Jesus Is Anointed By Mary

Jesus Is Anointed By Mary

“Therefore Jesus said, ‘Let her alone, so that she may keep it for the day of my burial.’” John 12:7

            We are coming up on what is known as Holy Week.  Holy Week is the week-long celebration of the work Christ did for us on the cross.  It will end on Easter Sunday the day Jesus was resurrected from the dead.  There is a lot written about this week in the four gospels.  Many churches will have things going on to remember the works and teaching of Christ each of the days of Holy Week.  The day before the week began Jesus is in Bethany at Lazarus’ house.  This is the same Lazarus that Jesus raised from the dead.  Martha is there serving the people and Mary will take some perfume and anoint Jesus’ feet with it.

            As we examine the story we see that the perfume is pure nard.  Scripture in verse 3 tells us that it was a pound, or about 12 ounces.  Pure nard is an extract from India and at the time was very costly.  Mary is taking this perfume and putting it on Jesus’ feet while he is reclining at the table.  What an act of humility on her part.  The smell would have filled the whole house, and everyone would be aware of what Mary was doing.

            Judas knows that it was worth lots of money.  He was the keeper of the money for the Apostles and was also a thief.  The love of money, as everyone knows, can be the root of evil and for Judas he loves money.  Judas will stir up the apostles about the value of this perfume and how it is being wasted when there are poor people who need food and things.  Judas doesn’t care about the poor people only the money, but he does get the people around Jesus to talking about what was going on.

            Jesus will correct those in the crowd around Him.  What she is doing is preparing Him for what is going to come by the end of the week.  There are always going to be poor people, but Jesus would not always be on the earth and she is preparing him for His burial.  Money is temporary, but what Jesus was about to do was going to be everlasting.  The Apostles don’t now understand what is going to come, even though Jesus did teach that He was going to die and be raised to life again.

            Sometimes when people are put into their place it can lead to bitterness and even anger.  This can lead us to do things that are not good.  Everyone needs to learn to deal with correction and rejection, because if we don’t we can end up doing damage that goes beyond ourselves.  Judas does not handle this correction well.  He wanted Jesus to make Him rich and because Jesus does not elevate making money from this perfume, Judas will go for money another way.  Judas will sell Jesus to the Chief Priests for 30 pieces of silver.

            The Chief Priests are looking to put Lazarus or Jesus to death because they are losing the people to Jesus.  They, like Judas, want a Jesus to elevate and give them glory.  But Jesus instead has been driving a change that does not drive people to them and elevate the good works that they do.  Jesus even teaches them to love the people that they do not love.  We all need to have ourselves checked in how we view Jesus.  Selfishness is something we all can struggle with, as well as the desire to be the one in control instead of Christ.  It should always be about Jesus, not about ourselves and we should all be about Jesus’ will, not our own.

            As we come to Easter let us examine our lives as to how we serve Jesus.  It was Jesus’ plan to come and die for us, yet His Apostles and those around Him had other plans for Jesus.  We need to live our lives by the word of God.  If we want to be what Christ wants us to be, that means following His word through the power of the Holy Spirit.  Love for how Christ loves needs to dominate our lives.  Too many times we make God and Jesus as a Santa Claus that we can somehow control to get our way and then we leave the faith when it doesn’t go our way.  If we want to be blessed, we should always seek Christ’s will for our lives through the Bible.  Easter is all about Jesus and the work of the cross not about ourselves.

All Scripture is from the New American Standard Bible, copyright 1995 by The Lockman Foundation, La Habra, Ca.

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Make Decisions In Prayer

Make Decisions In Prayer

“It was at this time He went off to the mountain to pray, and He spent the whole night in prayer to God.”  Luke 6:12

“But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him.” James 1:5

            In life we have many forks in the road and big choices that we will have to make.  Sometimes those choices can be hard and have far reaching consequences.  Many a time, though we have all probably made these decisions without prayer or only a short prayer, to seek guidance of the Lord.  Yet, Jesus set an example for us in how he made decisions. We should seek to follow that in our lives.  Even though Jesus was fully God, He was also fully man and being in that form spent many a time in prayer before making any big decisions.  Let’s examine one case of this from Luke chapter 6.

            Jesus has come to the point in His ministry that He needs to appoint apostles to train, to later build His Church.  At this point opposition has been growing to His ministry that will climax with Jesus being crucified and so this was not a decision to be taken lightly.  He felt it was time to get the guidance of the Father in the selection of the 12 Apostles and the future of the church.  Are you coming up on some big decisions in your life?  Do you plan to seek wisdom from God?

            Prayer, as it has been pointed out, was a big part in the decisions of Jesus.  It was not just here, but has been seen elsewhere in the life of Jesus. (Lk. 3;21; 5:16; 9:18, 28, 29; 11:1; 22:32, 40-46).  In Jesus’ example here, we can see some important things to add to our prayer time.  Jesus withdrew to a desolate, lonely place to pray.  This was a place that He could have uninterrupted communication with God.  In Matthew 6:6, Jesus teaches us to pray in secret and here we see that is what Jesus did.  We need a place of prayer where we can go, that it is just us and the Father, where we are free from distraction and we can just focus on the Lord.  We all need to find that place we can pray.

