Do You Perceive It?

Scripture Lessons: Isaiah 43: 16-21 and John 12: 1-8 Sermon Title: Do you perceive it? Preached on April 7, 2019 Have you ever tried to be in two places at one time? I say, “tried to be in two places at one time,” because no one really can. It seems the best we can do is be present in one, and when we try to be in two, we generally end up being in neither. But trying to be in two places at one time makes for good comedy. I remember watching Saved by the Bell after school. This was a teen-drama that came on TV every afternoon during the week, and the most popular boy on the show, Zach Morris, once asked two different girls out on a date for the same night and at the same restaurant. It didn’t end well, and neither did it end well in the movie Mrs. Doubtfire, when a character played by Robin Williams is trying to meet with a business associate on one side of the restaurant as himself, while trying to enjoy dinner with his children, his ex-wife and her new husband, on the other side of the restaurant where he is trying to keep up the act of being an aging British, female, nanny. Thinking of situations like these and many others, the challenges of being in two places at once become obvious, but we still try, because sometimes life seems to demand it of us. In our Second Scripture Lesson from the Gospel of John, if you’re Martha, while you may want to just enjoy dinner with your guests, sitting down to relax with them at the table doesn’t seem possible, for if anyone is going to eat then somebody has to go back and forth between the table and the kitchen. Someone has to cook. Did Mary think of that? Maybe Martha wanted to sit at Jesus feet to fully hear and comprehend what he had to say too. Or maybe she would have enjoyed sitting next to her brother Lazarus, freshly raised from the dead, but someone had to be in the kitchen and so Martha was trying to be in two places at one time. You know what this is like. Maybe after dinner your spouse and kids went outside to play basketball in the driveway. You wanted to play too, but someone has to wash the dishes. Maybe your preschooler came home from gymnastics ready to offer you a full demonstration of what she’s learned. You’re trying to watch, but as she displays cartwheel after cartwheel, she could see that your attention was compromised because there’s laundry to fold, bills to pay, and emails to send. I’ve heard mother’s respond to their children’s cry for attention by asking, “is anyone bleeding?” because that makes it easy to decide what to pay attention to first. The rest of the time it’s really hard to decide where to be fully present. So, at dinner in Bethany we have Martha going in between the kitchen and the table, just like every parent I know. Why? Because that’s life. I imagine that your perception of which demand gets priority changes should you become a grandparent, because those who are lucky enough to become grandparents have had a lifetime to learn that the laundry will always be there, but the grandchildren will grow up. Since we can’t really be in two places at once, we have to decide which really is the better part, but Mary already knows. She is fully present. Focused solely on Jesus, while like Martha, we have to think about it. We think about the plates pilling up in the sink. We fold laundry and cut the grass. What will the neighbors think if we don’t? People say that we should all dance, like no one is looking. Have you ever done that? Neither have I. Instead, I worry about decency and decorum like all the dinner guests in that house. Jesus came to Bethany, the home of Lazarus, and there they gave a dinner for him. If I were among those invited, I’d try to play by the rules of the house just as they did. If Martha set the table with more than two forks at my place, I might not know which one to use first, so I’d sit back to watch what everyone else does. That’s what guests should do. One summer during college I was sent by our denomination down to Argentina to be a missionary intern, and there, if you order ice cream, they put a little spoon in your cone. I didn’t know what it was for, but I’m glad I watched everyone else, because in South America one of the most vulgar things you can do is lick an ice cream cone out in public. It’s just not done. Of course, it’s hard to enjoy an ice cream cone if you’re so conscious of social decorum, but you have to think about these things when you’re invited over to someone’s house for dinner. You get too immersed in enjoying something and you might make a scene. That’s why Mary is the only one anointing Jesus’ feet. The other guests are sitting back, trying to do things decently and in order, not realizing that just as you can’t be in two places at once, you also can’t do two things at once. You can’t be both decent and devoted, and Mary picked the better part. She knew, that we always have the chance to be respectable, while ice cream tends to melt. She doesn’t care that it’s considered scandalous for a woman to let down her hair in front of a man. She doesn’t care that some will say that she’s making them embarrassed, that she’s being a poor host, or that the perfume she poured on her savior’s feet could have been sold to the poor. Judas is right about that of course. Nard is a perfume made from a plant that grows in the Himalayas. Because of its distant origins, even a little of this oil would have been expensive. A small vile might have cost a week’s wages, but we know from Judas’ observation that Mary poured three hundred denarii’s worth, a full year’s salary for a low wager worker in that region. Some say that the perfume would be worth as much as $10,000 today. $10,000, poured out on his feet. Can you imagine? Do you know what MUST Ministries can do with $10,000? Do you know what her children or her sister’s children might have done should she have invested $10,000? We’re told that responsible people have to think through their decisions. We have to be mindful of the future. Not only do we challenge ourselves to be in two places at once or to think about being both decent and devoted, our lives also call us to try and be in the present while mindful of the future. But not Mary. Mary is so completely present with Jesus, knowing that the poor will always be with her, but Jesus only had a little more time. It’s true. At this point in the course of his life, his days were numbered. Our Second Scripture Lesson began: “Six days before Passover Jesus came to Bethany.” That’s six days before the Last Supper. Six days before he was betrayed. Six days before he was arrested, tried, and sentenced to death. That means it was about a week before he was crucified. That’s why she gave him everything that she had. All her attention, all that she could give. She was before the Lord undistracted, completely devoted, and fully present. She poured out all of who she was to this man who meant everything. Her act of devotion was so beautiful, so pure, and so costly, that I imagine, not only did the smell of this perfume fill the room, but were we to stand at the foot of his cross several days after this dinner, we might still have smelled the love she poured out coming off his feet as he breathed his last on the Cross. Maybe he smelled it. As he was dying, perhaps he smelled the perfume coming off his feet and remembered that as the world turned their back, Mary still loved him. As for the rest of us. Well, even when we are having dinner with just one person, still we are distracted. And so, we must be warned not to reach the end our days like Emily in the Wilder play, Our Town, lamenting how “It goes so fast. We don't have time to look at one another. I didn't realize. All that was going on in life and we never noticed.” The prophet Isaiah calls us to be more like Mary, asking “do you not perceive it?” I don’t, for sometimes I’m busy in the kitchen, as though anyone ever lay on their death bed embarrassed over the dishes left unwashed in their sink. Other times I’m too worried about what everyone thinks, even though I know that when they go off to college I’ll have forgotten what I missed their soccer games what, but they’ll remember whether or not I was there. Then sometimes all I can think about is what tomorrow will hold, so I must remember to pay attention to the one who holds tomorrow. Today, let us all try and take a lesson from Mary. For soon he will make his way to the Cross, and just as she poured out everything that she had as a sign of her love, so He will pour out everything he has for us. Today, perceive the wondrous love of His body broken for our sake; his blood shed for the forgiveness of our sins. Amen.