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Series: The Gospel of Mark
Speaker: Drew Zuehlke
Hope Community Church - Heights
For more resources or to learn more about Hope Heights, visit hopecc.com/heights.
A weekly message of Hope Community Church: Heights, located in Columbia Heights, MN.
Good morning, everybody. My name is Drew. I'm the pastor here at Hope Heights. Thrilled that you're here. We did have a great work day yesterday. It was just exciting to be in there. I think Emily said to me, someone said, I think Emily was like, it feels like you just got a house and you're like figuring it out and there's this excitement about what will be in this place. And there was. There will be less dust for sure than there was. So thank you, thank you for coming. And we're excited for one more of these this Sunday, and we're getting very close to our time in there. I don't know if the word heirloom might be too strong. Maybe I shouldn't have asked it in that strong of a word, but I have some stuff that I inherited or boxes that were dropped off at my house, that I guess you'd consider a family heirloom because of that. But I do have things that mean a lot to me because they came from Bailey's house. In fact, if you've been to our house, if you haven't, you should come over. Maybe not today. I'll ask Kelly, but you can come over for sure. We have a room that has a fish on the wall. And I did not catch that fish. I don't think I've ever caught a fish that big. But my grandma caught that fish. And it means a lot because the story behind it of where it came from and how she caught that fish and it was the biggest bass on my grandfather's wall. He had lots of taxidermied animals and fish in his cabin and he would love to like walk you around and tell you the stories of them and he would skip that fish and you'd say, what about the big bass though? And he'd go, well your grandma caught that. And so we loved that story because grandma always would yell from the kitchen like, tell them how I caught the biggest bass in the family. And she rarely would fish but she did it's great so i have that on my wall and it means so much because of where it came from because of the story behind it and i think if my house was on fire i don't know if i'd save that but it would be sad to lose that fish um, Lots of things like that in my life that have this story of the kind of the journey of how it got to my house. And then thinking of it on my grandparents' wall and how that got passed to me. Or at least I volunteered to take it. And it will mean something. I hope maybe that's something that one of my girls maybe would put someday somewhere in their garage or something. And say, that's my great grandma's fish she caught. She always caught the biggest bass in the family. There's these things that we carry through, and they have this real value to them. Sometimes actual value, right? Some of you might have listed jewelry or something. This is in our family, and now it's worth so much because it's really old. Today, we get to encounter something that is, in a sense, a family heirloom that has great value. And what's done with it shows, like illustrates, communicates the great value in the action. And so we have a story today in the book of Mark. And in that, in the center of that story is a person, a woman who we'll get to, we believe is primary. But she has a jar of this fragrance. They would call nard or spike nard. But I want to tell you how that got, how we think probably that got to her family. Because I think it holds this even more value. This type of fragrance would have been very common. And it actually comes from the root of a plant, a plant that would grow in the Himalayas. It probably was taken from India way before she ever had it in her hand. It's a plant that would have been dried and crushed, the roots of it. It would have been soaked in oil. Some of the process of this would be like months in order to get all the richness. All the scents from it. It said it had a very heavy, pungent, earthy, sweet, woody, spicy scent. It's a lot of words. It's a scent I think I would like. Earthy, sweet, woody scent. I love the idea of that scent. One person described it as the scent of a sweet animal i don't know what that means but that sounds awesome, and what would happen was there was people who would go these would grow not near where people lived and this plant would grow this beautiful flower and they would take it out of the ground and they would dry the roots and crush them and make this it took months to make this, oil that had this scent and it was like exciting and exotic and it's very special. And that would be taken in jars and traveled many, many miles and sold in little spots along the trail and maybe along the path or maybe towns. Sometimes a whole like wagon of those could be sold to maybe a merchant somewhere and that merchant would sell it to more people. And somehow one jar of this spikenard got into a family that then eventually lived in the town of Bethany, just outside of Jerusalem, sort of a, suburb of Jerusalem, a city just outside Jerusalem. And it entered into the house of Mary and Martha, we believe their dad, Simon, or relative. And. And it could have been there for a few generations. This is so valuable. In fact, people would buy these. A family would invest