meanwhile, a large crowd of Jews found out that Jesus was there and came not only because of him, but also to see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. It seemed that Jesus earlier visit that had brought Lazarus to life. Jesus immediately withdrew from the area, but now he's back, and the crowds have been buzzing because, you know, Lazarus has been raised from the dead. And I'm sure these two sisters kept him kind of secluded, but now they're out in public at this dinner in Bethany in honor of Jesus and Lazarus. And, you know, when you only live 2 miles from the main center of the whole nation, Jerusalem, there were people all over the place hearing about this stuff. This was gossiped all over town, not just in Bethany, but also in Jerusalem. So when they found out Jesus was there, a whole bunch of people showed up.
[00:39:24] It was the reason why when Jesus came a few days later, walking down the mount of Olives, there were so many people walking with him and those that came before him. This was the most significant thing that had ever happened in most of their lives. This was a major moment. And let's face it, you know, not too many people come back from the dead after four days.
[00:39:48] Now, that created a problem for the Sanhedrin.
[00:39:52] We got to do something about this. This is getting out of hand, right? The whole city is in a buzz. I mean, they were losing their control over the lives of people, and they were threatened by this. And so the Bible says they intended to kill Jesus and Lazarus. So the chief priests made plans to kill Lazarus as well. Why would they want to kill him? He's the evidence. You know, what do you do with this guy? He's walking around. He was dead for four days. Now he's walking around, he's a billboard everywhere he goes.
[00:40:24] Do you understand why the devil doesn't like Christians? You don't know this, but you've been raised from the dead spiritually. And you're walking around, you're a walking billboard that the kingdom of God is real.
[00:40:37] It's true.
[00:40:39] For on account of him, many of the Jews were going over to Jesus and believing in him. It was threatening the status quo.
[00:40:47] Craig Keener explains the message that John is trying to convey to his first century readers. So now you have to remember John's writing a long time after this event, and he's writing to people who are being persecuted. And so Craig Keener says, what was John trying to convey to the readers, not just in the first century, but what he trying to convey to you and me? You know, the narrative rings with irony. Jesus went to Judea risking his life to give life to Lazarus. But now life, Lazarus new life may cost him his life. How many see that?
[00:41:17] It's a scary thing to follow Jesus because your life is on the line. That's what he's saying.
[00:41:23] The paradigm shift for disciples could not be clear. Those who would follow Jesus must be prepared to die, for the world will hate them and wish to kill them. You know, why do we act surprised that the world hates us?
[00:41:37] You shouldn't. Jesus.
[00:41:40] He says that to us in this high priestly prayer.
[00:41:44] But faith would not be decreased by such martyrdom, producing new life. The sign of Lazarus new life brought others to faith.
[00:41:52] So what may seem shocking to us to see such extravagant love expressed and the awful, vile response to those around us who witness such love, it is the love that comes from above. And only those who really have experienced that kind of love can demonstrate that kind of love. In other words, you and I could never act like this unless God's love is in us.
[00:42:12] And so how do we act like this? Well, we got to let more of that love come into us so it can go through us. And the more I practice the love of God in my life towards others, the more that love flows into my soul. It's a never ending stream.
[00:42:27] Do you know, it's a human thing to love the lovable, but it takes a divine love to love the unlovable. And that's why we need to experience God's love in order to love ourselves.
[00:42:37] You know, some of us in this room, we don't even love ourselves. Well, you need God's love to love you.
[00:42:43] And you can't love other people if you don't love yourself. It says, love your neighbor as yourself. How do you know? A lot of reason why people don't love other people. They don't even love themselves.
[00:42:51] How do you come to a place where you can actually love yourself? You got to receive God's love and understand that God doesn't create junk and that God is in the redemptive business, and God is in the restoration business, and God is in the transformation business.
[00:43:04] And that God begins to change us and we become the person we were designed to be. In other words, now God's God is love can actually flow, not only so that we can love ourselves, but then we can love other people, and finally we can love our enemies. How many know that that's going to take us special kind of love?
[00:43:24] The christian life is a journey of love maturing our souls until, like the south african woman, the object of love can be the one who wounded us the most.
[00:43:34] And I could even say this is the way it should be in marriage, because sometimes the person we live with and the closest to can hurt us. The most. But until we have the love of God in our heart, that love has got to keep growing. You know, I love what Cs Lewis said. The love we are commanded to have for God and our neighbor is a state of the will, not of the affections.
[00:43:58] Though if they ever also play their part, so much the better. So what is he saying? He's saying love is a choice.
[00:44:05] You know what? Sometimes you don't feel like loving people.
[00:44:09] Sometimes you feel like strangling people.
[00:44:12] Come on, isn't that true?
