SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/9/2016 10:40 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-2 The Humble Sacrifice of Mary
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 12:3
Message of the verse: “3 Mary then took a pound of very costly
perfume of pure nard, and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped His feet with
her hair; and the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.”
Let us look
at the perfume that she used to put on Jesus.
In the first place a pound during that day was twelve ounces as measured
in our day. MacArthur writes that “Nard
was a fragrant oil extracted from the root and spike (hence the translation ‘spikenard’
in some English versions) of a plant native to the mountains of northern
India. Perfume made from nard was very
costly because of the great distance from which it had to be imported. Mary’s nard was pure in quality, making it
even more valuable. Some were thinking
it was worth ‘over three hundred denarii’ (Mark 14:5), and Judas agreed with that
valuation (John 12:5). As noted in the
discussion of verse 5 below, such an amount would be equal to a year’s
wages. The expensive alabaster vial in
which it was stored also added to its value (Matt. 26:7). She broke the vial (Mark 14:3) thus giving up
the whole thing—both contents and container.
The perfume likely made up a sizeable portion of Mary’s net worth. But like David (2 Sam. 24:24), she refused to
offer the Lord something that cost her nothing.
She acted in unrestrained love.”
We have
already mentioned that Mary poured the perfume on most of the body of Jesus as
we compared John’s gospel with Matthew and Mark, and we also spoke of having
Mary undo her hair which certainly was taboo in Jewish culture, and not we want
to point out that not only did she undo her hair, but used her hair to wash the
feet of Jesus. We will also see later on
that Jesus would was the feet of the disciples before He went to the cross. The point here is that washing the feet of someone
was usually done by the lowest of slaves.
When Paul writes in some of his letters that he was a slave of Christ
that is the job that he is talking of as he will do whatever the Lord wants Him
to do. We see John the Baptist had this
same attitude “It is He who comes after me, the thong of whose sandal I am not
worthy to untie’ (John 1:27).”
Now as we
look at this story, a story that many of us have read and heard many times we
may not have understood that in the eyes of many of the guests that were there
or would hear about this that is was a shameful thing in their eyes of what
Mary did, but that was not the concern for Mary, she did this out of her great
love for the Lord, and I believe that when we look at the other story of the
former harlot that her motivation was exactly the same as Mary’s.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: Last night I attended an event at our church
that has to do with stretching the members in our church in a verity of ways
including giving extra money to pay off the debt of our building. As part of a three person group of people who
will be praying for this event my prayer is that I will have the same attitude
that Mary had towards the Lord Jesus Christ, and that many more in our church will
also have that same attitude.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: Pray that God will give me
the attitude that Mary had in doing what she did for the Lord.
Memory verse for the week:
(Romans 6:8-10) “8 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we
shall also live with Him, 9 knowing that Christ, having been raised from the
dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him. 10 For the death that He died, He died to sin
once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.”
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “At Gibeon” (1 Kings 3:4-6).
Today’s Bible question:
Who sent her son away when his life was threatened by his brother?
Answer in our next SD.
9/9/2016 11:28 AM
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