The Plot and the Party

The pure devotion of the anonymous woman throws into bold relief the hostility and treachery of the priests and their accomplice. It is further suggested that, at the time men were concerned with securing Jesus’ death, Jesus’ body was prepared for burial through an act which expressed faith and love.[1]

Killing Jesus without an Uproar

Mark 14:1–2 (ESV)

1 It was now two days before the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. And the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to arrest him by stealth and kill him, 2 for they said, “Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar from the people.”

These priests are aware, as Mark makes known here, that time is growing short, that if they are going to act, they must act now. The days of the Passover and the Feast of the Unleavened Bread are at hand. That the Passover was yet two days away indicates that it was still Wednesday. Josephus, the Jewish historian, tells us that at these Passover feasts there were sometimes as many as three million people in Jerusalem and the surrounding villages, pilgrims from all parts of the earth. The Passover could be celebrated only in Jerusalem, so the city was thronged with strangers from various parts of the world. Demonstrations and riots could always be expected, especially on the part of the excitable Galileans, among whom were many potential supporters of Jesus. The reference in verse 2, then, is to the noise and confusion of an excited crowd, when mob fever, intensified by the hope of redemption associated with the Passover, could seize the people and the situation become uncontrollable.[2]

The chief priests and scribes know that if they take Jesus at the height of the feast, they are apt to incite a riot; so they want to act beforehand. As there are only two days left, there is a deep sense of urgency about their malevolent threat. This is always characteristic of hatred. Hatred can never wait. Hatred must act as soon as an opportunity affords.

So the leaders, while they play their little petty games, are merely pawns in the purposes of God. They’re guilty. They’re culpable for their hatred and their rejection. They are also to be held responsible for the murder of the Son of God. They’re accountable to God everlastingly for their unbelief. But they do not determine what happens or when it happens.

Our Lord will die by the predetermined foreknowledge and purpose of God. He Himself is directing everything by His providence, even though it is invisible to everybody except the Lord Himself.

Mark interrupts his narrative at this point with a flashback to the previous Saturday, six days before the Friday of Passover (John 12:1), when the Lord arrived in Bethany just east of Jerusalem. [3]

The Party

Mark 14:3-9 (ESV)

3 And while he was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he was reclining at table, a woman came with an alabaster flask of ointment of pure nard, very costly, and she broke the flask and poured it over his head. 4 There were some who said to themselves indignantly, “Why was the ointment wasted like that? 5 For this ointment could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor.” And they scolded her. 6 But Jesus said, “Leave her alone. Why do you trouble her? She has done a beautiful thing to me. 7 For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you want, you can do good for them. But you will not always have me. 8 She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for burial. 9 And truly, I say to you, wherever the gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her.”

This occurs, we are told, in verse 3 at the home of Simon the leper. He would be a former leper, or he wouldn’t be having a dinner party. You do understand that. Lepers were outcasts, right? They were outcasts. They didn’t interact with people at all. They were societal rejects, they were put out of society in every way and people kept as far from them as possible, fearing the contagion of such a disease.

Likely then, this is a man who has been healed by Jesus and that was something Jesus did all over the land of Israel during His ministry. It is not a stretch to assume that this man named Simon who had been healed by Jesus, planned this meal knowing that Jesus was coming to Bethany to be with His friends and to be there for the Passover to say thanks. It would have been him, Mrs. Simon, if there was such a woman, and all the little Simons. There would have been the Twelve and it would have been Mary, Martha and Lazarus, so anywhere from 15 up, not including his family of 15 and other friends and his family would swell the number.

It is a typical meal in that it is an evening meal, reclining is the posture. You lounge, in a sense, in a reclining position. That means you’re going to be there a while, that’s how meals were taken in those days.

They were really prolonged conversations … This is a normal posture for the prolonged conversational meal. This would be the antithesis of drive-through fast food.

There are three movements

An act of loving sacrifice

You can picture it in your imagination: Mary coming into the room with the jar of expensive ointment as Jesus is reclining on the couch.

She breaks the jar and pours the whole contents upon his head and feet, anointing him. It is a beautiful act, one which captures the attention of all those present.

At that meal, it says, there came a woman. John tells us this is Mary … Mary of the family of Martha and Lazarus. Why does John name her and Matthew and Mark not name her?