            Prayer time is as long as it needs to be.  For Jesus this decision was not something to be made by a short prayer.  Here he prayed all night long.  As a young Christian I was amazed at people who could pray that long.  I was puzzled about the scriptures that said to pray without ceasing (1Thes. 5:17).  When you grow in Christ you will see, as I have, more what this passage means. In relation to Christ’s example here, we need to pray about our decisions as long as it takes to get the peace and wisdom about the choices we need to make.

            Wisdom in making hard decisions will come when we ask for it.  James the brother of Jesus taught, through the Holy Spirit, that when we lack wisdom we need to ask God for it.  God will give wisdom generously without holding it back when we ask it in faith.  Jesus told us that with faith the size of a mustard seed we can move mountains (Lk 17:6).  Why then don’t we seek that wisdom when we make difficult decisions?  Even more important what about all decisions?  We know that God’s wisdom is greater than ours and yet often we don’t seek that great wisdom.  Jesus was fully God and He still went to the Father for wisdom.

            It is okay to admit to God if we don’t know how to pray.  When we do ask Him to teach us how to pray and look to scripture for the answers on how to pray.  It is so important to pray.  God wants us to talk to Him!  He is our Father and He loves to hear from His Children.  Just like if we have good earthly parents we seek advice from them, we need to seek it from our Heavenly father.  Don’t forget just how much He loves you and will answer your prayers and sometimes we need to seek out that wisdom and not do just do it in passing.  Like with any person we might need to go through the whole decision process with Him.  That does take time, but doing so will strengthen your walk with God and your wisdom from the Father will grow.  Jesus Loves to hear from His people!

All Scriptures are from The New American Standard Bible, copyright 1996 by the Lockman Foundation; La Habra, CA

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Who Needs A Doctor

Who Needs A Doctor

“And Jesus answered and said to them, ‘It is not those who are well who need a physician, but those who are sick.  I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance,’” Luke 5:31-32

            A few weeks ago, I received a piece of mail from my health insurance provider about when to go to the emergency room.  For many people they go there, when they aren’t that sick, to see a doctor.  We know that when we are sick, we need to see them to get better.  Most doctors, we see, are there for us when we are sick.  I know I don’t think about going when I am well.  It was Christ’s mission to go to those in need of spiritual healing, people who need Him.

            In the above scripture, Jesus is answering a complaint that religious leaders were giving about Him.  Jesus had just called a tax collector, named Matthew, to follow Him.  Matthew then invited him over to eat along with fellow tax collectors.  Today we might not think this was a big deal, but back then, it was.  Jewish people, at that time, had a deep hate for Romans and gentiles.  Rome was the ruler of the nation and tax collectors were hired from the people to collect the taxes. The Jews however, labeled them sinners by the religious people and would not associate with them.

            We know that the religious leaders didn’t come directly to Christ with their complaining, but to Jesus’s disciples.  I think that is often what we do as people.  We have a compliant about something, so we talk to others about it instead of going to the source.  Often, we do this when we know that we might be wrong in our complaints. Jesus, being God, knows their thoughts and he answers them. The answer may not be what they wanted to hear though, but it shows He truly is from God.  Remember, God knows what we are thinking and saying to others.

            If you look at the Old Testament, which is all they had then, nowhere does it say the Jewish people were the only people.  It says they are to be a blessing to the world and show God to the nations.  By this point they were a closed off nation and not willing to let anyone in.  Evangelism was not part of what they did and even worse, they felt that they were saved by just being a Jew. They had gotten very religious, but for the most part it was meaningless practice and was doing no one any good.  This is a danger that happens all the time in churches.  Some churches are dying because they refuse to change from practices and traditions not found in the Bible.  They push others away who find no meaning behind what they do and even call them unbelievers and sinners for not wanting their traditions.

            Jesus, was very gracious in His response to them.  He points out that His mission is to call sinners to repentance.  Righteous people have already repented of their sins and don’t need the message He has.  This was not a time for Him to address the kind of people the Scribes and Pharisees were.  He was pointing out indirectly that they should be caring for the souls that aren’t righteous in His response. It’s easy to judge others instead of loving them.  We all can become so caught up in ourselves, that we forget the message of the cross.  Who is it that we should be having a dinner with, but don’t because we don’t like them or what they are doing?  They need Jesus too and we are called to spread the message of Jesus to the world.

            We know that Jesus came to seek and save the lost.  Remember, that we too were once lost, and Jesus saved us.  Sometimes we can let our “righteousness” keep us from reaching out to those who need Jesus.  Remember, those without Jesus are facing death!  Will we let our traditions, though we might love them, become a stumbling block and keep others from Jesus?  How about our personal feelings for certain people keeping us from wanting them in church to hear the gospel?  Who does Jesus save, needs to be the question we ask.  Finally, we need to ask, is Jesus welcome in our church?  Most would say yes, but really think about what you know about Jesus from the Bible, when answering that question.  God Bless!

All Scripture is from the New American Standard Bible, Copyright 1995 by The Lockman Foundation, La Habra, CA. 

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