Awkward!

Back when I was working as a full time minister, Monday was my day off, so I didn’t like getting out of bed early on Monday mornings … unfortunately, I’m not good at sleeping in either.

So that usually meant I’d be wide awake by six o’clock … but I wanted to stay in bed.

The good thing is, they’ve created an invention for people just like me – breakfast television news shows.

So, on Monday mornings, I used to roll out of bed at six, turn on the coffee, turn on the TV … and climb back into bed.

Now, I need to tell you, I’m not getting paid any endorsement money for this, but my favourite morning show in Toronto was Breakfast Television on City TV … and a while ago, they were running a contest for a trip to Greece.

People were asked to send in their entries, and then, one Monday morning, as I was watching the show, they were hoping to give the prize away … however … the staff at Breakfast Television hadn’t thought this through very clearly.

It’s 7:20 AM, and they announce, “Okay, here’s the deal – here’s what we’ve decided to do! We’re going to randomly call one of the people who sent in an entry, and if they answer the phone saying, “I watch Breakfast Television on City TV!” They win the prize!”

Now let me recap...

It’s 7:20 AM on a Monday morning. Thousands and thousands of people have sent in an entry for this contest. They don’t know they might be called. They don’t even know this is the way the contest is going to work. And there’s about a 99% chance they don’t even have the TV on!

So, co-hosts Dina and Frank make the phone call. The phone rings and rings. Finally some groggy person answers the phone. Dina and Frank blunder their way through this. They have not carefully thought this out … the person on the other end of the line has no idea what idiot is calling her at 7:20 AM on Monday morning. The situation spins out of control, and before anyone is fast enough to push the right buttons, on Breakfast Television … live … we hear this person swearing at Dina and Frank … and not nice swear words …

It all happened so fast, but you know what was fun, I was recording the show. So I could go back and forth over this segment. I could spot the moment when this “train wreck” began.

I could study the looks on their faces. I could see the panic as co-host Frank Feragini moved his hand just a little too slowly to cut off the call. I could enjoy the awkward nature of those first few moments after the call - “Oh my gosh, did that just happen to us?”

And I knew, after the show was finished – at 9 AM sharp. They’d be doing just exactly what I was doing – replaying the video, shaking their heads, dissecting the moment, wondering, “How did things go so horribly wrong … and whose fault was this anyway?”

I like the scripture passage we read this morning from the Gospel of John, for many of the same reasons I enjoyed that moment on Breakfast Television.

Sometimes we really need to slow things down when we’re reading scripture – maybe go over it a few times just to kind of “get the feel” for what’s really happening in a particular text from the Bible.

Let me set the scene. It’s just a few days before the crucifixion of Jesus, but nobody knows that’s going to happen – maybe Jesus knows … but nobody else …

Jesus and the disciples are at the home of three siblings – Mary and Martha and Lazarus. Do you remember the story of Lazarus?

Just one chapter earlier in the Gospel of John, Lazarus dies – he’s been in the tomb long enough for his body to begin to rot, but at the request of Mary and Martha, Jesus comes to their hometown of Bethany, and to everyone’s amazement, Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead.

So, it’s some time later, and Jesus and the disciples are in Bethany again. Mary and Martha and Lazarus – raised from the dead - have spread out a big feast … and I think they’re the kind of people who would have some money. This is a home of elegance … probably a candelabra on a baby grand piano in the corner … probably cut flowers in the hall … cloth napkins tucked in crystal stemware … lace cloth … several Chantilly knives, forks.

And then, sometime during the evening, Mary, the sister of Lazarus - the man brought back to life; out of gratitude and love for Jesus, takes what might have been the most precious thing she has, and instead of the usual act of hospitality – washing the feet of a guest – she breaks open an expensive alabaster jar of perfume, pours it out onto the feet of Jesus, and wipes his feet with her hair.

Right there … you already have an awkward moment. It’s a pretty intimate thing to do – a little unusual. Check out the expressions on the faces around the table.

Maybe just let it go … maybe not …

After everyone gets over the shock, just start up a little small talk, “Sure has been hot lately, eh?”

But things don’t get better … they get worse …

Now, I don’t know, I haven’t looked up any books of etiquette on this, but my best guess is this, if you’re invited to a dinner, and in the course of that dinner your host or hostess does something you think is strange or inappropriate, perhaps even offensive … either sit there and be quiet and eat your dinner … or leave. But don’t start an argument at the table with one of them.

