Costly Worship

This morning we're in John chapter 12.

John 12 · chapter mention

Now, as we approach this part of John's gospel account, what we need to realize is he has spent the last 11 chapters going through the three years of Jesus' public ministry.

And in that, he's been focusing on these seven specific miracles that Jesus performed through his ministry that John believes is persuasive to convince his audience that this, John chapter 20, verse 31, that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

John 20:31

So the first 11 chapters of John is focusing on the three years of Jesus' public ministry with this end in mind, of the seven miracles that he highlights.

We're now in the last 10 chapters of John, and it's all focused on the last week of Jesus' life.

So almost half of the whole gospel account of John focuses on the last week of Jesus.

Now, he does give us a couple of days of content after Jesus' resurrection, but by and large, we're going to be spending the rest of this year in John in the last week of his life.

Now, we find ourselves this morning at the very start of that last week.

That's where we're at today.

And this begins a growing intensity for Jesus and for his disciples that his time to die is at hand.

Jesus and his followers had begun their journey toward Jerusalem from Ephraim.

Right?

This is what we learned about last week.

They departed into Ephraim to distance themselves for a short time from the malicious Sanhedrin who had been making a plot to kill Jesus because of the followers that he was attracting to himself.

They wanted to try and stop a Roman response of authority and power because of this following, and they thought they could stop that through taking Jesus' life.

Now, they're journeying into Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover feast.

And ultimately, they're journeying into Jerusalem so that Jesus gives himself over to the hands of sinful men to be crucified.

Ephraim was about 12 miles outside of the city of Jerusalem.

And on his journey into the city to celebrate the Passover, he stops once again in Bethany.

Bethany is about two miles outside of the city capital.

Bethany is where Lazarus is and where Lazarus was raised from the dead.

And as he arrives at Bethany, they celebrate by throwing this huge communal feast in honor of Jesus and what he has done.

Now, undoubtedly, because right, what does John say?

John says, if I was going to write everything that Jesus ever did, the world could not contain the volumes of the miracles and signs that Jesus performed, the teachings that he gave.

The world couldn't contain it.

John highlights seven specific miracles to convince or persuade his audience Jesus is the Christ.

So when we look at this communal feast in Bethany, I would submit that undoubtedly it's filled with people who had heard the teachings of Jesus, who had experienced the miracles of Jesus, lame people who were able to walk, deaf people who were able to hear, all of this commotion around what Jesus had done in their life.

And they're going to celebrate and honor him at this feast.

But the focus of the feast, undoubtedly, is Lazarus being raised from the dead.

He is the central figure at this feast.

He's even present at the dinner as an honored guest and a testament to the power and presence of Jesus, the long-awaited Messiah.

The Gospel of Accounts of both Mark and Matthew, they tell us that the setting of the communal celebration is at Simon the Leper's home.

Now, we don't really know a lot about Simon the leper, right?

But we do know that he lives in Bethany, that his house can facilitate a pretty uh stellar party, and that he was more than likely healed himself by Jesus of his leprosy.

The distinguishing epithet that he carries, the leper, is more than likely to set him apart from the other Simons in Jesus' life, but also to point to a miracle performed by Jesus that gave Simon communal privileges back, which now he's fully celebrating and living out and enjoying at this feast.

Now, John tells us that Martha, one of Lazarus' sisters, is busy serving the dinner guests, and that Lazarus was actually reclining at table with Jesus himself.

I want to try to paint a portrait of what this dinner party could look like for your imaginations.

You see, it was their custom to eat at a very slow pace.

I don't know about you.

I eat uh really fast.

I wasn't an orphan.

Uh I didn't have to like fight over food uh because it was gonna be gone from me at some point in time.

Uh my family had enough, but I eat uh grossly fast, and I don't know why.

But uh they didn't do that.

They took their time.

It was slow, it was spread out, usually over several courses, uh, and they reclined on cushions around the table with their head uh toward the table and their feet extended out away from it.

So when it's saying that Lazarus and Jesus and other honored guests are reclining at table, they're literally laying out on these cushions, taking their time.

There's no sense of rush or hurry.

If you can imagine kind of them in a U shape, so where that opening of the U was, the servants could come in and hand them their food and drinks, and they're sharing stories, right, about what Jesus had done in their life, the experiences and encounters that they had with Jesus, and no doubt the central story is Lazarus.

And he's probably being overwhelmed with what happened when you died, what did you see?

What was your experience like?

Did you go to heaven?

Did you come back from heaven?

