Tonight, we are headed to a home somewhere in the Jerusalem suburb of Bethany, where Jesus stopped in to see his “old friends Mary, Martha and Lazarus” before he enters the city for the last time.
“He loved them,” John tells us… although he does not tell us why. It doesn’t really matter either.
Sometimes there is no “why” to love.
They called him Lord, so they knew “who he was,” and yet they were not his disciples, at least not in any kind of formal sense.
They were his “friends,” (his bff’s, his amigo’s, his buddies, his pals) the three people – in whose presence – he could be totally himself, as well as being “their Messiah.”
Jesus has come back to Bethany with “the usual temple posse” hot on his trail. By raising Lazarus from the dead Jesus has graduated from the category of being “a manageable nuisance” to that of – being a “serious threat.”
News of the incident – has sent Jesus’ followers over the edge. They are sure he is God’s “anointed one!” Is there anything that Jesus cannot do? He preaches, he teaches, he heals, he feeds and he restores to life.
Has there ever been any one like Jesus of Nazareth before this? Why they say he can even control the winds and the seas and the waves…
There is not a chance Pilate is going to ignore any of his followers during the Passover festival. They will all be watched!
It is time for Jesus to “disappear” before he leads hundreds to their deaths?
So “his days are numbered” and he knows it and so does his friends.
Like everyone else, they have heard all the rumors. The whole area is abuzz with the talk. What will happen to the Messiah? How will this all end?
When he arrives at his friends’ house in Bethany, they can see it on Jesus’ face. They know him too well. He is tired. He is concerned. He is not – his usual self. He says, he is worried for them, he is worried for Lazarus. He apologizes for bringing all this to their doorstep.
So they gladly take him in and care for him, “shutting the world out” for this one night or for as many nights as he can stay…
Their home is his home. They are thankful for his presence. They are thankful for his “raising of Lazarus.” It calls for a feast…a party…a celebration.
They are more than grateful.
Mary disappeared for a short bit and then came back holding a clay jar in her hands. “Wordless,” “speechless” she kneels at Jesus’ feet and breaks the jar’s neck. The smell of spikenard fills the room- a sharp scent halfway between “mint and ginseng.” Then, as everyone watches her, she does (four remarkable things in a row.)
She loosens her hair in a room full of men, which “an honorable woman” never would do. She pours perfume on Jesus’ feet, which also would not be done. She touches him-“a single woman” rubbing a “single man’s feet”-also not done, not even among friends. She wipes the perfume off with her hair-totally inexplicable-the bizarre end to “an all around strangely-bizarre act.”
It took only a few minutes of time, but before it was completed, everyone’s mouth was ajar! WOW!!! Just wow! What just happened? What did she do?
Only in John’s version of the story does the woman have a name-Mary-and a relationship with Jesus-not a stranger, not a notorious sinner, but his long-time friend-which makes “the act” all the more peculiar.
Jesus knows she loves him. He loves her too. It was extravagant. It was excessive. It was overboard, as Judas was quick to note.
Jesus brushes Judas aside.
“Leave her alone,” he says.
Leave her alone. Just this once, let her look after me, because my time is running out…and she knows it!

Everything around Mary smacked of significance-Judas, the betrayer, challenging her act; the flask of nard- perhaps left over from Lazarus’ funeral-and not to terribly far away was a freshly “vacated tomb” that still smelled of burial spices.
Mary was anointing Jesus for “his burial,” and while her behavior may have seemed “strange” to those standing around…it really spoke volumes…
Almost like a prophet of old, she sensed it, or she saw it, or perhaps, God himself (Blessed be he) had revealed it to her. Mary knew things…and they were not good.
Jesus was going to die.
If, he went to Jerusalem…he would surely die. He must avoid the Holy City. He must not go there for the Passover observations. He must stay away.
Going to Jerusalem will seal his fate. Everyone knew the saying, “it is impossible for a prophet to die, except in Jerusalem…the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it.”
No, Jesus must avoid it. He must stay away!
But Mary knew better. “Wild horses” could not keep Jesus away. He would go there…and he would surely die. She had to do, what she did. She had to.