16 Why Do You Bother Her? (Mark 14:1-11)

Speaker: Welcome to Wednesday in the Word with Krisan Marotta. This is the sixteenth lesson in the series titled Questions Jesus Asked. What is the most prized thing that you own? What would it take to make you part with it? That kind of costly, self-sacrificing love is the theme of our passage today. Mark chapter 14, verses 1 through 11. Krisan Marotta: What is the most expensive thing you own? You don't have to answer out loud, but just think about it. What maybe it's not the most expensive thing in terms of dollars, but something that you would just you couldn't replace. Something that's that's precious and uh irreplaceable to you. And then think about what would it take for you to part with it? What what would make you give it up? When I was in high school, I met a German couple. They were Jewish, they were named Oscar and Inga, and they had escaped from Nazi Germany just at the beginning of the war. And there was a time when the last way out of the country, if you were Jewish, was if you were going on your honeymoon. So their parents talked them into getting married and leaving the country, and then their plan was that once they got to America they were going to get divorced, that this was just a a way to leave. And if I remember the story right, their families had already lost their businesses because they'd been confiscated because they were Jewish, and they could kind of see the handwriting on the wall. So Inga's mother sold her most prized possession, which I think was her wedding rings. It was like the last thing she owned that had value to her. And she sold it to pay for her daughter's wedding and a boat ticket to America. So, as I said, Oscar and Inga expected to get divorced when they were safely out of the country, but you know, transatlantic crossing was a couple of weeks in those days, and they fell in love on the boat, and they uh were married over 30 years by the time I met them. Um But neither of them ever saw their parents again. They uh and they lost they're pretty sure they were killed during the war, they were unable to find out even what happened to them or where they had been taken. And what always struck me about that story is how much Inga's mother gave up because not only did she sell her last remaining prized possession, she put her only daughter on a boat to America, knowing she would probably never see her again, most likely. And I always think about what must it have been like for her to turn and walk away from the boat. You know, just that moment of thinking, this is it, I may never see her again. Um that kind of love, that kind of self-sacrificing love is the theme of our passage today. So, as you'll recall, Mark is uh we are now into the last weeks of Jesus' life. Uh he is in Jerusalem and its surrounding area, and it's the week before the crucifixion and the resurrection. And in this chapter, Mark's going to bring together certain themes and events and put them side by side, and I think so we can see the contrast. Because as you'll see as we go through this passage, he takes a story about someone's hate, and then a story about someone's great love, and then a story about someone's hate, and then great love again, and kind of braids them together, I think, to make a larger point. So just to give you the overview, in verses 1 and 2, you have his comments about the hatred of the priest toward Jesus and how they are seeking to kill him, and then he follows that with the story we're going to spend most of our time on, which is the story of Mary of Bethany and her love toward Jesus. Then in 10 and 11 you get the story of Judas and how he is seeking to betray Jesus, so it goes back to someone who hates him, and then it's followed by the Passover celebration with Jesus, the last Passover, where you see Jesus' great love for his disciples, uh, followed by again by the betrayal of Judas. So you have this love and hate working its way through the passage. All right, so turn to Mark 14, and we're gonna pick up in verse one. 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, for they said, Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar from the people. 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. There were some who said to themselves indignantly, Why was this ointment wasted like that? For this ointment could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor, and they scolded her. But Jesus said, Leave her alone, why do you trouble her? That's the question today. Why do you bother her? Why do you trouble her? She has done a beautiful thing to me, 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. She has done what she could. She anointed my body beforehand for burial, 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. Then Judas Iscariot, who was one of the twelve, went to the chief priests in order to betray him to them. And when they heard it, they were glad and promised to give him money, and he sought an opportunity to betray him. Okay, let me start with some background, some cultural observations about this. Verse 1 tells us that it's two days before Passover, and they're in the Feast of the Unleavened Bread, and these feasts commemorated the Exodus, and almost all of Israel gathered in Jerusalem to commemorate the Exodus. So Jerusalem would have been bustling with thousands of pilgrims as they're preparing to celebrate the Passover. So the Feast of