Were you not in heaven?

You know, imagine all the ways that he would have to kind of retell his story for others who didn't hear it that first time and answer the same question probably over and over.

Have you ever been in a situation like that, right?

And I'm sure Lazarus, in some ways, is just beaming and being the central focus, sitting next to the truly honored guest, Jesus, with him.

It was in the midst of this setting that Mary, Lazarus' other sister, came walking into the room holding this alabaster jar of pure Spikenard oil.

Now, she approaches Jesus as he's still reclining at the table.

She breaks open the flask and begins to anoint Jesus' body, starting at his head, flowing all the way down to his feet.

Now, to anoint a dinner guest at a party like this would not have been shocking or uncustomary to those at the dinner party.

In fact, in Luke's account of a similar story, Jesus rebukes the dinner host for not anointing his head as he came into his home.

But it was custom to anoint the heads of your guests to show honor to them, to declare them welcomed in your home.

So the act itself wasn't necessarily shocking.

What was the shocking to those witnessing this was the volume and costliness of the anointing.

Now, John tells us that Mary had a pound of pure spikenard perfumed oil.

For us, we don't really comprehend how much that is.

It's about the size of an aluminum soda can.

So an aluminum soda can is about 12 ounces, right?

This was close to that.

So if you can imagine something that can hold that much volume, full of this costly oil, and Mary breaks off the neck of the jar and pours it all out on Jesus.

All of it.

Now, the perfume oil inside was extremely costly.

It had to be imported.

It wasn't something that they could buy regionally or source regionally, it had to be imported from the Himalayan region, mostly from Nepal in Northeast India.

And the process to get this oil was extremely laborious and challenging.

You had to go on these mountainous terrains and you don't just pluck the leaf or the fruit off of the plant.

You have to get the root of the plant because it's actually the root that produces this essential oil.

And in the process of ripping this plant out on this mountainous terrain from its root, you have to break part of it back off and replant it so that it can continue to produce itself so that you have more and more supply.

And then you take the root, you have to distill it down so that that distillation process extracts this oil, and then you have to export it to all these surrounding regions so that people can actually purchase this and it makes it so costly.

The dark perfume was probably some precious heirloom that Mary had inherited, or maybe it was an extravagant gift given to her by someone who dearly loved her.

And she comes into that room and she pours it all out on Jesus.

And then she kneels down before his feet and she lowers the tresses of her hair and she begins to wipe off all the excess from his feet.

In this beautiful posture of humility, Mary lavishes costly worship on Jesus.

The one before her was the one that she adored and treasured, and we see it in this act of worship.

Now, in the gospel accounts, we're told that the cost of this oil was about 300 denarii.

Now, a denary was simply a common laborer's daily wage that you would pay to them.

So if you imagine someone who's like a farmhand or can do kind of just basic things that you would hire and what we would call pay minimum wage for, if you came in and worked a vineyard or you uh helped take care of a market shop or whatever it might be, you would hand that person a denary for their day's labor.

Now, I did the math on this.

This 12-ounce bottle of jar to be able to be worth the cost of 300 denarii means that it cost a common laborer's year's salary.

That's how much was in this 11-some ounce jar of oil.

For Ohio, our current uh minimum wage is$10.45 per hour.

So if you're just doing something it that about any other person can do without any special job skills required, uh you're gonna get$10.45 per hour.

Now, the value of that jar of oil in today's context would be$25,000.

$25,000.

And what does Mary do?

She believed that every drop of that oil was fitting to pour out on Jesus.

You see, for Mary, Jesus held the ultimate value in her life, and everything else fell abundantly short of measuring up to his worth.

In her heart, the jar of perfume being poured out was the only right and faithful response to his presence in that room.

John tells us that the whole house was actually filled with the aroma of Mary's worship.

You see, it was affecting the people around her.

They couldn't help but to be drawn into the act.

They were captivated by Mary's costly worship.

I believe that heartfelt worship of Jesus is never something that's simply private.

It's nothing that we hold back or keep for ourselves.

True, passionate, heartfelt worship of Jesus always spills out onto others.

The lavish, heartfelt, sacrificial, worshipful display of affection was for Jesus, but it blessed everybody in that room.

Yet there were, John tells us, and the other gospel writers tell us that there were some in that room who didn't share in Mary's affections.

All three gospel accounts tell us that there was a sense of indignation over the act.

But John, he's the only one who singles out Judas as the one who was vocally outraged at what Mary did.