in one of these because it was worth so much money. They'd invest in it because it was essentially a nest egg. If something ever happens to the family or if they get in really hard times, they could always sell it. It's like an investment. It's like my grandpa's friend was really into buying gold. And he'd always tell me, Drew, you've got to buy gold because when the world ends, you're going to need gold. And I was like, I think I might need other stuff too, but that sounds great. So he would have like all this gold they had hidden in the woods in Northern Wisconsin. I would still wonder if it's like out there and someone's going to find it. Be like, this doesn't feed me. But it would have that value kind of. So you can think of it as it's so valuable. It had this wonderful aroma to it. It was probably a few generations in this family. And no, there's this jar that sat in this family home that that's like, that's the jar of spikenard that like someday we might use. We might get a little oil out of it. We might use it for some special things, but it's really special. This also would have been traveled all over and they would have used it for really special occasions. They believe this might have been the scent and the oil that's used to anoint kings. So before a king sits on his throne, the moment when they pray over him and they say, you're now the king. and it's like introduction to being the king. They would put some of this on the king. Also used in really other special moments, they would use it often at burials. And so this really valuable, special scent and oil would be used on someone before, often even just after they had died before they were buried. So it has this deep, rich meaning, kind of like the scent of it, this fragrance. This potent, strong, spicy, earthy feel, like there's a lot to this. And when this is used, it signifies something. And it might just be held because of its great value. It has all this cool stuff in this one item that we don't necessarily have always items like that. But this would have been something that this woman would have had in her family, that they were waiting for the right moment, for this special moment. And so this heirloom that we see. We're going to see used now in the book of Mark. We're going to enter now into the home in a moment in Bethany. We believe these two sisters and possibly their dad. We don't get all those, Mark doesn't give us those details. We kind of learn it from other places in scripture and just history, tradition, and church. We're about to enter into that as we enter into the book of Mark again in chapter 14. So if you have a Bible, if you have a Bible journal, we have some Bible, journaling books of Mark still if you want any. I think they're out on the tables if we still have some. I'd love for you to grab those, take lots of notes. But we are in chapter 14, and we are just entering this last part of Mark. This is essentially the introduction, the beginning. We're stepping out through the threshold into the story of the passion of Jesus, these series of moments that lead to his death and resurrection. The part of the story that we just were talking about here for a few weeks is of first importance. And so this takes place, if you're curious and you like to see a little map, Jerusalem is the city with the walls and the temple. Last week we were sitting on the Mount of Olives with Jesus and his disciples, and he was reminding us of how the temple will fall, and it will be rebuilt essentially in him. And then it's because Bethany is right there at the Mount of Olives. And now this is where they're staying. Jesus and his disciples are staying in Bethany with these friends while they celebrate this huge festival. One of the largest festivals the largest for the Jewish people as people come from all over to gather they say there's a wide range of reports up to 300,000 people, Down to 50,000, there's still a lot of people all gathered in this place in this time to celebrate the Passover, are here now, and we're going to be in this place. Now, two stories happened today. So I shared about the spike now. That's the part I'm really excited to get into in the middle. It's this Mark and Sandwich that we've been looking at where Mark tells these great narratives about Jesus' life. But he puts things together so you see the contrast. So you see. You often get like, he starts to tell something and he goes, let me tell you this other thing so that this thing will be even more significant. And so today he does that as he has done well. And so that is how I laid this out so you can see. He's going to tell a story of essentially the story we know of Judas taking money to betray Jesus. And in the middle of that story, he tells this other story. There's a reason he does this, so that this story has even richer significance as he shares the story of these two people. So I'm going to read the whole thing really quick. And then we're going to look first at the story of Judas and what happens. And then I think like if you're watching a movie and you get a story and then all of a sudden they like cut to someone's memory of something else that gives way more understanding of the story you're in. That's kind of how I feel when I'm reading this. But let me just read the whole thing first. This is Mark 14, 1 through 