Assuredly, I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be told as a memorial to her

 After two days it was the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread.  And the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might take Him by trickery and put Him to death.  But they said, "Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar of the people."

And being in Bethany at the house of Simon the leper, as He sat at the table, a woman came having an alabaster flask of very costly oil of spikenard.  Then she broke the flask and poured it on His head.  But there were some who were indignant among themselves, and said, "Why was this fragrant oil wasted?  For it might have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor."  And they criticized her sharply.  But Jesus said, "Let her alone.  Why do you trouble her?  She has done a good work for Me.  For you have the poor with you always, and whenever you wish you may do them good; but Me you do not have always.  She has done what she could.  She has come beforehand to anoint My body for burial.  Assuredly, I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be told as a memorial to her."

Then Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went to the chief priests to betray Him to them.  And when they heard it, they were glad, and promised to give him money.  So he sought how he might conveniently betray Him. 

- Mark 14:1-11

In yesterday's reading, Jesus completed His discourse on the times of the destruction of the temple and of His Return:  "Now learn this parable from the fig tree:  When its branch has already become tender, and puts forth leaves, you know that summer is near.  So you also, when you see these things happening, know that it is near -- at the doors!  Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all these things take place.  Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.  But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.  Take heed, watch and pray; for you do not know when the time is.  It is like a man going to a far country, who left his house and gave authority to his servants, and to each his work, and commanded the doorkeeper to watch.  Watch therefore, for you do not know when the master of the house is coming -- in the evening, at midnight, at the crowing of the rooster, or in the morning -- lest, coming suddenly, he find you sleeping.  And what I say to you, I say to all:  Watch!"

 After two days it was the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread.  And the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might take Him by trickery and put Him to death.  But they said, "Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar of the people."  The Feast of Unleavened Bread begins with the Passover meal on the evening of 15 Nisan on the Jewish calendar.  It lasts seven days (see Exodus 12:12-20).  Both feasts together commemorate the liberation of Israel from slavery in Egypt.  Passover refers to the "passing over" of Hebrew homes by the angel of death when striking the firstborn of the Egyptians, the Jews having put lamb's blood on their doorposts as a sign (Exodus 12:13).   The unleavened bread, as part of the Passover meal, is a reminder of the immediate haste required the flight from Egypt (Exodus 12:39).  This Passover, my study bible tells us, was fulfilled in Christ, whose blood was shed to free humanity from bondage to sin and death.

And being in Bethany at the house of Simon the leper, as He sat at the table, a woman came having an alabaster flask of very costly oil of spikenard.  Then she broke the flask and poured it on His head.  But there were some who were indignant among themselves, and said, "Why was this fragrant oil wasted?  For it might have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor."  And they criticized her sharply.  But Jesus said, "Let her alone.  Why do you trouble her?  She has done a good work for Me.  For you have the poor with you always, and whenever you wish you may do them good; but Me you do not have always.  She has done what she could.  She has come beforehand to anoint My body for burial.  Assuredly, I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be told as a memorial to her."   My study bible points out that Simon the leper must have been a man healed by Christ, as lepers were forbidden to live in towns.  This woman's great faith and love for Christ is such that he promises her act of grace perpetual public memory, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world.   It's also noted that there is no consensus across the tradition of the Church as to who exactly this woman is in relation to accounts of similar events in the other Gospels (Matthew 26:5-13, Luke 7:36-38, John 12:1-8).  Some Fathers say that there were three different women in the four accounts, others that there were only two.  John's Gospel tells us specifically that it was Judas Iscariot (and names him Simon's son) who criticized the gift of this woman (John 12:4-7), and who was rebuked by Christ.

Then Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went to the chief priests to betray Him to them.  And when they heard it, they were glad, and promised to give him money.  So he sought how he might conveniently betray Him.   My study bible says that Judas on his own initiative seeks to betray Jesus.  While his motivation has been historically debated, John tells us that his underlying motive was greed (John 12:4-7), being particularly upset about the "waste" of myrrh in the story of the woman who anointed Christ above, because he was a thief (see also 1 Timothy 6:10).    We may contrast, as do many traditional hymns for Wednesday of Holy Week, the greed of Judas with the generosity of the woman.

A rebuke from Christ is an act of love, intended for correction.  Proverbs 27:6 tells us "Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful," illuminating quite starkly the future actions of Judas, although telling us a truth about human beings.  If, as John's Gospel seems to indicate, Judas openly criticized this woman at a dinner in his father's home, and was in return openly rebuked by Christ (who usually reserved correction for private times with the disciples), perhaps it was not only greed but also the open exposure of his motives that is at play here.  One can respond to a rebuke by Christ with acceptance, or with refusal to hear or listen or see one's own flaw.  The latter results in deeper problem, as the person "digs in" more deeply in the direction of the flaw.  This we can see quite clearly in Judas.  He has an opportunity for repentance, but does not take it.  Neither does he come to Christ or his fellow disciples with his problem.  He responds to the generous gift of this woman with a problematic censure:  it is her expression of great love that he has a problem with, focusing instead on the money.  The Gospels teach us all about the personal.  While we are instructed to love God and neighbor as friends of Christ, and as expression of our love for Christ, the abstract does not substitute for the personal.  What one sees in one's immediate circle that needs redress, attention, and love is often the tougher road of repentance and growth in our faith and following of Christ.  We look at Jesus' healings, and they are always personal.  They involve faith, and connection, relationship and participation in His love and person.  To seek to do acts of charity for others is always laudable, but repentance takes place in the heart not in the abstract but the personal level.  A response to injustice is more greatly challenged if it requires us to stand up to our own particular social circle, particularly those whose opinions of ourselves we regard as important.  In some sense, Jesus invites us into this challenge directly when He teaches, at the home of  an important Pharisee, that one should take the lowest place at a wedding feast, and be invited up.  Then He goes further by teaching, "When you give a dinner or a supper, do not ask your friends, your brothers, your relatives, nor rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you; for you shall be repaid at the resurrection of the just."  (See Luke 14:7-14).  Each of these acts is personal, requiring a deep shift in our relations with those of our own immediate social circle.  They require a kind of repentance, challenge our own hearts and the nature of the ways in which we operate within relationship.   They involve shame, and the willingness to bear that shame, as Christ says specifically in Luke 14:9.  In Mark 8:34-38, Jesus again links shame to service and love of Himself and His teachings, and couples it with Judgment.  He says, "Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.  For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it.  For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man also will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels."   This sort of shame is one that teaches us about humility and position within a social context.  Judas responds to Christ's rebuke not with humility, but rather with a rejection of this teaching.  Perhaps his father's home in Bethany suggests even more deeply a kind of humiliation among a social hierarchy, a position within the ruling or upper classes in Bethany near Jerusalem, a cross to bear that each of us might find quite difficult -- but called to bear that shame of rebuke he was, and he failed to accept it.  To bear shame for the love of Christ is our highest order, our greatest sacrifice.  The woman in this story is willing to humiliate herself for His love.  This does not involve diminishment of ourselves as persons; it is instead an exchange of one type of life for another that is greater, an expansion of ourselves.  This is the great truth of the Cross -- of each of our crosses -- which a worldly social construct will hide and has to be found in the personal, when we truly follow Him.  In order to understand this humility, we must contrast shame with guilt, and also with the service or obedience to any false idol, which are entirely different matters.  Jesus lauds this woman; in contrast to the others, He defends and praises her with highest honors, even ageless memory -- wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world.  Let us remember His love and what it teaches us.