Perfume Poured Out

A seal breaks. A sweet, heavy scent spills into the room, so strong that every head turns. Long ago, wise men brought myrrh to a baby. Now a woman brings her own precious gift to the grown-up Jesus.

Bethany was a village on the far side of the Mount of Olives, about two miles from Jerusalem. It was the home of three friends Jesus loved: Martha, Mary, and their brother Lazarus. Not long before, Lazarus had died and lain in a tomb for four days, and Jesus had called him out alive. Now it is six days before the Passover. Jesus' enemies in Jerusalem are plotting to kill him. And in Bethany, his friends throw a dinner in his honour. Martha is serving, as she always does. Lazarus, the man who was dead, is reclining at the table beside Jesus.

Then Mary comes in. She is carrying a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly. Pure nard, a perfume made from a plant that grows in the high mountains far to the east, carried across deserts on trade routes. It was a treasure, the kind of thing a family might keep for years. And Mary does not use a few drops. She pours it over Jesus' feet. Then she does something no respectable woman would normally do in public. She lets down her hair, and wipes his feet with it. And John says: the house was filled with the odour of the ointment.

Not everyone is pleased. Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve disciples, speaks up. Why was this ointment not sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor? It sounds generous. But John tells us the truth behind it. Judas did not care about the poor. He kept the disciples' money bag, and he used to help himself to what was put into it. To Judas, Mary's gift looked like waste. He could only see the price.

Jesus answers him. Leave her alone. She has kept this for the day of my burial. You will always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me. Do you hear what Jesus is saying? In a few days he will die. Bodies were anointed with spices for burial, and Mary, perhaps without fully knowing it, has anointed him ahead of time. Her gift was not waste. It was love, given at exactly the right moment. And the sweet smell lingered on Jesus as he walked toward Jerusalem.

How much was three hundred denarii? In one of Jesus' parables, a vineyard owner pays his workers a denarius for a day's work. So Mary's perfume was worth about a year's wages for a labourer. The Roman writer Pliny the Elder, in his Natural History, describes nard as one of the most prized perfumes of his day, imported from India and sold at high prices.

Perfume Poured Out. You'll find it in John chapter twelve, verses one to eight. At Christmas we think about gifts. Mary gave Jesus her most precious thing, and the whole house was filled with it. So here is a question to carry with you. What precious gift could you give to Jesus, not because it is cheap or easy, but because you love him?