11 today. It was now two days before the Passover, the feast of unleavened bread. The chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to arrest him by stealth, Jesus, and kill him. For they said not during the feast lest there be an uproar from the people, And now we get this moment where we're going to go into the home with Jesus in this home in Bethany and then kind of come back to this story. And while he was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he was reclining at a table, a woman came with an alabaster flask of ointment, a pure nard, very costly, and she broke the flask and poured it over his head. There were some who said to themselves indignantly, why was this ointment wasted like that? This ointment could have been sold for more than 300 denarii and given to the poor. And they scolded her. Jesus said, leave her alone. Why do you trouble her? She has done a beautiful thing to me. For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you want, you can do good for them. But you will not always have me. She has done what she could, and she has anointed my body beforehand for burial. And truly I say to you, wherever the gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, What she has done will be told in her memory. We kind of get back to the other story. What about these people plotting to kill Jesus? Then Judas Iscariot, who was one of the twelve, went to the chief priests in order to betray him to them. And when they heard it, they were glad and promised to give him money. And he sought an opportunity to betray him. Two very different things happening here. Kind of the same things, but in very different ways, actually. Let's just first look at this one so we have some time to look into this moment with our spike narn. First, there were people at the Passover. Passover was this festival that celebrates. They come together to remember the Exodus, the essential foundational story for the Jewish people, a story when they were enslaved and captured and oppressed, and God freed them. In the night, they put blood on their doors, and death passed over them, and they could escape. It's the story they go back to over and over. It's the story that identifies them the most. And so they would get together from all over the place. People would come in and stay in every little town around the area. So Bethany would have been packed full of people, relatives, and friends who were staying there to celebrate the day, the four days they're going to celebrate this moment when God rescues his people. It's a beautiful thing. And so during that, there's so many people there. The chief priests have already mentioned this earlier in Mark, but they're like, we need to get rid of this Jesus guy. The tension has boiled over. There's so much anger. There's so much fear of him. There's all sorts of things going on. And they say, we got to find a way, and Mark tells us, not just any way, in a stealthy or some versions say a sly way, and we have to kill him. We can't just grab him and get rid of him because they know, Mark even quotes it, all these people are here. He's already been doing things in the temple. We already see people celebrating him and around him. If we did that, it would cause riots, which was a thing that happened during Passover. People would get kind of excited. You can imagine if that many people are gathered, there would be people who would also gather there with other agendas who'd want to stand up and get people excited about certain things. Certain groups of people might come who normally aren't very friendly and there would be riots or fighting that happens. And they said, we don't want this to rile the people up. They're also concerned in other areas of Scripture we hear just about their reputation. They want to make sure this happens. They don't look bad or lose any of the power or reputation they have. Pretty wild. These people are like, how do we get rid of this Jesus? And then we hear they find a way. One of Jesus' disciples, Judas, says, I will betray him to you. He'll point them out to him. Partly part of this process was they couldn't just arrest him publicly. So a stealthy way to do it would be to get one of his disciples in the night. We know that's going to happen in a garden. And he comes and kisses Jesus on the cheek and say, this is the one. Not because they couldn't recognize Jesus, because it probably was dark and hard. And also now you have a person who's very close to Jesus and can tell people who maybe don't even know him that well or haven't seen him. There's no social media to be like, oh, we've all seen him on there because he's going viral right now. They would have to help indicate it. So they're like, he'll help us. He'll be their inside guy. He'll help us find Jesus when there's the right time, when it's late at night, when we're in a garden, so there won't be like an uproar. And so he betrays them. So he says, I will take money. We hear in other Gospels, 30 pieces of silver. And I will turn him over to you. We don't know his motives here. We hear in other Gospels his motive might be greed or money. It could be also Jesus just went to the temple and flipped tables and called people robbers instead of worshipers. He might be. Judas would have been a zealot, which would have meant he would have wanted an overthrowing