Unleavened Bread was a week-long feast reminiscent of God's, it was supposed to remind them of God's instructions to the Jews as they were to leave Egypt. And what they did is they scoured their house, cleaned everything out to make it kosher and clean, and they removed all traces of yeast or leaven in preparation for the Passover. And it was to remind them of the extraordinary thing that God had done in what he was in the Exodus. Now, often in the Bible, yeast or leaven is a symbol of sin. And it's used that way because the analogy is just as a tiny amount of yeast will spread throughout an entire batch of dough and cause it to rise, so a little bit of sin spreads throughout the entire body or uh subtly through all our lives and makes us sinful people. So there's no kind of excuse of, well, it was just a little sin. It sin is sin. It permeates and influences the whole person. So this yearly festival, you were supposed to kind of ruthlessly clean your life and home, looking for any evidence of compromise or sin, preparing your heart to focus on God and remember the action that he took in the Exodus. So the Passover then was came at the end of the week, and it told God it was to remind them of God's mercy toward them when they were slaves in Egypt. And this was the last of the plagues. Most of you are probably familiar with the story where Moses and Aaron were trying to convince Pharaoh to let the Israelites leave. And God had been bringing a series of plagues to convince Pharaoh, and this was the last one. And what the Israelites did is sacrifice a lamb and then take its blood and sprinkle it on the post of their doors. And when the um and then that mark on their doors caused God's judgment to pass over them when it fell on Egypt. And of course, God's judgment was the death of all the firstborn, from children to livestock and every uh and every firstborn living thing. So when they had this mark on their door, God's judgment passed over them, and then of course Pharaoh relented and left and they were able to leave their slavery in Egypt. So the purpose of the Passover then and the unleavened, the feast of unleavened bread was to remind them of these events, to reinforce kind of gratitude and humility before God and thankfulness for what he had done for them. So in the midst of that, you see the priest plotting to kill Jesus. It's like, okay, that goes right along with the feast, right? I mean, this was completely uh against the intended purpose of the festivals. Um Josephus, the Jewish historian, says that during these Passover feasts there were sometimes as many as three million people in Jerusalem and its surrounding villages. That number really surprised me. I always think of the ancient world as there couldn't possibly have been that many people, but um there were. And so what you had is the whole city, kind of every room filled and bustling with activity, and then they would spill out into the surrounding villages to stay there as well. So the priests want to kill Jesus, but with all these people in the city, they're afraid that they will incite a riot because his popularity is pretty high at this point. Uh on the other hand, they think there's only two days left before the Passover, so there's this sense of urgency of we've got to do it, but we can't do it, and it's kind of this hatred of, well, we can't wait, we have to act, we have to seize this opportunity. So why did they want to kill him? I think they were motivated mostly by wanting to keep their own positions of power because he's teaching a lifestyle and a gospel that threatens them. He's been exposing them as hypocrites, he's been talking about the law in a way that they don't like, and he's exposed their hypocrisy, and so he's a threat to them, and they want to get him out of the way. And of course, they're trying they're Mark also tells us in verse one that they're doing this by stealth. They want to do this in secret, and which I think is another characteristic of hatred. Hatred is usually urgent, it's usually done in secret, and it's got this malevolent intent. Now, um so you have this the setting of this feast that's supposed to inspire great gratitude toward God. You have the priests then plotting to kill Jesus, and into the midst of this account, Mark tells us the story of Mary of Bethany. It's I don't know if you read the parallel accounts. It probably this event probably took place chronologically a few days earlier. In John's Gospel, when he records it, he puts this as six days before Passover. And Mark, I think, is moving it out of chronological order to make the point by putting it between the story of the priests and Judas to make this contrast of the hate and the love. So, look at verse 3. While he was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he was reclining at table, a woman came with an alabascar flask of ointment of Pyrnar, very costly, and she broke the flask and poured it over his head. So the setting is this dinner party. It's at the home of Simon the Leper in Bethany, and Bethany was a village just over the hill from Jerusalem. Jesus had probably gone there to escape the crowds and the the, you know, the millions in the city. And a lot of scholars speculate that he probably cured his host because he's referred to as Simon the Leper. And if Jesus hadn't cured him, they would all be in violation of the Mosaic law. They wouldn't have been able to celebrate the