[00:44:16] But we have to make a choice emotionally. We can say at this moment, I feel like killing you, but I'm commanded to love you. And so therefore, by an act of my will, I'm going to love you, even though that's not how I feel.
[00:44:31] But I'll just say this about our emotions. If we act like God acts and we don't give in to our wrong, our emotions, we're not denying them. We're saying, that's how I feel. I'm going to choose to do what I know. I'm not going to let my feelings define me. I'm not going to let my feelings determine how I'm going to behave. I'm going to control those feelings, acknowledge them, control them and do what God wants me to do. And that brings about transformation. So let us pray today that God will inspire us on this journey of love so that others may know the author of love, our father in heaven. Let's stand.
[00:45:08] How many here say, you know, pastor, this is, you know, there's probably room for more love in my heart.
[00:45:17] I got both hands up, you know, I don't think this comes from us. It comes from God.
[00:45:24] And so how many here say, you know what? I really want God's love to flow in me, and I want God's love to flow in me like a channel.
[00:45:33] I want it to be a river. I want love to flow in like a river and love to flow through me like a river. Amen.
[00:45:41] And let's pray. Let's say, God, we want to be the most loving people. We want God's love to just flow through us. And I believe that what will happen, listen very carefully.
[00:45:52] God will trust us with broken people.
[00:45:55] Because, you know, if God brings in people that are messed up and broken and all the rest of it, and they're, you know, like, how many know when you're newly married and then you decide, we're gonna have children? And when you have a child, immediately what starts happening is a child is born and you end up being staying awake at night, you got dirty diapers to change. You got the kid to feed. Come on, that's reality. But you don't go, oh, this is awful. You just go, I'm tired. I'd rather somebody else change that diaper once in a while. But love compels me to get up and feed and change the diaper. Come on. Amen. That's the way it works. And all I'm saying to you is if God starts bringing in a whole bunch of people in the kingdom of God, they're going to come in with dirty diapers and they're going to need to be fed. They're going to be toddlers, and they're going to bicker and fight amongst themselves.
[00:46:48] And we got to have a lot of love in our hearts to nurture and care for this little one so that they can grow up and become adults and be mature. Isn't that what parenting is all about?
[00:46:59] And that's what a church is supposed to be all about. So we don't walk around going, well, what's wrong with them? Why are they doing this? Criticizing that, listen, there's going to be dirty diapers.
[00:47:10] That's what's going to happen. And some of us are going to walk up and go, got to change a diaper. And we're not going to do it like, oh, I got to change diapers. Hey, you know, I'm so thankful to have this little one in my home. I'm so thankful to have this child in my home. I'm so thankful to have newborn ones in our family.
[00:47:27] Amen. I am thankful for that. And I believe that God is on the verge of bringing in a lot of new people into the kingdom of God, and they're going to. God's going to deposit them here. And when he does that, folks, we got to be ready.
[00:47:43] We could get the milk bottles out. We got to get the diapers out. Come on, now. Are we catching on? So when we're praying a prayer, Lord, fill me with your love.
[00:47:55] I'm just warning you that there's going to be challenges with that prayer.
[00:48:00] Okay?
[00:48:02] You got to understand it. But if you want to be grumpy and unloving, which is not what a Christian should be, you're not maturing correctly. You gotta get fixed. So let's pray right now that the love of God comes so that we happily change diapers and feed newborn ones. And we're just delighted to do it, just like a good parent is, right?
[00:48:25] Amen.
[00:48:27] You know, the amens earlier were a lot stronger now that I've applied it to a very specific situation. I could see it, like, really? Oh. I just wanted love to be filling my heart. Whoo. All the good feelings, right? I'm challenging you. It's not just good feelings, folks. It's got to be real. So, Father, I just pray right now that love would flow. Your love. And I just pray this morning, if there are people here that don't know you, I pray that they'll open their heart to you. I pray that your love would flow into them. I pray that they would experience this amazing, unconditional, extravagant, forgiving love, that they would get to know you as the lover of their souls and see the transformation that you're going to bring about in their lives. And may, Father, in our lives, may we see that develop in a very profound way, Father, that we are now opening our hearts to you to allow the love of God to flow into us in a measure we've never known before, so that we can love people in a way that only you can love them, and we'll shock ourselves to think, you know what? I actually really love this person. Even though they're driving me crazy, I'm loving them. And that's a miracle, because that's not where I was at earlier. You've changed me. You've made me become a more loving person. And that's my prayer for me as a pastor. That's my prayer for our staff. That's my prayer for our congregation. Father, that your love would just flow so profoundly in our lives. And we thank you for that. In Jesus name, amen. God bless you as you leave.