It was a common custom at a meal to wash feet. If you were in a reclining position, that would be of great benefit because as you recline your feet necessarily appear in some way. And so, anointing feet, washing feet, as we see in John 13 where Jesus washed the disciples’ feet. This was a normal thing, even putting perfume on feet was somewhat of a tradition or custom. And pouring perfume on people was a routine kind of function.

If nothing else, it was a precursor of the modern use of deodorant.

It was a common courtesy.

It also was a way in which because it was necessary in a world of heat and perspiration without the kind of access of bathing and perfumes that we have today, it was a gesture of kindness, not only to the person but to everybody in proximity to the person. This was commonly done. Perfume was kept around for such purposes.[4]

A Response is Awakened

Mark tells us the first response was one of indignation that she should waste this ointment. John says it was Judas and apparently a few of the other disciples whom he managed to persuade in the moment, began scolding her. who raised this objection.

There are always people who try to place a monetary value on things.

They seem to know the price of everything, but the value of nothing.

In this account, Jesus is warning us of the foolishness of that attitude, for if you look at the world only in terms of dollars and cents, you are going to miss three-quarters of life. This is what he wants to teach us here.

The quality for which Jesus commended her was her recognition that the needs of this poor sufferer, whom they do not always have, take precedence over the obligation to help the poor who will always be with them. This is emphasized in verse 7, where the contrast developed through an allusion to Deut. 15:11 is not between Jesus and the poor, but between “always” and “not always.”[5]

What’s going on here? Adoring worship of Christ is the ultimate priority. Did you get that? Giving to the poor has a place. Deuteronomy 15:11 says, “Give to the poor.” You always have the poor of the land and make sure you care for the poor and give to the poor. That’s a priority.

The ultimate priority is to worship Christ. Care for the poor is important,

worship of the Lord is more important. And Jesus wasn’t going to be there very long.

An Extremely Valuable Act

He says five things about it which mark it an extremely valuable act.

First he says, "She has done a beautiful thing to me." The beauty of it lay in its very extravagance. This woman did not spare any of the ointment but broke the flask and poured the whole quantity out upon him.

In this case, this act by Mary is way beyond common courtesy, way beyond sort of normal custom because what she does is lavish. She has an alabaster vial of very costly perfume of pure nard. Matthew says, “A very precious perfume.” This marble bottle typically would have a long neck … a long neck and perhaps some kind of small plug from which small drops of this perfume could be poured out, sprinkled. This kind of bottle would contain this perfume and the perfume might last a long time. It is said here that the value of it was three hundred denarii. That’s a year’s wages.

Can you imagine spending a year’s salary on a bottle of perfume? First of all, you say, “Who would do that?” People would do that who needed to do that because even though it cost that much, it could be stretched out and used a very long period of time because a small drop would satisfy the social need. But she has an alabaster vial of very costly perfume of pure nard.

She doesn’t drop a drop out, she breaks the neck of this vial and it says poured it over His head. And John adds, “Then anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped His feet with her hair.” She has dumped a year’s value of perfume on His head and on His feet. And John adds, this would be obvious, “The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.” You can understand that. You spray a little on you and you can smell it through the house. This dousing of a year’s worth of perfume all over Jesus would have dominated the environment. This is lavish love. This is profound, sacrificial affection.

It was such a lavish act, and therein lay the beauty of it. Jesus said, "That's beautiful! She hasn't held anything back, but has simply poured it all out. It's a beautiful thing she has done to me."

Second, he said that it was a timely thing she had done. "It was something that could only be done now. Anytime you want to do good to the poor you can, because they are always around." And it is right to help the poor.

There are opportunities which come in our life which must be seized at the moment; they never happen again.

Mary had sensed this and had seized the moment to do this which could only have been done then, for such a time would never occur again. It was out of the sensitivity of her heart that she realized that the timing was right, and Jesus recognized this

Worship is always the ultimate priority. While loving one’s neighbor by caring for the poor is noble and necessary, loving the Lord is more important (cf. Mark 12:30–31). That was an especially poignant truth in light of events that would transpire over the next six days. Jesus would be crucified less than a week later. In light of that, this was no time for charity but for worship.[6]

Charity is good. Charity is necessary. Worship is always better. And true worship will lead to charity.

Third, She did that which was feasible

That is, she did what she could. It was all that was open to her. She could not fix him a meal; there was no time for that. She could not make a garment for him; there was no time for that. There was nothing else she could do to show her love but this, and so this is what she did.

