We are the Nard God’s Purchased at Great Cost

The politics of Christians ought to be unintelligible if God has not raised Jesus Christ from the dead.

This coming Sunday’s lectionary Gospel is John’s account of Mary anointing Jesus at Bethany. Here’s a reaction Bishop Will Willimon wrote to my sermon on the text for the Journal for Preachers.

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John 12.1-8

Thousands of us preachers receive encouragement from Jason Micheli’s podcast, Crackers and Grape Juice. Here’s my commentary on one of Jason’s Christ the King sermons. Take this as two preachers thinking together about the challenges of doing politics in the pulpit with Jesus.

— Will Willimon

For God’s sake, don’t lie.

Admit it. You think Judas is right.

You know that you’re not supposed to identify with Judas the traitor, the villain. Judas is the Judas, the bastard who turns around right after today’s text to rat out Jesus for thirty pieces of silver, which according to the prophet Zechariah was about a day’s wage. A day’s wage.

But be honest. If you saw a line item in our church operating budget for nard you’d be PO’d too. Nard was a perfume from the Himalayas. 300 denarii is what Judas guesses it would go for on the open market. 300 denarii was the rough equivalent to $45,000.00.

You think Judas is right on the money about the money. Considering the cost of nard, it would be better to rub Jesus down with some $5.99 Old Spice and give the remaining $44,990.00 for do-gooding.

And doing good is what it’s about, right?

Way to go, Jason. Lure them into the sermon by claiming their secret sympathy with Judas. Treat ‘em rough.

After all, Matthew’s account of this anointing occurs right after Jesus lays down every liberal Methodist’s favorite parable— clothing the naked, giving drink to the thirsty, feeding the hungry, welcoming the stranger, and visiting the prisoner. So who blames Judas for wanting to be reckoned a sheep rather than goat?

Matthew 25, favorite text (they think) of all Methodist do-gooders. Nice juxtaposition between Matthew and John. Move them from a text they think they know to consideration of a text they probably don’t know, allowing scripture to interpret scripture.

If we’re honest, it’s hard for us to see what Judas got wrong. Christians ought to be on the side of the poor. The world sees our inability to live up to Christ’s teachings about the poor and judges us accordingly. Isn’t Judas’ the better strategy for the Church to survive in a pagan nation like America? After all, Americans may not believe that Jesus is Lord but they at least believe we ought to help the poor. Serving the poor is a way for us as Christians to win friends and influence people.

Interesting link with the American church’s insecurity about our status in the culture. Why does the mainline church “helps the poor”? Because it’s the last socially acceptable thing the church has left to do.