Jesus and his disciples are on their way to Jerusalem for the Passover. When they come to Bethany, a few miles outside Jerusalem, they stop at the home of Jesus’ closest and dearest friends: two sisters, Mary and Martha, and their brother Lazarus. A dinner has been planned for him. Martha has prepared and served it.
As they are eating, reclining around a low table, talking, laughing, Mary does the most extraordinary thing: gets up, walks over to where Jesus is reclining, pours out a jar of very costly and very aromatic perfume over his feet, and then kneels down and wipes them with her hair.
Not everyone was happy with her but it was an extravagant, passionate, wasteful act of love, a holy waste , so to speak .
The history of humankind is the history of men and women who wasted themselves and were not afraid to do so. They wasted all out of the fullness of their hearts.
Dr. Willy L Mafuta, Ph.D, Th.D
Senior Pastor,
Hopewell United Methodist Church, Hopewell, NJ 08525