Judas says in verse 5, Why was this ointment not sold for 300 denarii and given to the poor?

Now, at first glance, it seems that Judas' desire is altruistic, right?

To serve the poor, to not be greedy, but to be uh open-handed and generous to those who are in need.

John gives his commentary here, like he does in other parts of his gospel account, to the real motivations happening inside of Judas's heart.

He says in John 12, 6, he said this, being Judas, not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief.

And having charge of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.

You see, Judas didn't really have regard or concern for others.

Judas's virtue signaling was a distraction from his true heart's desires.

He was greedy, he was selfish.

John calls him a thief.

This is his personhood.

Then Jesus, I love what he does here as Lazarus is working to steal something away in that moment.

Jesus comes to the protection of Mary.

In verse 7, Jesus says, Leave her alone, so that she may keep it for the day of my burial.

For the poor you always have with you, but you do not always have me.

Now, there's a couple things nested within what side and inside of what Jesus is saying that we need to work through.

I believe that the first is the protection of Mary and her worship.

Jesus stands up for Mary.

Right?

And he validates this costly act of worship with the command to leave her alone.

Jesus doesn't start to side with Judas in this moment.

Well, maybe that was too extravagant, maybe that was too costly, maybe you're right about this.

No, he validates everything that Mary's doing with this rebuke of Judas, who himself is working to rebuke the worship of Mary.

He then gives this reason for his defense so that, so that she may keep it for the day of my burial.

Now, as we approach this text, we have to ask ourselves, what is the it that she's supposed to be keeping, right?

I don't believe it was the oil.

I don't think that's what Jesus was talking about.

Mary had poured out, she had broken the neck off of this alabaster jar.

She had poured it out all on Jesus.

She's lowered her hair in this uh uh act of reverence and humility, and she's wiping up the excess oil from his feet.

The contents of that jar is unredeemable.

You're not gonna be scraping this off of this stone and dirt floor and putting it back in as to keep it.

So, what was the it that Jesus was saying she needed to keep?

I would submit that it was her joy-filled heart of worship.

Let her keep that.

You see, Jesus was charging Judas to not allow his thieving heart to steal away Mary's worshipful one.

The thief Judas was working to take more than the market cost of the oil.

He was working to take away the cost of Mary's worship also.

Another thief would soon be coming to take away her worship, is what Jesus helps.

My burial is happening.

There's the thief of death who would come and take away Mary's joy and peace and worship and replace it with mourning, weeping, despair, and sorrow.

But in this moment, Jesus would not allow some petty thief to rob Mary of her costly worship.

And then Jesus says this for the poor you always have with you, but you do not always have me.

Now, Jesus wasn't dismissing the need for his followers to care for the poor within the city, the marginalized with inside their context.

He was identifying a more relevant reality.

The poor would always be there to care for and to minister to, but Jesus would soon be removed from them as his body would be put away in a tomb.

You see, there was something more urgenting, uh urgent happening that Jesus wanted to draw everyone at the feast's attention to.

His hour was drawing near.

Verse 9 through 11, as John wraps up this story, we read When the large crowd of Jews learned that Jesus was there, they came not only on account of him, but also to see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead.

So the chief priests made plans to put Lazarus to death as well, because on account of him, many of the Jews were going away and believing in Jesus.

So the fear of the Sanhedrin is being intensified.

Right?

We talked about last week the Sanhedrin being the 71 chief priests of Israel who executed all judicial affairs within the land.

And their fear is that all of these people will follow after Jesus, and Rome will have to come in their power and put it to death.

Well, now, because of Lazarus, many more are following.

They're coming to see this man who was raised from the dead.

They had feared that Jesus would continue to draw followers to himself, and this celebration is validating their angst.

Not only do they desire to kill Jesus, but they want to kill anyone else who stands as a threat.

And now Lazarus finds himself in their crosshairs.

His Lazarus, the most prominent and visible testimony to Jesus being the Messiah.

They continue to grasp for control in the midst of their fears, and their idolatry has driven them to sacrifice anything necessary to preserve what they treasure most.

But there was nothing that could stop the plan and purpose of God.

That was going to be accomplished through the self-sacrificial death and victorious resurrection of Jesus.

So as we come to the close of this dinner feast that John lays out for us, what I think we can draw out of it for ourselves today is this that cheap pursuits are thieves of costly worship.

Cheap pursuits are thieves of costly worship.

In this story, John gives us two contrasting characters to observe.

One being Mary, who held Jesus as the ultimate value in her life.