But that’s what Judas does … maybe he’s feeling a little out of place in this elegant home … maybe still wondering what fork he should be using for the main course …

Regardless, Judas attacks, “Hey, hey … What’s going on here? Mary, why did you do that? We could have sold that perfume for a small fortune … helped the poor … think of the diapers, the baby food, the milk … and here it is … gone … gone! Wasted!”

Now that may not have been the most diplomatic response … but … but … Judas had a point. You can call him a thief and a betrayer – the most vilified human being down through the course of human history … but the point is – he had a point!

... Because what are we following Jesus for, if it’s not to take care of the needy? And the point Judas made – betrayer … yes, thief … yes – but his point should be brought up every time any church builds a steeple, puts in windows from Manchester, England or hangs a chandelier – “Is anybody going without a meal because of what we’re doing?”

But Mary has a point. Mary really has a point. What she’s done is a beautiful thing – a beautiful expression of gratitude and love, and who in the world, with human heart, gets real practical and useful when you want to show your love and gratitude?

You’re extravagant. You borrow money. You take out the savings.

I’m inclined to believe, what she did was just as natural and normal as putting food on the table.

You never get so poor, you don’t have a place on the table for a bouquet of flowers.

Mary has a point …

But the argument between them is not the point.

What happens is Jesus has to step in. He has to settle this dispute.

Jesus says, “Cool it! Just cool it!” – that’s in the original Greek!

Jesus says, “Cool it! What she’s done … she has anointed me for burial.”

The clues are all over the scripture text we read this morning. It’s six days until Passover. In other words, Passover is the time Jesus is to die – it’s six days before he dies. There is the anointing of his body – his body will be anointed in less than a week. There is dinner. There’s Judas, and all the talk about the poor.

All over this story, it’s more than perfume or food, it’s the death of Jesus.

And what makes what Mary does so beautiful is that she doesn’t know that … she doesn’t know it …

What does she do? She anoints the feet of Jesus with perfume, and dries his feet with her hair. But what does she really do?

Jesus takes the act of this woman and elevates it to the level of the sweeping purposes of God concerning God’s son, “She has anointed me for burial.”

That’s what makes it so wonderful. She’s totally unaware of the deep and more profound meaning of what she’s done. She just does it!

And that’s true in all the Bible …

Abraham and Sarah sitting out in front of their tent. Three people come over the sand dune.

Abraham says, “Sarah, it looks like we’re having company for supper. Set out three more plates.”

They don’t know till later, that these are messengers from God.

That’s what makes it so beautiful …

Sarah doesn’t say, “Well I only feed messengers from God!”

Three people coming in – it’s supper time! You feed them!

You remember the two on the Road to Emmaus in the Gospel of Luke, after Easter – walking along – a stranger appears with them. They start talking and walk seven miles, talking about scripture and about Jesus and the resurrection. And it’s late in the evening and one of the men says to Jesus, “Well friend, it’s getting late and we’re tired from the long walk. Why don’t you stay and have a bite. Stay the evening with us and rest.”

And it isn’t until the meal that they know it’s Jesus …

See, it would have been different if they’d said, “Oh, this is Jesus. Let’s fix something.”

It’s a stranger who’s hungry and tired … and that’s enough!

When the Apostle Paul writes the letters in the New Testament, he doesn’t sit down some Sunday afternoon and say, “I think I’ll write another book for the Bible.”

No, no, no …

What he does is he fires off a letter to another church that’s in trouble, and later on, the church, guided by the Holy Spirit says, “Now this is scripture.”

He didn’t know that … and you don’t know, it may happen to you.

I know in Matthew 25 it says, “When the Son of Man shall come with all the angels in glory, and he says to the group on his right, “Come into the joy of the Lord. I was hungry and naked, imprisoned, alone, a stranger … and you came to me …”

And they all say, “Well, we never … we never saw you like that!”

And the Risen Christ says, “Oh yes you did … you just didn’t know it …”

That’s the beauty of it.

And I dare say, for some of you, when the time comes to be ushered into heaven, and he says, “Come in! Come in! It’s good to see you again. I haven’t seen you since you stopped by and fixed the steps on my front porch …”

You didn’t know who that was? Not a clue … that’s the beauty of it!

“As you have done it unto one of the least of these, you have done it unto me …”