[Propertalk] 5 lent c

[Robert P Morrison]

Here the first draft for this Sunday. We'll think a lot in the next
few days! 8 - )
Bob

	THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF ST. ALBAN, ALBANY 5 LENT C

	ISAIAH 43:16-21 13th MARCH, 2016

	PHILIPPIANS 3:4b-14 PSALM 126

	JOHN 12:1-8

	 First, a spiritual health advisory. You’ve heard it before, but
just like taking allergy medication and operating farm equipment at
the same time, it never hurts to remind ourselves.

	 John, or John’s Gospel school, had an axe to grind. Whoever wrote
the fourth Gospel doesn’t mind in the least if the truth were shaved
a bit and a few lies flung in. As long as the candidate could be made
to look good, that was all that mattered.

	 Things haven’t changed much, have they?

	 Anyway, John took every chance he had to blast the Jews of his day.
By the time the fourth Gospel hit the religious newsstands, Jews and
Christians no longer shared the same worship space, as they had for
the previous forty or fifty years. They’d had several too many
heated exchanges, used way to many epithets, been way too territorial
in terms of the use of the same liturgies and pushy about people’s
opinions to be comfortable with each other, and civil to each other.
In other words, they were brothers and sisters behaving badly.

	 As I said, things haven’t changed much!

	 How else to begin the run-up to the sacred feast of Passover, with
all the elements Jesus and His friends were overlaying on it, than to
give the Jews another stick in the eye. So we have this description of
the confrontation with Judas.

	The very name was like a body slam. It means actually, very simply,
the Jewish person. That’s all. Nothing personal whatsoever. No
Nathan, no Joshua, no Samuel, no Zeke. That might lead people to show
a little sympathy. And that was the LAST thing the Gospel writer
wanted. And this is extraordinarily important t remember, especially
for the next fourteen-plus days. Blame whatever you can, even what you
can’t, on the Jews. The New Testament wasn’t the first piece of
anti-semitic writing, of course, but it certainly wasn’t the last!

	So here we have Jesus and His friends. Sitting at dinner – a
veritable feast – as the tension mounted. Everyone was jumpy because
of the atmosphere: Romans, Judeans, Galileans, folk from the East and
West, from Egypt, and Lydia, and Phrygia – all starting to pile into
Jerusalem for the Festival. And some of them were eager to pick a
fight.

	It must have been such a bitter-sweet evening. Mary and Martha must
have been glowing still in the wonder of the resurrection of their
brother. They must have been so attentive, so full of joy, to have
their closest friends under their roof once again, and to have the
living, breathing Lazarus as testimony to the way God’s Presence was
alive in Jesus.

	They must have talked about everything they’d heard and seen. They
must have been fired-up about the possibility of seeing Jerusalem made
great again. No doubt everyone there had his or her own view about
what the great Jerusalem would be like. But most, if not all, had the
same problem we have. They and we were looking for, were longing for,
greatness to be brought in on some great-white-horse-type incident..
They and we couldn’t admit, couldn’t imagine that the greatness
was already present. It was simply a matter of having faith, having
clear insight that God was, God is, God always will be present – to
guide, to encourage, to draw out the best in us.

	But did the Gospel writer point that out? No! The Gospel writer, like
so many before and after, looked around for someone, anyone, to blame,
to ridicule, to belittle, to disenfranchise.

	So look at what we’re told.

	As Jean Vanier points out, “Martha serves the meal. In the middle
of the meal, Mary, in an audacious act of love and gratitude, takes a
large measure of costly perfume made of pure nard, anoints the feet of
Jesus and wipes his feet with her hair. The house is filled with the
fragrance of the perfume, reminding us of the contrast with the stench
of Lazarus’ dead body. It is an excessive, extravagant gesture, an
act of love, similar to the excessive amount of water turned into wine
at Cana. There is obviously a close relationship between Jesus and
Mary of Bethany.” 1 And this is how she showed her love. She was
on-board completely with Jesus. She believed Him to be the Messiah,
the Promised One of God. She saw and accepted the way that He was
trying to transform Jerusalem and the entire country. And she was
experiencing, first hand, how this transformation from God came about
when everyone who had little or nothing were brought up to the level
of everyone else. Jerusalem wouldn’t ever be made great when those
in charge had more horses, more summer cottages out on the Heights,
fancier silver vessels for the celebration of Pesach. Jerusalem would
be great when everyone recognized that there was to be no inequality
allowed to continue, when everyone admitted that ALL were God’s
children.

