The third course we are having today is the salad. Let’s do our hair, put on some perfume, sit down and eat our salad… with a dash or two of olive oil.
For the life of me, I cannot imagine myself arriving at a party uninvited. To be the centre of attention, scares the living daylights out of me. Yet, there was a presumptuous woman who broke all the rules and crashed a party. I am taking you to the well-known story where Jesus was ‘anointed’ by a sinful woman, not the other way around. A woman who did not follow any protocol and who ignored all the rules - Mary Magdalene.
This story is stipulated in Luke 7:36-50. But before we go there, I want to ask you two important questions: DO YOU SEE? OR ARE YOU JUST LOOKING?
“When one of the Pharisees invited Jesus to have dinner with him, he went to the Pharisee’s house and reclined at the table. A woman in that town who lived a sinful life learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee’s house, so she came there with an alabaster jar of perfume. As she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them. When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is—that she is a sinner.” Jesus answered him, “Simon, I have something to tell you.”
“Tell me, teacher,” he said.
“Two people owed money to a certain moneylender. One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he forgave the debts of both. Now which of them will love him more?”
Simon replied, “I suppose the one who had the bigger debt forgiven.”
“You have judged correctly,” Jesus said.
Then he turned toward the woman and said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I came into your house. You did not give me any water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss, but this woman, from the time I entered, has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not put oil on my head, but she has poured perfume on my feet. Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—as her great love has shown. But whoever has been forgiven little loves little.”
Then Jesus said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.”
The other guests began to say among themselves, “Who is this who even forgives sins?”
Jesus said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.””
Simon saw Mary through his religious eyes, but Jesus saw her without any label and addressed her with compassion, kindness, forgiveness, and acceptance. Jesus’s last words are significant to all of us, whether we are a ‘religious Simon’ or a ‘sinful Mary’. No matter what others believed and said about her, her faith saved her. It saved her from being judged by the laws of religion. It saved her from being thrown out of the house – rejected. What could have been chaos, ended in peace and salvation.
Mary was objectified and judged by Simon – and rightly so, he thought. Simon’s pride did not see Mary’s humility. Don’t we all hang labels and tags around people’s necks? Common negative identity labels include:
sinner
divorcee
widow
not our type of people
loser
stupid
poor
ugly
criminal
addict
You can break free! Question your labels by asking:
Is this label currently true?
Was this label ever true?
Is this label actually negative? Or was I told it was negative?
Is this label serving me or harming me?
Who would and could I be without this label?
Labels may not only just become part of you, but it can also become you. The truth is that labels don’t have to run your life when you realize that you can move past them. Mary lived up to what was spoken over her life. Not only had she embraced an unmentionable sin for so long, but it had also become her identity – sinner, prostitute.
But Mary was tired and hungry enough to not worry about what others would say anymore. She had nothing to lose. Mary knew and believed that she was not welcome and that she will be rejected, but she didn’t care. She was hungry enough for Jesus – for ALL of Jesus. She was hungry enough to break the rules:
1. She entered the house of a Pharisee.
2. She wasted expensive perfume.
3. She uncovered her hair.
Women of God, to what lengths will you go to break free? Stop allowing the enemy to tell you who you are. SEE yourself. SEE others. Leave all pride. Don’t just look at and live up to your label.
YOU ARE INVITED! Jesus says COME! Now all you must do is GO!
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