You see, nothing could compare to his worth.

And this moved Mary to costly worship, to pour out a lavish amount of oil to honor him and to make it known to all who were present that Jesus was intimately welcomed into her life.

Mary no doubt held Jesus as the true resurrection and the life, the one in whom all joy everlasting was known and obtained.

It wasn't absurd for her to empty that alabaster jar because her heart had been filled with the eternal life of Jesus' salvation.

You see, Mary emptied out her stuff because an infinitely greater treasure was in the room before her.

But on the other hand, we have Judas.

For Judas, Jesus did not hold the ultimate value in his heart.

Stuff held the ultimate value in the heart of Judas.

For Judas' greed drove him to thiever, and his pride would ultimately drive him to betrayal.

He wanted to pursue cheaper, lesser things that had no real life in them and no life-giving effect on others around him.

If we go back to the dinner scene, it was Mary's act of worship that filled the room with the aroma of what she had poured out on Jesus.

It was Judas's rebuke that was challenged by Jesus that fell dead to the floor.

It impacted no one.

You see, in his charge to leave her alone, Jesus halts all attempts that Judas had.

These sinful pursuits.

And so in that, Judas would leave the celebration frustrated.

With a heart that failed to hold Jesus' worth within it.

And where does he go?

Right after this dinner feast, Judas goes to the very ones who want to kill Jesus, to betray him, to hand over infinite treasure for a bag full of change.

You see, Judas's cheap pursuit was all for 30 pieces of silver.

That's it.

Now, we did the math on the expense of the jar of oil.

In today's context,$25,000 worth of goods poured out in worship to Jesus.

And today's market value, those 30 pieces of silver is worth$264.60.

That's it.

It's worth a couple hundred bucks.

You see, Judas' heart drove him to do this.

Ultimately, Judas's heart didn't correspond to the value and worth of Jesus.

That's why he was willing to settle for cheaper things.

That's what drove him.

That's why he was able and willing to exchange him for such a measly amount of change.

Ultimately, for Judas, this heart that didn't correspond to the worth of who Jesus is, it was suicide.

That was his end.

That's the end of every heart that does not correspond to the worth of Jesus.

It will follow after cheap pursuits until it succumbs to the tightening of the noose.

You see, there is no life in a heart like that.

There's only death.

It's a suicidal pursuit.

Mary's heart, Mary's heart corresponded to the worth of Jesus.

For Mary, that$25,000 bottle of perfume, it was unable to be compared to the worth of knowing and being known by Jesus.

Personally, I believe that Mary would have broken open jar after jar after jar after jar if she had the means to pour it all out on her Savior.

Her heart treasured him.

So in the end, there was nothing too costly to be poured out upon him.

Nothing too treasured to be held back.

You see, Judas's heart, it treasured stuff.

And in a heart like that, Jesus wasn't even worth a couple hundred dollars to this worship thief.

Church, often our hearts fail to correspond to the worth of Jesus.

I think we can be honest about that this morning, right?

We can be honest about the things that we try to pursue, the cheaper, lesser things that we chase after in this life, unwilling to pour them out upon Jesus in lavish worship.

Instead of pouring out our life at the feet of Jesus in costly worship, we find ourselves chasing after these lifeless pursuits.

We struggle to live in a worshipful response of his grace, his truth, his love and mercy for us.

We fail and struggle to live in a faithful response to his infinite worth.

Because if we are honest with ourselves, our hearts are often captured by the cheap luster of lesser things.

For us in this room this morning, I believe what we contend against is that we listen to the voice of Judas.

We listen to the voice of Judas, the voice that tells us to diminish our worship, to pull back because of the opinions and judgments of those around you.

Don't make yourself look like a fool.

Don't embarrass yourself in front of all these people.

But the sad twist on all of this is that the restraint of our worship impairs those very people from beholding the treasure of knowing and being known by Jesus.

What was the effect of Mary's lavish worship?

The whole room filled with the aroma.

People were drawn into the act of what she was doing.

And what was the response to Judas?

His rebuke fell dead to the floor.

It had no impact on the people around him.

What are we doing when we listen to the voice of Judas and we diminish and pull back our worship?

The sad state is we do it out of a heart that doesn't want to be perceived as a fool or a zealot or someone who's not honest about real life and real circumstances or whatever it may be.

But we're hindering those around us from being drawn into the oil that we're supposed to be pouring out in correspondence to his worth.

A life not lived in lavish worship is a life with no kingdom impact on the people around us.

Mary's worship filled the room.