Passover, they wouldn't have been clean. So it's m it's likely that he had cured him. Now, at this kind of a dinner party, people didn't sit in chairs at tables. At this time, they reclined on cushions. If you've ever seen old movies, you know, the about Roman times or Roman emperors, you may have seen this. They had would have pillows and they would sit with their heads and shoulders kind of toward the table and either reclined away from it or parallel to it. So Jesus is reclining in this manner, so it would have been easy for the woman to come in and reach his head and his feet to anoint him with this oil or this perfume. John tells us in his account, he recounts us in John 12, that this is Mary, Mary who was the sister of Martha and Lazarus. This is not Mary Magdalene, this is Mary of Bethany. Mark doesn't name her for his own purposes, but John tells us it it was Mary of Bethany. And then she brings this sealed alabaster container of perfume, which was worth about a year's worth of wages for a working person. The nard plant that's mentioned here is a plant that's native to India. So if the perfume came from that plant, it would have had to have been imported from India, which would make it very, very costly. Now, just if you were looking around when you were studying, there's a similar incident in Luke chapter 7, where uh it's at the home of another man named Simon, and another woman pours perfume on Jesus' feet and her hair. I think that's a different event. I think the one in John and uh the one in Matthew are the same as this event, but the one in Luke 7 is a different woman. Um because the details are different. The Mark event, Mark says this event took place in Bethany at the home of Simon the leper. Luke says they're in Galilee at the home of Simon the Pharisee. The woman in Luke's account is probably a prostitute. The text says she had lived a sinful life, and the Pharisees are indignant. Why would Jesus let this unclean woman touch him? Whereas in Mark's account, the focus is on this woman who is righteous and what she has done and how much money she has spent on him. So you see a different emphasis in the two accounts. So the focus in Luke's account is, or in um yeah, in Luke's account is Jesus' refusal to reject this sinful woman, but in Mark's account the focus is on Mary's love and devotion. So I think the Luke incident is a separate incident that occurred earlier. Okay, so there's three kinds of scenes in our passage. First, we get Mary's action, then we get the disciples' response, and then we get Jesus' response to that. So we're going to take them in turn. And we're going to spend most of the time on Jesus' response because that's what the text does. We have the most information, and I think it gives us the fullest picture. So you can kind of picture in your imagination what's going on. Mary coming into this room with this jar of very expensive perfume. Jesus is reclining with whoever else is at the dinner away from the table. John tells us she anointed both his head and his feet. Mark just mentions his head, but she would have been able to reach them because he would have been, you know, stretched out oriental fashion. She breaks the jar and pours the whole contents over his head, and then this fragrance would start filling the room. And we're going to look more at what her actions mean when we look at Jesus' response. So let's just go to how the disciples respond. In verse 4 and 5, they say indignantly, why was this ointment wasted like that? For this ointment could have been sold for more than 300 denarii and given to the poor, and they scolded her. So they're aghast. Mark doesn't say who they were, but Matthew tells us they're the disciples, and John specifies that it is Judas Iscariot who speaks loudest of all and is most vocal in rebuking her. So the Matthew account is in Matthew 26, and the John account's in John 12. And Judas was the treasurer of the group, so you can imagine he's probably exclaims the loudest because he's the one who handled the money, and he's like, what a waste. John tells us that Judas was not only the treasurer, he was a thief, and that he had been helping himself to the money in the treasury. So apparently he was handling all the money for the group, and he'd just sample a little bit for himself in the process. And he probably looked at this and thought, wow, look at all that money. Not only could it have been spent on the poor, but I could have taken a nice little chunk for me. I'm speculating, but it would be in character. So verse 4 and 5 say they read the disciples are indignant and they rebuke her harshly. Her actions break all of protocol here because this is a dinner party, and you don't just kind of barge into a dinner party and an and pour oil on the guest of honor. It's not, you know, it's just for perfume or whatever. It's not really protocol. And according to John's account, she wiped his feet with her hair, and uncovering her hair for him was also a breach of protocol. He's a single man, she's a single woman as far as we know, and that was not acceptable behavior to let down your hair in public like that, and especially before a single man, she would have most likely had to touch him, which also would have been a breach of protocol. And that's probably part of their indignation that she's just this is just not, this is rude behavior, this is just not acceptable. However, they criticize her