of the Roman people there. They shouldn't have power. And it might just be also in his mind, he goes, I came with you. I've been following you. We finally got here. We finally got to the temple. You finally approached these people and then you didn't overthrow them. You didn't start like a military revolution. This isn't the revolution I thought. I come from people who are like, we're ready to fight. My people, my family, my tribe within the Jewish people are ready to take over power again. I thought you're going to take over. This might have just bubbled up so much in him that I finally am here, it's Passover, and I'm with you, and you're not doing that. You're talking about this other kingdom and this other way to. To rescue people. I could see kind of all those things, right? Probably, maybe there's greed. It's not that much money. But he was also maybe frustrated with it. Maybe just, he has a moment too where he goes, this guy isn't who I thought he was. We don't know all the other conversations he's had with chief priests and religious leaders. We don't know all of Jesus' history, but he decides to betray. We hear very strong language here. It wasn't like he stumbled upon them. It wasn't like they had something over him and they blackmailed him. It isn't like a Jason Bourne movie necessarily where they gave him a potion and he, I guess that's Harry Potter, but it ejected him and now he has to do something for them, right? It says here, Mark makes it clear, he went to them. Judas goes, this is not the guy maybe I thought it was or I don't like how he's spending money or I would like some money. whatever it is, causes him to move towards them and take money to give Jesus over to them. This happens. If we just heard this story, heartbreaking. We know this may be part of the story if you've been around church. But we get this story in between that really adds a lot more depth to this story. In the midst of that happening, another thing happens where there's an exchange, that indicates another person's heart motive, different than Judas. This is a story that we see in Bethany with this family, the family of Simon the leper. Really important things to hear here that Mark, he says, so he wants us to know them. Mark is very short in how he writes. It's the shortest gospel, so it seems like his words all really matter. They're in Bethany. We know Bethany, the town, because in the book of John, which is the most connected to this story, Bethany is where Mary and Martha live. Bethany is where we have the story where Jesus goes and he's talking to Mary and Martha, and Martha's doing all the work to get the dinner ready, and he says, and Martha's sitting with him, and he says, come on, Martha, you can just sit down. This is the most important thing, is being here with me. That's the household, we're thinking. And Simon, we believe, is maybe their father or relative. And it's also really important, Simon was a leper. So Mark is just, I think he's reiterating, Jesus and his people went to places where there were lepers. He probably wasn't a leper anymore. Maybe Jesus even healed him. So it has this connection there. But they're sitting in a home of someone who others wouldn't even have come close to. Even if he was healed, it's like, but that's the leper family. We don't want to hang out the lepers. And so there's even a sweetness to this. There's hanging out not the high priest, but the lowest, the unwanted, the outsiders. And in this story, he calls that there's just a woman. We could guess maybe, this story is told in John, that they're at Simon's house and it's with Mary and Martha and it's Mary. Traditionally, even Mary Magdalene's been the one that's been told in this story. We think it probably is just Mary and Martha and Mary. There's lots of Marys, so you've got to keep them all separate. There's other stories of someone anointing Jesus, his feet. Those could have actually just been multiple stories. It wasn't that unusual to anoint a person when they came to your house. And so those could be different stories. That's where we get all, we don't want to get mixed up in this. What we want to do is do what Mark told us. So he tells us there's this woman. She takes this alabaster flask or this jar that would have had this ointment or oil kind of in it that has pure nard, this great spike nard that we all know about now. It's very costly. And what does she do with it? she walks to Jesus, she breaks the flask. So it's like, this is the one time we're going to use this. It's like she cashes out all of her spikenard in that moment. She doesn't just use a little bit of spikenard, she uses all of it, and she pours it on his head. That would be a weird thing to do. If you came to my house to look at my grandma's fish, and I was like, and I pour oil on your head, you'd probably leave, I would guess. Maybe not. I've never done it. I'll try it maybe here. But there's a reason she does this. It signifies a lot of things. And mostly, if you remember, this was a way people would anoint kings. To become crowned and also a way that they would anoint kings as they were buried. Now, we already got ahead because we read it already. Jesus indicates which one of those this is. She does this, breaks it over his head as she begins the passion of Jesus, begins the story of Jesus going to