She did what she could.

I like that. I am sure our Lord has called our attention to it because it is so practical for us. Someone has said, "I'm only a man, but I am a man. I can't do everything, but I can do something. And what I can do I ought to do. And what I ought to do, I'm available to do."

James 4:17 (ESV)

James 4:17 ESV

So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.

This is really the attitude the Lord asks of all of us. You cannot do everything. You cannot feed the starving world, but you can feed one person. You cannot comfort all the lonely hearts on earth, but you can comfort one or two. And

Mary did what she could. Everywhere in Scripture, this is all God asks of us -- that we bring him what is at hand.

Some of you think that you live dull lives, and that you never have an opportunity for real service.But you do! This is what this story tells us. You have something that you can do today. And in doing it with the expectation that God will take it and enlarge it, you will find that tremendous results can follow. We are to bring our loaves and fishes -- a simple little meal -- and Jesus will feed the multitude.

“We must fill the jars with water, but he will turn it into wine. When we do what we can, with this expectation that God will use it, what a beautiful expression it is!” Ray Stedman

The fourth element of this act was that it was insightful. Our Lord says, "She has anointed my body beforehand for burying." It is interesting to go through the Gospel accounts and note the many times Jesus said to these disciples that he was going to die.

Over and over again he informed the disciples that he was heading for death. Not one of them believed him -- except Mary of Bethany. She believed him, and understood that he was here for that very purpose.

This was what motivated her. She understood that he was heading for burial. And just as love would long to do some act of service for him since she could not be sure she would ever have the opportunity later to find his body and anoint it for burial in the Jewish custom, she did it now.

The woman’s pouring out of costly perfume foreshadows the costliness of the pouring out of Jesus’ blood.

Why waste Jesus on a cross? The answer to this question is to be found in the very attitudes of the indignant grumblers, the treacherous leaders of the nation, and the traitorous false disciple.

The world needs saving. The text resounds with the affirmation that neither the pure nard poured out for Jesus nor his blood poured for the many is a waste. It is all connected to the good news that will be preached to the whole world.[7]

After Jesus’ death, where are these complaining followers when he needs to be buried? Unlike the disciples of John the Baptizer, who claimed his body after his execution and buried it (6:29), Jesus’ disciples are missing in action. According to Mark, Jesus is hurriedly buried by a stranger in a borrowed tomb, with no mention of any anointing of the corpse. This anointing before his death will have to suffice. The later attempt by other women to anoint the body after Jesus’ burial (16:1) is not realized because he receives a greater anointing from God.[8]

I think it is clear from this account that Jesus knew she did this deliberately for that very purpose. What a comfort this must have been to our Lord! Of all these friends who were around him at this time, only this one had the sensitivity of heart to understand what was happening.

There is nothing more comforting to us than to be understood in what we are trying to do. How she must have ministered to him by this understanding act!

Fifth, what she did was deserving of being remembered.

It was memorable. Jesus said, "The story of this beautiful act will be told in memory of her wherever the gospel is preached in the whole world." Here we are today, 2000 years later, fulfilling this very word, telling again of the act of Mary of Bethany, when she anointed our Lord's head and feet. Those elements constitute what Jesus called, "the beautiful thing she has done to me.

This story is not a tragedy; it is good news. Faithful and loving actions toward Jesus will not be forgotten; for that matter, neither will acts of foul play.

Humans will scheme to deliver him up, but they do not know that God also delivers him up (14:21). They deliver him up to death; God will deliver him up from the grave.[9]

The Plot Thickens

Mark 14:10–11 (ESV) Then Judas Iscariot, who was one of the twelve, went to the chief priests in order to betray him to them. 11 And when they heard it, they were glad and promised to give him money. And he sought an opportunity to betray him.

By introducing the action of Judas at this point Mark sharpens the contrast between the selfless devotion of the woman and the treachery with which the righteous sufferer is greeted by his friend (cf. Ps. 41:9).

The betrayal consisted in the offer to inform the chief priests of an opportunity to arrest Jesus without a public disturbance (cf. Luke 22:6 “in the absence of the crowd”). The offer was welcomed because Judas could lead the Temple guard to Jesus and would prevent any mistake in identity.