for the money that's wasted for her extravagance. And partly what's going on is during this the festival of unleavened bread and the Passover, it was customary for Jews to give a gift to the poor at the end of the evening of Passover, so that was kind of part of the rituals, and thousands could have been fed from the proceeds of what they thought had been, quote, wasted on Jesus. So they rebuke her harshly. The verb in they scolded her in verse 5 is very strong. It's a word that's like to express this violent indignation. It's not just they were annoyed, they were really upset with her. This is an open kind of rebuke and tirade. So let's look at Jesus' response because that's where we I think we can learn the most about what's going on. So verse 6. But Jesus said, Leave her alone. Why do you trouble her? She has done a beautiful thing for me, for you will always have poor with you, and whenever you want, you can do good for them, but you will not always have me. She has done what we she could. She has anointed my body beforehand for burial, and truly I say to you, wherever the gospel is proclaimed in the world, what she has done will be told in memory of her. So he says five things about her action. We're going to take them each one in kind. And I think these five things may are what make it this kind of valuable and admirable action. So first she says, he says, she's done a beautiful thing to me. And I think the beauty of it lay in its extravagance. Some commentators suggested that the flask was sealed in order to preserve the perfume so that you had to break it to use it. And the idea they claimed is that it would be, you had to save it so it could be sold for a financial emergency. Other commentators, and I actually like this view better, they claimed that she didn't need to break the flask, that most of these kinds of containers would have had either a stopper or a piece of cloth over the opening that was tied with a leather cord, and she could either just remove the stopper or untie the cord. That makes more sense to me because if it's perfume, why would you ever want to use perfume all at once? You know, it's just it doesn't make sense. So I tend to lead toward the idea that she could have opened it and poured out a little bit, but that part of her actions were this extravagant of breaking it so that she had to use the entire thing and not spare any of it, but pour the entire quantity out on him. And that breaking the flask is kind of is an outpouring of her faith and love and devotion for him. So it it just you know it just shows more of what she gave. Now, it's Judas tells us, or the text tells us it's worth about 300 denarii. A denarii was a day's wage, so this is almost a year's worth of wages. Now, in that day, a denarius was about what we would think of as 20 cents, so this would have been about sixty dollars, but that doesn't sound like much, but if you think about what's your yearly wages today, I mean that's what she's g she's uh giving up. And we know pretty much from the clues about her in the text that she was a fairly wealthy woman, probably more what we would think of as upper middle class. So what's an upper middle class range today? What would that be? $80,000? $100,000? I mean, what of what does the upper middle class make in a year today? That's the kind of value, that's a huge amount of money. She probably had this as part of her dowry. That would be typically why a woman would own something like this. It was given to her probably by her father or to make her a more desirable marriage partner, that she had this expensive thing that could be sold in a financial emergency, but it was part of her wealth. So by giving it to Jesus, she is diminishing her chances of getting married in the future. She is reducing her dowry, which would have made her less attractive as a marriage partner. I suspect it's probably one of the most precious things she owns. I mean, how many things do you own that are worth a year's worth of your wages? I mean, not many of us have, you know, I guess our houses are more than a year's worth of wages. Cars are getting that way. But but most of us don't own something that costs that much. So it's probably part of her dowry, part of her future hopes and dreams, and she is pouring it all out on Jesus. And um contrast her actions with the rich young ruler that we looked at back in chapter ten, that was a few weeks ago. In his case, he was also wealthy. Jesus asks him to sell everything and to follow Jesus, and he's he leaves, he can't do it, he's discouraged. And yet here we have Mary giving everything um she has and to to Jesus. And I have to admit, if I'd been there and I'd been her financial advisor, I would have said, No. Don't do this. This doesn't look smart on the surface. It looks very foolish. And yet Jesus praises her for it. So that's what why? Why is such this act of extravagance something that he says is praiseworthy and beautiful? And I think it's because she learned the most important lesson any of us can learn. And that is she believes Jesus is who he said he is. She believes he's the Messiah. She believes he's the Son of God and that he says he's going to die in two more days' time to pay the penalty for their sins and then be resurrection. And that's the most important thing you can ever learn. If we don't understand that fact, we really have nothing. So you could give away more money than Bill Gates