the cross and dying and being buried and rising from the dead. She starts the story for us and Mark, and Mark does in the way he lays this out, and saying this woman anoints his head, and then Jesus says, they get upset with him, and he says, she's doing this to prepare me for my burial. She has discovered in time with Jesus that he's the king who is moving towards his death, others in the room maybe seems like don't understand that she also has experienced if this is Mary and Martha that just before this in the book of John we get that right in order, their their brother Lazarus who's also a friend of the family who's one of Jesus's closest friends just died. And Jesus showed up and raised him from the dead. So you have to imagine in the moment you experience the death of your brother and you're crying and they cry out to Jesus, why would you let this happen? And then he cries with them and says, come back from the grave and Lazarus raises from the dead. Their family is like, Jesus forever is the story of their family. So when he comes in their house, she can't nod, go, of course you are who you've been saying you are. Of course you're the king who's about to go to the grave. I don't know if she totally understands, but I have to believe she's remembering in that moment the words Jesus said to her when she stood with him and her brother who was in the tomb, and he says, it's okay, I'm the resurrection. And then he raises him from the dead. So she goes, you are the resurrection. And so we don't know any of this. He gives us one sentence. But she has to be breaking that, anointing him, going, you're about to die. And I wonder if she looks him in the eye. She goes, but I remember, if anyone's not going to stay dead, it's you. She knows he's the resurrection. And in that moment, they have to be having a moment. And at the same time, we get this group of folks who are in there. Probably some of the disciples, other people who are there maybe for Passover. Maybe there's like a family, a friend, like brought a friend. And you're like, why is he here? And you're like, it's my friend's friend. And he's there. So there's like, who knows who's all there for Passover? But they are not happy with this. They don't go, look at this treasure we have of a king. Who's about to rescue us from death. Look at the resurrection who's sitting with us. Instead, they look at the spike night and go, do you understand the miles that had to come, the work that had to come, how much that cost? In fact, they say, do you realize this costs a whole year's wages? That's a whole year. You get paid about one denarii a day for work. And so that's about a year's worth of work. They said, this is my whole annual salary worth of stuff. And he just wasted it all on, we could have given that to the poor. We could have done something else with it. It was like, even if they go, that's cool you did that, but the whole thing. The word here that is used is a word that also is used when they talk about the noises that animals make when they're like upset. So like imagine like a, that's exactly how it sounds. My mom used to make this noise, she'd go, ugh, which we all knew was like, my mom's passive aggressive way to be like, I don't like what's happening. She wouldn't just say, guys, could you stop? She'd be like, ugh. Then we're like, are you okay, Bob? And she'd go, yeah, I'm fine. Ugh. We know you're not. They make a noise. Mark actually tells us a noise they make that's like, ugh. Why would you do this? She knows exactly what she's doing, right? It indicates even this is like heart posture. I think of this, there are times where I even feel like I have given, some of my spiked nard to her. I go, Lord, I'm going to give you this thing. Maybe it's actually monetarily valuable, maybe just part of my life, or I decide not to do something that could have really been valuable in the world's eyes for this other thing, or just even giving over your life in general. And then I have this moment where I switch between Mary and these people. And I go, was that silly? Why was I doing that? That could have been for this other thing. I could still do that. And maybe they have this, it's a very real thing that happens in us. And then Jesus corrects them. It's this beautiful moment. So she's standing there. She's probably got oils on her hands. The smell has to be so strong. Why would you spend it on me? What would you do with this? You could have sold it and we could have given the money to the poor, which is an honorable thing. I think we're actually called in Deuteronomy 15, there's a whole passage that says we have to give to the poor. We have to care for the poor. This is what God's people do because this is what God does. And then Jesus says something to them. He says, leave her alone. Why are you troubling her? And he says a really cool thing. She has done a beautiful thing to me. The word there is actually good works for me. She's done very good, beautiful works for her. I mean, he could have just said like, hey, stop. It's okay. Could have said nothing. But he actually doesn't just say the thing she did is okay. He says, this is a beautiful thing. And then he goes on to say, it's so beautiful that people are going to talk about this forever. All over the world. They're going to hear the story of what Mary just