That Jesus’ betrayer should be one of his own disciples remains enigmatic. No detail in the text permits more than conjecture concerning Judas’ motive. With remarkable restraint Mark contents himself with recording the bare facts that Judas collaborated with the Sanhedrin, that he received payment for his services, and that he sought an opportune moment for the arrest. Judas seems to have responded to an official notice that circulated in Jerusalem: “Now the chief priests had given orders that if anyone knew where he [i.e. Jesus] was, he should let them know, so that they might arrest him” (John 11:57). The need to employ an informer demonstrates how difficult it had become to locate Jesus and seize him in the period just before the Passover.[10]

He went deliberately to the high priests -- took the initiative -- with the intention of betraying his Lord. Mark highlights it with these words; "he was one of the twelve." He was of the inner circle, the ones upon whom Jesus leaned and depended, and yet he went to betray his Lord.

He did it, Mark says, because of greed and covetousness.

Here again is that sense of urgency which hatred always exhibits. It has got to be done quickly. And because it is evil, it has to be done in secret as well. He went in secret. motivated by a deep sense of greed.

If we put all the gospel accounts together we can see that he had a little scheme of his own. He had been stealing from the treasury in order to purchase for himself a piece of land that would be his when he came into the Kingdom. He needed a little more money, just thirty pieces of silver, and it was for that he bargained with the priests in order to complete his purchase. So it was nothing but common, ordinary greed that drove Judas to this act of betrayal. He went deliberately, coldly, intending to work it out that way.

Now we can understand why Mark has put this account alongside the story of Mary of Bethany.

Here our Lord is showing these disciples that he was doing to them what Mary had done to him. She brought a beautiful alabaster flask, and she broke it. He said, "My body is that flask, and I am going to be broken for you."

She poured out of the flask all the ointment that was in it, so that the fragrance of it filled the room, as it has filled the earth in the centuries since. And Jesus said, "I will pour out of the flask of my body [what Peter calls 'the precious blood'], all of it, for you, that the fragrance of it may fill your life, and fill the whole earth."

The Hiding Place -- a powerfully moving film. In the midst of it is a scene set in the Ravensbruck concentration camp in Germany. Corrie Ten Boom and her sister Bessie are there, along with ten thousand other women, in the horribly degrading, hideous conditions of this camp. They are gathered with some of the women in the barracks in the midst of the beds, cold and hungry and lice-ridden, and Bessie is leading a Bible class. One of the other women calls out derisively from her bunk and mocks their worship of God. They fall into a conversation, and this woman says what so frequently is flung at Christians: "If your God is such a good God, why does he allow this kind of suffering?" Dramatically she tears off the bandages and old rags that bind her hands, displaying her broken, mangled fingers and says, "I'm the first violinist of the Symphony Orchestra. Did your God will this?" For a moment no one answers. Then Corrie Ten Boom steps to the side of her sister and says, in simple words, "We can't answer that question.

All we know is that our God came to this earth, and became one of us, and he suffered with us and was crucified and died. And that he did for love.

This story is saying to us. This is love's extravagance. When you and I partake of the table of the Lord together, Jesus is saying, "Look, it is I who break the flask of my own body, to pour out upon you all the precious ointment, so that you may understand that it is no longer law which governs your life; it is love."

The celebration of the risen Lord would not erase the memory of this unnamed woman whose action anticipated Jesus’ death and expressed her profound love for the Master. The incorporation of the tradition of the anointing within the Gospel already marks a fulfilment of Jesus’ promise.[11]

[1]Lane, W. L. (1974). The Gospel of Mark (p. 492). Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. [2]Lane, W. L. (1974). The Gospel of Mark (p. 490). Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. [3]MacArthur, J. (2015). Mark 9–16 (p. 272). Moody Publishers. [4]MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (2014). John MacArthur Sermon Archive. Grace to You. [5]Lane, W. L. (1974). The Gospel of Mark (p. 494). Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. [6]MacArthur, J. (2015). Mark 9–16 (p. 275). Moody Publishers. [7]Garland, D. E. (1996). Mark (p. 519). Zondervan Publishing House. [8]Garland, D. E. (1996). Mark (p. 517). Zondervan Publishing House. [9]Garland, D. E. (1996). Mark (p. 517). Zondervan Publishing House. [10]Lane, W. L. (1974). The Gospel of Mark (pp. 495–496). Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. [11]Lane, W. L. (1974). The Gospel of Mark (pp. 494–495). Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.

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