earns ever, and it's for nothing if you don't know that Jesus is Lord, that He is the Messiah, that He came to pay the penalty for your sins. Or, you know, we could have the most effective social program ever and wipe out poverty in our state or in our country or whatever, but it's not going to save your soul. What's important is that you know who Jesus is and what he came to do for you. And all the good deeds and acts of compassion done for whatever reasons apart from that are nothing. They aren't going to get you into the kingdom of heaven. So if we haven't faced into the fact of who Jesus is, it's useless. There's only one way to get into heaven, and that is trusting that the blood of Jesus paid the penalty for your sins, and that God will have mercy on you because of that, because of his death on the cross. And that's what Mary's counting on. She believes Jesus is who he says he is. She believes he's going to die, and so she's preparing him for that burial. And she's counting on it. And I think that's why he praises her. He says she's got it. She's learned what's most important. She's giving up everything to throw her lot in with him and to trust him. She's putting him first. So if he's not the Messiah, if he's not going to be raised, this is a really foolish thing to do. But if he is who he said he is, it's a very smart thing to do. So it's this lavish act of love and faith. And I think that's why Jesus says it's beautiful. So it's beautiful. It's is the first thing. The second thing he says is it's timely. What she did is is timely. It's something that could only be done now. Anytime you want, you can go and do something good for the poor. They will always be around, and that's a good thing to do. It's a right and and worthy thing to go and help the poor. But I think what he's pointing out is there are some opportunities that come in our life that you have to seize, you have to take when they happen. So in Mary's case, she believed Jesus was the Messiah. She believes his predictions that he's going to die very soon and that she's going he will be raised from the dead. And if he's going to die, then there are Jewish customs and traditions about what must be done with the body. And she doesn't know if she'll have the opportunity after his death to do these things. So she does them beforehand. So she seizes the moment. And I think the analogy for us is there are times in your life when you have to decide who is Jesus. Do I follow him or not? Do I trust him or not? Do I believe the claims he made to be Lord and Messiah or not? Or do I think he's a liar? And those opportunities come around and it's time to act. It's time to decide. So the evidence that he lived and died is out there to find for the reading, and there comes a time when you have to decide. So the first thing he says is her action is beautiful. The second is it's timely. And the third is that it's feasible. She did what she could. This was an opportunity that was open to her, and she took it. So she couldn't fix him a meal, there wasn't really any time for that. She couldn't make him a garment, there, you know, he didn't need it, there was no time for that. But she could show her faith this way, and she did. Now, I find that immensely comforting because how many of you feel like there's nothing I can do? You know, I'm I'm too old, or I or I'm too young, or I'm too poor, or I'm too illiterate, or I don't have the right education, or um, maybe I don't speak well enough, or my personality is too mild, or my personality is too obnoxious, or you know, whatever. There's always something, nobody knows my name. Um what could I possibly do that would make any difference? And I think Jesus says, just do what you can, do what opportunity God has given you. So Mary gave her marriage box, her most precious thing. And I I that I think by analogy the question is, well, what's in your box? What has Jesus given you that you could lay at his feet? You don't have to do everything. Um, you can't do everything and you don't have to. So you don't have to feed the whole starving world, but there's probably one person you can feed. There's probably someone in your life. You may not be able to comfort all the lonely hearts on earth, but there's one or two you could comfort. Or you may not reach as many people with the gospel as, say, Billy Graham did, but you can teach Sunday school, or you can teach your children. Um, you know, you may not write the apologetic books that Francis Saffer write, but you can certainly explain your faith to uh your children, your neighbor, uh, the person sitting next to you every day. So I find that comforting that she just did what she could. With whatever opportunity God gave her, she responded. So some of you are probably thinking, oh, but my life is too dull, you know, I never have the opportunity for real service. And I think part of what this story tells us is you do. There's service all around you. There is something that God has put in your life that you can respond to, and that's for Mary, it was this box she could anoint Jesus. There's something in your metaphorical box, lay it at Jesus' feet and see what he decides to do with it. You never know. So, you know, think back to the story we looked at in the fall of the the loaves and the fishes. You know, you bring your meager little meal and you see what Jesus will do with it, and sometimes he feeds the multitudes. So I find