did. Because this is the story, the beginning of the story. of a thing that's gonna change the world forever. He does mention there, he says, you always have the poor with you and whatever you want, you can go for them. That's not him going like, hey, don't worry about the poor, I'm a big deal. It's actually him probably maybe quoting Deuteronomy 15. He's saying, the poor are here and it's good, but in this moment, what's important is she is showing you that a burial is about to happen. That's pretty important. We actually know the burial does happen. And actually, these women, again, again seen even culturally as lower, less than, and Mark raises them up in these to go like, these are the people who are seeing it and understanding who Jesus is. Later, the women actually go to anoint him in the tomb. If you remember this, that's when they go and it's empty and he's not there. And they get to run and tell everyone he's not there. They're going to anoint him. He was already anointed. It's a beautiful moment. She does a beautiful thing. He affirms her actions. And he also tells us the reason she's doing this is not to say you're special or you're great, but to say, I know you're about to be buried. And you wonder, does she know? And resurrected. Do you know who this guy is? He raised my brother from the dead. Death's not going to hold him. He's going to change everything. And it's a moment where, if you remember the words that were used, things were broken, things seemed to be wasted. They use the word wasted here, thrown away. And the things that seem broken and thrown away and wasted have become what Jesus calls beautiful things. It's the story of the gospel. Broken, wasted things actually become quite beautiful things. And it'll be remembered. There's three things for me that have really resonated from this. I've been thinking a lot about this week. And they actually are emphasizing, there's a lot of passages that share about this, about what it looks like to give, to be able to say the things that are so valuable, that hold so much space and weight for me can be given to Jesus because he's the greatest of treasures. There's parables. I want to share three of these moments that for me share a little bit, I think, of what Mary and Mark here is trying to help us understand. In a moment where we see two different people contrast, that a person who gives, to Jesus releases her most valuable things and even her household's valuable things to indicate this is our true treasure to someone who takes treasure and gives Jesus away. Sort of breaks him and wastes him. The difference in the heart there, the motivation there. First is a passage from Matthew. A passage from where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. An indication of what you're treasuring, where you put your value and your money and your time and your heart, is an indication of where your heart is, where your motivation is, where your loves are. Also where your hurt is and your pain is the thing that like is the center of who you are. So if you desire to be content and peaceful and joyful, that's your heart's desire, then the things you run after are things that you think are going to bring you contentment and peacefulness and joy. I think the thing that you just are thinking about and dwelling on and that you know will bring you hope, sometimes in Scripture we see these also just becoming kind of idols to us, things that we look to that will bring us the ultimate. And so where we spend our time and our things, where we break our jars of nard, is where we indicate our hope is in. In a not as intense thing, I think if my heart, like just great love of mine was the carnita tacos at Los Cactus, which are pretty good. If you haven't had them, you should check them out. We're not sponsored by them. That's just a free advertisement. If you get some carnitas and you get this creamy avocado sauce they have there, I don't know what that is. I think it's avocados and salsa. I've been trying to make it, but I cannot make it. Some chopped onions on a corn tortilla. My heart is there. If I go, that, I'm just having a day. I got to stop at Los Cactus. It's right on my way. It literally is on my way now from my house to our new building. So dangerous. I'm going to have to take a different route some days, I think. But if that is it, then I, in a way, my heart, I become Carnius Tacos with creamy avocado sauce and onions, which you kind of do, become the thing you have your heart of, the thing that I think will be my hope and rescue me. That object that I treasure so much becomes me and my heart. Augustine has, he says this in Confessions, it's one of the most famous Augustine things we hear. We were made for God and our hearts are restless until they rest in him. The problem with my carnitas is that I have them and they're kind of good. They're pretty, very good. But they, I'm not satisfied. And I go, I'm not actually at rest. Sometimes I'm actually less restful. I kind of don't feel awesome. But I think that's it. And Augustine reminds us, he goes, but you were made for God and your heart is going to be restless until you go, oh, you can have it all. You're the greatest thing. And so we have to ask ourselves, what do we treasure? What does that reveal about our heart? Or maybe where do we spend our spikenard, right? Secondly, we hear the same sentiment in Philippians 3. Indeed, I count everything. This is Paul sharing about Jesus in his life. