Mary Anoints Jesus

Mary Anoints Jesus
John 12:9-11

9 Much [polus] people [ochlos] of [ek] the Jews [Ioudaios] therefore [oun] knew [ginosko] that [hoti] he was [esti] there [ekei] : and [kai] they came [erchomai] not [ou] for [dia] Jesus [Iesous] ' sake only [monon] , but [alla] that [hina] they might see [eido] Lazarus [Lazaros] also [kai] , whom [hos] he had raised [egeiro] from [ek] the dead [nekros] .
10 But [de] the chief priests [archiereus] consulted [bouleuo] that [hina] they might put [apokteino] Lazarus [Lazaros] also [kai] to death [apokteino] ;
11 Because [hoti] that by reason [dia] of him [autos] many [polus] of the Jews [Ioudaios] went away [hupago] , and [kai] believed [pisteuo] on [eis] Jesus [Iesous] . KJV-Interlinear

9 The great multitude therefore of the Jews learned that He was there; and they came, not for Jesus' sake only, but that they might also see Lazarus, whom He raised from the dead. 10 But the chief priests took counsel that they might put Lazarus to death also; 11 because on account of him many of the Jews were going away, and were believing in Jesus. NASB

The raising of the dead is just not the kind of thing you hear about everyday. And when someone who has died and then returned to life, lives nearby, and especially when they are so near Jerusalem which is becoming swollen over with people from all over the region, coming to celebrate the Passover, then it is difficult not to resist going and seeing the dead man raised and the one who did it.

Remember that there is a warrant out for the arrest of Jesus. So if anyone knows where He is .....?

It would seem that everyone knows where Jesus was, as well as Lazarus, and they have come from far and wide to see them both. For Jesus, it was to confirm their faith perhaps, or just out of curiosity. For Lazarus, then perhaps to get a little peek at what the other side is like. 'Did you speak with Moses, Adam, aunt Martha? Just what is Paradise like?' These questions and more are not unreasonable questions from the curious.

The Pharisees too, knew where Jesus was. They even knew where Lazarus was, where he lived and that he too was currently at the house of Simon. But did they call out the guard, call for the army, summon the police, send for the sheriff? No. They did none of these.

What did they do? They met in secret again. 'What do we do now? He is disrespectful of us. See how He flaunts Himself at the home of Simon. Sitting there eating and relaxing when He knows, Oh yes He knows, that we have a warrant out for His arrest ....! Well, I guess we'll just have to kill Lazarus as well. Meeting adjourned. What's for dinner.'

And so the brave chief priests sit in their private quarters conjuring up, in their minds, all manner of cruelties against Jesus and now against those He has healed.

One would think that if a man was raised from the dead, then God must have had something to do with it. Of course in our present day, we would just attribute it to some form of coma, or the use of new wonder drugs or something, but then ... He was dead for four days and rigor mortise had set in and decay was well along. Hummm. Even in our day, I do not know of anyone who has recovered from that condition.

Jealousy, envy, and hate consumed the chief priests. They cannot stand the popularity of Jesus. They cannot stand it that He has powers they think they should have. But they are cowards, they are clueless, they just want to get rid of this distraction so that the people will resume patronizing their temple store. After all in order to make the proper sacrifice one must have the proper sacrificial animal, duly blessed by an authorized temple priest. Do you think they had T-shirts back then?

The chief priests had their priorities all wrong obviously. You would think that in the face of such a tremendous miracle, that they would begin to wonder and even investigate the truth. Some did (see verse 42), but the powers that be rejected Jesus and all He stood for. And those who came to believe in Him feared the established church more than they feared God, who could crush the entire universe with a mere thought. So they did nothing.

And that is our lesson for the day. We all know the truth, but how many of us will come out of our shell and begin to really grow up in our spiritual life, and how many of us will listen and come to some sort of understanding but prefer to cling to our old way of life. We are comfortable and if challenged with something that we have come to believe it is much easier to continue with the status quo than to make the change to Gods will.

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