that comforting. God doesn't ask you to save the world. Jesus already did that. That job is over. That's not our place. Our place now is to trust him and to humbly and faithfully respond to whatever he puts in our lives. Okay, so the third act, she did what she could. She did what was feasible for her. And the fourth element that he says is that her action was insightful. Our Lord says, She anointed my body beforehand for burying. So she's been, Jesus has been telling them that his death is coming, and we've seen three explicit predictions of it, and the disciples either don't want to understand it or they don't believe it, and yet Mary does. Mary gets it. She believes him that this act is coming, and that's the insight. She understands that he's heading for burial. She's not sure if she'll have the opportunity later to find his body and anoint it. So she takes the opportunity she can. And I think part of what he's praising her for is her faith that brought her to this place, that she saw who he was, she believed, and she acted on it. Okay, and finally, the last thing he says about her action is that what she did is deserving to be remembered. Um he says this story will be told in memory of her wherever the gospel is preached in the world, and here we are today, two thousand years later, fulfilling that very prophecy. That um telling again the acts of Mary of Bethany when she anointed him. And all those together, I think, is what makes this the beautiful thing that she did. Now, notice immediately he goes into verse 10. Then Judas Iscariot, who is one of the twelve, went to the chief priests in order to betray him to them. So you have this contrast of this woman who was not one of the twelve giving this extravagant act of love and devotion, and Judas, who was one of the twelve, who was one of the people that was closest to Jesus, turning around and trying and seeking an opportunity to betray him. So there's this immediate contrast of love and hate. Some scholars tried to, that I read, tried to excuse Judas for going to the high priest, that maybe you know he didn't really know what he was doing, and that maybe he was just misled, or he was trying to bring about a political revolution, and he thought this was help, and he was really on Jesus' side, but he's just trying to force a confrontation with Rome. I think verse 10 and 11 make it sound like what he did was deliberate, that he deliberately went to the uh chief priests in order to betray Jesus Jesus, that he took the initiative and sought the in the opportunity. Um and probably uh because of the money they promised to give him. We are John tells us he was a thief, he was helping himself from their community treasury box, and the offer of money was tempting to him. So uh again, I think you see this contrast of love and hate. And I want to go on and look at the Passover account next. I originally wasn't going to include this, so that's why you didn't have any homework questions on it, but the more I studied it, the more I think this is an integral part of the setting, and one of the reasons Mark tells it out of order. So let's go on in verse twelve. On the first day of the unleavened bread when they sacrificed the Passover lamb, his disciples said to him, Where will you have us go and prepare for you to eat the Passover? And he sent two of his disciples and said to them, Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him. And wherever he enters, say to the master of the house, the teacher says, Where is my guest room where I may eat the Passover with my disciples? And he will show you a large upper room furnished and ready. There, prepare for us. And the disciples set out and went to the city and found it just as he had told them, and they prepared the Passover. Now, I read some scholars who thought that this was a mar miraculous foresight, that he just knew that, oh, there would be this man carrying the jar of water. I read others that said, no, he probably made these preparations beforehand, and this was nothing miraculous, this was just ordinary advanced planning, and now he's letting the disciples in on it and saying, Here's how you'll recognize the person. So I don't know which it was. I I tend to lean toward it's probably pre-arranged preparations that he worked out because so many of the miracles he performs have a point, a larger point, and I'm not sure there is one here. However, if there is one, this is what I think it might be, because he says, when you go into the city, you'll find a man carrying a jar of water. Now, that would stand out in those days because men didn't carry jars of water. Women carried jars of water. So this would be like saying, go into the city and look for the man carrying the purse. We would go, What? Men don't carry purses. But um it was unusual. So you have this man carrying a jar of water. When when women carried the water in jars on their heads, men would carry it in skins or bladders, so they wouldn't carry these big jars. That was women's work. So he's gives them the signal of you won't have any trouble noticing this man, he is the one that's different. So that raised the question, why the jar of water? Did he ask the man to carry a jar of water? Did he why why the water? And it it, you know, kind of you can probably, this is probably what came to your mind too. At an earlier feast, which was recorded in John 7, when they were celebrating the feasts of Booth, Jesus