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord. For his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ. He doesn't just go, this stuff is cool and Jesus is a little bit better. Or I like this stuff and maybe I can just get Jesus to hang out with my carnitas tacos. But he goes, it's not even close. You can't even put him in the same category. You can't use the same words to describe him. It's his surpassing worth. I can lose all these things because I have found my treasure. This also indicates in Philippians, and we see all the Scripture, that there's suffering involved in losing and gaining Christ. Especially right now, we forget that we're in a moment before Jesus comes and makes all things right. This isn't actually the end. Then there's going to be suffering. It's going to cost us. We might have desires, that we don't get to run after until Jesus makes us right one day. And go, I gotta lay that desire down to me. I just had this conversation with a friend who started dating someone and they're getting to know one another. And in their conversations, he mentioned that he was not gonna have sex until he got married. This is an adult man. And that was like a deal breaker for her. She could not believe that. What would ever cause you to set that aside? And he said, I told her Jesus is better, which didn't help. It was like, that's a weird answer. It's not, though. What's his answer? He goes, I think for me, my celibacy is because I'm laying down that desire that I'm told over and over is the thing that we all just get. It's part of life. Why would you not? Because I think God has a different way he wants me to handle that in my life. And so I'm willing to lay down that thing because Jesus is so much better. What a good answer, huh? Why do I make some choices I make in my life? Why do I interact with people in the way I do? Why do I spend my money in the way I do? And I will say, if someone asks me, I say, hey, just do it different. Really, it's because Jesus is better. What an opportunity, right? It might lose you some dates, but it's worth it. Worth it. Lastly, we hear actually a parable. This is one of the shortest parables in Scripture. I was remembering this parable. There's a longer story version of it, another gospel. But I love, in Matthew, it is just to the point. The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. A guy was in a field. He finds some treasure, covers it back up, because he's going to buy the whole field. And in his joy, you hear how it's described? In his joy, he goes and sells all that he has and he buys the field so that he can have the treasure that's in the field. That's it. This is what we saw. It's like Matthew's describing what we just saw in Bethany. As she takes that and she cracks it, not over his head, but cracks the jar and pours the oil, she's found the treasure. And she goes, I don't even care. You have whatever you want. You're the greatest treasure. And I want you to know I know you're king and you're about to go to the grave so that we all could be rescued. It's an opportunity in our suffering to know that we can give it to the one who will bring us ultimate treasure. This is all very hard to do. I would love it if we all just went, man, it's even hard to know sometimes. What does that mean? How do I give? Do you want me to give all of my money away now and live in my car? What's the command here? This isn't a new thing. It's been a forever thing in the church to go, what does it look like to know there's a cost and be able to say, I'm going to give to the one who I know is my great treasure. We hear this. Cyprian of Carthage was in a time, early church. He actually has some cool connections to his church, to our friends Athanasius and Augustine. But he wrote a commentary on the Lord's Prayer, of how to think about the Lord's Prayer to help people understand the Lord's Prayer. He's in Carthage, North Africa. But he has this line. This is him describing what thy will be done in the Lord's prayer means, he says. Prefer nothing whatever to Christ because he did not prefer anything to us. That's not language we always use, but he's saying Christ did not, come on a mission to do other things but to serve and rescue us and to adhere inseparably to his love, to stand by his cross bravely and faithfully. Because they're a treasure. The church at this time is experiencing persecution. People are actually being arrested and killed and hurt. If they say there's people, he's seeing in the church that they stand before people and say, are you a Christian? You need to know this could cost you everything. Like maybe death, but also it could just cost you your status, your money. You could actually be taken and enslaved by other people. If you say yes to Jesus, are you willing to take that cost? And they're seeing this happen, like, people gather people and say, is it worth it? And people say, no, I'll stop following Jesus. And he's seeing people say, yeah, it's all I got. It's all I got. And so he's standing before his church to say, friends, we have to say, is it worth it? And it is worth it. He's worth it. And why is he worth it? Because in the same way that there's a treasure in a