	Vanier made a point I hadn’t considered before. Oh, yes, like most
of you and others, I’d been willing to pile on Judas, as to pick up
on the slam that he was a thief of an accountant. But Vanier said,
“I wonder if there isn’t something else in this opposition to the
disciples to Mary. Why are they so upset? Where does this anger come
from? Why do those men want to control Jesus and those who have a
relationship with him? Could they be jealous of Mary’s relationship
with Jesus?” 2

	Maybe Judas was a convenient scapegoat, a double scapegoat –
blaming the Jews for every little thing that went wrong, or troubled
them, or upset their apple cart of whatever standing they had. But
maybe, just maybe, Judas also was blamed for what every other one of
the twelve was doing. Maybe they were all saying the same thing. Maybe
they were furious that they couldn’t share in that priceless perfume
when Jesus wouldn’t even give them a MasterCard! Maybe they were
looking daggers and spitting nails at Mary AND at Jesus for allowing
this to happen. But, for heaven’s sake, you can’t write THAT in
the Gospel. Blame Judas; blame the Jews, from whom, at the time of the
writing of the Gospel, they were racing to distance themselves as much
as they possibly could.

	Blame, blame, blame. It’s an enormous industry. Far better to blame
someone for something, even if that thing is actually helpful, and
life-giving, and praiseworthy, and desirable; far better to blame
someone that to say, “Wow! Do you see how much Jesus actually HELPED
Mary and turned her life and the life of the whole household
around?”

	“Maybe,” wrote Vanier, “maybe they cannot believe that women
are important for Jesus and could be true disciples? After all,
hadn’t Jesus chosen _them_ as his disciples? Weren’t _they_ the
chosen ones? What is this woman doing here anyway?”

	So Mary becomes like Judas – a scapegoat, an outsider, someone to
be despised and ridiculed for her immoral act of daring to interrupt
the big boys while they were smoking cigars and drinking throughout
dinner, someone who didn’t know the meaning and value of money and
property.

	How many people, how many groups, did the DISCIPLES THEMSELVES
sideline? The very ones who’d been charged with the responsibility
of taking the openness of God’s love and the welcome of God’s
reign to everyone, they themselves were engaging in practices of
exclusion. Instead of breaking down fences and walls, they were
flinging them up as fast as they could. Instead of saying, Jesus died
for all, they said, well, maybe Jesus died for many.

	As an aside, has it struck you that the Prayer Book follows the
older, traditional usage and says of the chalice on the altar,
“Drink this, all of you: This is my Blood of the new Covenant, which
is shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins.”? 3 For
many? Are you kidding me? “Enriching our Worship”, which we use
throughout Advent and Lent, says “which is poured out for you and
for all” – not a mistranslation, just a proper understanding of
the Greek work which can mean many, but in this context means all –
everyone – no one is kept away from the salvific love of God.

	What might they have been saying, under their breaths, at that dinner
table in Bethany? “This is for us guys, not for women, not for Jews,
not for …” – well, you can extend this as far as your mind can
go, and then take it further than that.

	“Jesus silences Judas AND the disciples with strong words: he
proclaims his love for her! … Can you imagine any greater defence of
Mary? He is confirming her in her passion and in her dignity as a
woman. He is liberating her love. (Listen to this!) By defending Mary,
he is also revealing his need for HER love and trust at a time when
people have rejected him and are preparing to kill him.” 4

	What troubles me about myself is how quickly I can be, on being asked
for an opinion, or even for thinking through something in my mind, how
quickly I’m willing to begin with the negative. I say or think,
“Those idiots….” But this is how society works, apparently, and
it gets worse every day. Even from morning to evening, turn on the TV,
pick up a paper, and the language will be that of destruction, of
embarrassment, of belittlement. People who seek your approval, who
look for your help, who even appear to be willing to do something
beneficial, are doing it at the expense of others.

	IS it being Christ-like to be caught up in the life of the negative
and destructive? Or is it being Christ-like to act in such a way that
we produce a Mary-like response of incredible generosity, and
unlimited trust, an unending devotion, no matter what it takes?

	If for no other reason, we all need to listen to such things as the
studies which tell us that thinking and acting negatively never does
us any good, and only ends up by making our own lives acidic and
miserable, to the point of shortening them. And, if we don’t care
about ourselves, then we need to think of our families, our friends,
everyone else in the world.

	Jesus gave and gives everything for Mary, for Martha, for Lazarus –
for Judas and the disciples; Jesus gives all that He has for you and
for me. Mary responded by giving her all, “giving herself in a
beautiful, foolish and scandalous way.”

	We still have time to do the same.

	NOTES:

	[1] _“Drawn into the Mystery of Jesus through the Gospel of
John”_ by Jean Vanier. Paulist Press, New York/Mahweh, N.J. © 2004,
page 205.

	2 Jean Vanier, Op. cit.

	3 B.C.P. page 363, et al.

	4 Jean Vanier, Op. cit. page 206


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