says, If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. And it's not the first time that Jesus has used the image of water as the hope and the faith and the love that he offers. So I I don't know if that's stretching the rubber band too tight or not there, but it it makes me wonder if he didn't prearrange that symbol to remind them that he is the living water, the one that if anyone is thirsty, you can come and drink and find the salvation of your souls. Okay, so then we get to the Passover itself in verse 17. And when it was evening, he came with the twelve, and as they were reclining at table and eating, Jesus said, Truly I say to you, one of you will betray me, one who is eating with me. They begin to be sorrowful and say to him to him one after another, Is it I? And he said to them, It's one of the twelve who is dipping bread into the dish with me, for the Son of Man goes as it is written of him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed. It would have been better for that man if he had not been born. So they're gathered around the table, not like Leonardo da Vinci's painting. They would have been not sitting on chairs, they would have been lying on these cushions, reclining Roman fashion. Um that's where you have this interchange. And Jesus says, it's one who's dipping bread into the same dish with me. So what he means is it's either the person on his right or his left, because as they were reclining there, bread was their knife and fork. They would they had a little loaf of bread and they would break off a piece and dip it into the whatever the serving bowl they were eating, and then eat that, and then you break off a clean piece of bread. So they have these shared serving bowls, and only the people right next to him would have been able to share the one he was using. So it either had to be John or Judas. And what he's saying to them is, it's it's one of these two. Now it's always struck me that when he says one of you is going to betray me, not one of them says, Not me, it's him. You know. I mean, that would have been my first reaction. Not me, not me. No, no, no, I didn't do it. And yet all of them say, Lord, is it me? They must have grown spiritually to get to this point where now they he tells them that and they go, Oh my gosh, it could be me. I am sinful enough to do that. I am, every one of them recognizes that they are now, there's something evil in them. So I think this is uh a mark of how much they've grown spiritually that instead of pointing fingers at everyone else, they all say, Lord, is it me? Am I the one? And he reassures them by saying, No, it's one of these two, and then of course makes it clear that it's Judas. All right, so now we get to the last scene, verse 22. And as they were eating, he took bread, and after blessing it, broke it and gave it to them, and said, Take, this is my body. And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, and they all drank of it. And he said to them, This is the blood of the covenant which is poured out for many. Truly I say to you, I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until the day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God. So he's teaching them again symbolically here, that the bread is a symbol of his body that's going to be broken for him, and the wine is a symbol of his blood which will be poured out for their forgiveness, and this this is the new covenant with God that we will not be saved by keeping the law but by trusting in him. And now, I think this is where you can see why Mark put the account of Mary and Bethany here, because her actions foreshadow Jesus's. She brought this beautiful alabaster flask and broke it and poured it out on Jesus. And now Jesus is saying, My body is going to be broken for you. She broke a flask, but he's pouring out his body. He's breaking his very life. He's the one that's going to be broken. So she poured all the ointment or the perfume that was in the flask. He's pouring out his blood to pay for it. So if her action was extravagant and an incredible act of devotion, what is his? That I think is the point. She gave up this year's worth of wages, but he is laying down his very life. And if you think her actions were foolish and extravagant and she wasted this, you know, a year's salary, then Jesus' actions are even more extravagant because you have God sacrificing his one and only beloved son, sparing no expense. That's more than a year's worth of wages. That's everything. That is giving up his his I mean, how many of you would give up your child for for someone who hates you? And that's the extravagant act of love that we see. So I think that's why Mark puts them side by side. Mary's breaking a jar of perfume, but Jesus is breaking his body and his life. So if her actions reflect love and devotion, what did Jesus' actions say to you? As Paul writes, you're not your own, you are bought with a price, an expensive and high and costly price. God spared no expense, not even the life of his own son, to pay the penalty for our sins. And all you have to do is believe in him to have eternal life. Speaker: We're glad you've been with us at Wednesday in the Word with Krisan Marotta. We hope you've been encouraged and challenged to depend on the Lord. Please let us know if you have questions about this study. We are on the internet at wednesdayintheword.com, where you will find this and other Bible studies.