field that we'd sell everything for, Jesus goes, there's my people, and I've got to give everything so that I can get them. He sees us as his treasure and is willing to give it all to get us back. So I want to tell you one more little history story before we end our time here. There was a person who was far, far away. I mean, it'd be like India far away. And decided to come, travel so far, down so many roads to dwell amongst his people. Our God came so far to be with people, to suffer with people, so that we could smell his aroma and be close to him, and experienced the joy of the great value of being with this treasured thing. And that person, like that jar, was broken. The word here, poured on his head, the spiked heart, is the same word we're going to hear real soon in Mark. But not about a fragrance. It's going to be about the blood of our God. Who was anointed, who was arrested, who was put on a cross, and he poured out his blood for us. He was broken and poured out so that we could be made whole. He treasures us in that way. We don't deserve that treasure. I'm not nearly worth as much as a nice jar of spikenard, right? Maybe half a jar, but not a whole jar. He sees us to the place that the Son of Man comes and rescues us. He's willing to say, I'll be broken and I'll be poured out so that you could have life. You could be once again brought back. Your sin would be atoned for. I think in that moment, Mary goes, this is the one. People are still missing it. He's the one. And is he the one for us? That's my question. I'm going to invite our worship team up to lead us in songs. And I want to ask you those just simple questions today. It's a day where I feel a lot of anxiety. There's things that weigh on me that are not valuable in like money sense, but they hold a lot of weight. Things I can't get out of my head. Broken things often. Things that cause anxiety and they hold to them. And today's the day I want to say, they're yours, Jesus. You can take these. Be my treasure. Take these. You can handle them. You can take control of them. You can comfort me in that. So I ask you today, have you taken joy in finding Jesus as your treasure? And what could possibly be more valuable than this? There's a few ways that we love to respond. We love to give because we've been given everything. So it's not hard to give. It can be hard, but we love to give. So we love if you want to respond in giving. It's one of the ways as followers of Jesus we do that. We respond in prayer. There's people who would love to pray for you in the back of the room here in a minute. They're going to have yellow lanyards on. We also are going to sing songs about this great king and how he's rescued us. And lastly, today I just want to take an extra moment in this. We're going to take communion. And so we do that every week here. Our whole service moves to a moment that we do this thing Jesus does. He's going to do this with his disciples in a few moments and Mark in a few weeks for us. And he's going to take bread and he's going to take wine and he's going to say, when you get together, I want you to do this so that you remember me. And so I want us just to take a moment to remember what you're about to do. You can go out in the hallways. there's crackers and there's juice out there and we do this to remember who Jesus is. But don't forget what he does. Because in Bethany, a long time ago, there's a woman that we still talk about, just like Jesus said. And she broke open her most valuable possession and poured it on Jesus. Some people called it a waste. Jesus called it beautiful. And today we get to come to a table with a cracker and some juice and remember that his body was broken. His blood was poured out so that we could have life. So I really want us to encourage us to not lose a moment that we could have here in worship. That as you hold the bread, the cracker, and the juice that we're reminded that whatever we're carrying with us, failure or doubt, whatever anxiety, or maybe what is actually we see is so valuable are nothing compared to him, and that we have an opportunity to go, Jesus, your body broken and blood poured out. It's worth more than this. We get to align our hearts. And so I want to remind you of, these are the words when I was a kid that was always spoken. And it said, as we gather, this is the bread of our Lord that was broken for you for the forgiveness of sins. And this is the blood that was poured out for you for the forgiveness of sins to make you whole again. So friends, I want us to come to the table today, not forget how good this is and that he is worth it. There's nothing, no treasure better than him. Let me pray for us as we move to a time of worship and communion. Lord, you are worth so much more than I could ever hold. You are a great treasure. I confess that we value so much more, so many things over you, and I today, Lord, want to give those to you. Whatever it is that I'm holding that is holding so much weight or value, You want to give and say, Lord, it's yours because you're the best. You're better. And make our hearts glad in that and joyful in that. Thank you, Lord, for the moment we get to share with Mary and her family. And I pray, Lord, you continue to turn our hearts and have hearts like Mary that would love you well. We pray this in your good name. Amen.