Judas's rebuke fell dead to the floor.

Many of us, though, we also listen to the voice of Judas that tells us Jesus isn't worth it.

Jesus isn't worth that costly sacrifice.

He's not worth giving that up and handing it over to him.

You better hold tight to that.

And that's all of our fear, right?

All of us have something in our life that we're holding back from Jesus because there's some type of deep-seated fear that we haven't been able to be honest about or really wrestle with in community, that we're just not sure if handing this over in worship to him is going to be worth it.

Is it going to pay out?

You see, we often believe that our real treasure is found in our lifestyles, our bank accounts, our pride, our prominence with inside of culture.

That life is actually found in the pursuit of our own happiness, our own pleasure.

Maybe it's found in the success of our children or in our retirement plans that we're saving up for.

But let me tell you something.

That voice, Judas's voice, the voice of this world, it's striving to cause you to settle for infinitely lesser things.

Don't listen to it.

It wants everything from you and it will give you nothing in return.

When we look at the very first narrative of sin throughout Adam and Eve, into their children, Cain and Abel, we see that God warns Cain about sin's desire.

You see, you and I, we approach sin because we believe in its false promises to satisfy our desires.

Every person you've ever known in your life that has abandoned the church, their confession of faith, uh, their walk with Jesus for sin, the root of that in their heart is they did not believe Jesus was worth it.

That they, if they were going to be happy, if they were going to be satisfied, it would be discovered in pursuing this sin.

Because the sin whispered in their ear, I'll satisfy your desires if you come with me.

But God tells Cain what sin's desires are that its desire is for you, not for your good, for your destruction.

And it's crouching at the door waiting for you.

And so sin is the very thing that promises everything and gives nothing in return.

Only death, only destruction.

You see, church, what I'm pleading with you, what this story of Mary's worship is trying to give us this morning, is that Jesus is infinitely better.

He's infinitely better than any cheap pursuit of prosperity, of prominence, of wealth and success, of sin and satisfying of our flesh, of anything.

Jesus is infinitely better than stuff.

You see, there's no sacrifice of worship that we could offer that could ever begin to compare to the worth of Jesus.

We have to stop listening to the suicidal voice of death.

It does not want our good, it wants our life with nothing in return.

You see, this is the portrait that's given to us at the very end of Judas' life.

At the very end of Judas' life, he takes that bag of cheap change and he tosses all 30 coins onto the ground and he hangs himself in a tree.

That's what a life that chases after cheap pursuits ends in.

It's suicidal in its very nature.

And this is the irony of Judas' life.

The irony of Judas's life is that in the end, he was poured out as a sacrifice of worship.

But it wasn't worship to God, it wasn't worship to Jesus as the Messiah and reigning king of all creation.

It was worship and sacrifice to cheap pursuits.

And he was poured out every drop for them.

You see, Jesus is the only one who asks for our life by giving his own in return for it.

He's the only one who begs you to come and die and it's worth doing it.

Because you get his life in return.

Because the gospel hope for us is this that Jesus poured himself out as a costly offering of worship.

Jesus poured himself out as a costly offering of worship.

Church, we may fail to have our hearts correspond to the worth of Jesus.

We may fail to have our hearts be poured out as an offering of worship, but Jesus has triumphed in our place.

I would say that if you want to see what the image of costly worship looks like, we don't have to look any farther than the cross.

The cross is the ultimate visual reality of what costly worship looks like.

And Jesus, as he drew his final breath, the tip of a centurion spear broke open Jesus' heart, and blood and water poured forth.

Jesus' heart was emptied to the very last drop.

You see, his life was poured out in the sacrifice for our sin, so that our hearts could be poured out in an offering of lavish worship to his worth.

In the Old Testament sacrificial system, an offering of wine had to accompany every sacrifice.

And so if there's burnt offering for the atonement of sin of the people of Israel, it had to be finished by this wine offering poured out over top of it.

An offering was not complete until the drink offering was given, until wine was poured out upon the sacrifice for man's sin.

And the pouring out of Jesus' blood from his heart from the cross was the riches of wine to complete the atoning sacrifice in our place.

You see, Jesus' heart is the alabaster jar.

Broken and pouring forth a fragrant aroma that today fills the earth, drawing in those who are his.

For the lavish worship of his infinite worth.

We're equipped by heaven to worship Jesus in the way that he deserves.

Church, may we live as broken alabaster jars, pouring out everything in lavish worship to him, Jesus, our great treasure.

Let's pray.