The Gospel of John

In the Name of the Poor

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Conversations, Panels and Sermons

Lesson: 39- 70

Genre:

Track: 039

Dictation Name: RR197W41

Location/Venue:

Year:

Let us worship God. Serve the Lord with gladness, come before His presence with singing, enter into His gates with thanksgiving and into His courts with praise. Be thankful unto Him and bless His name for the Lord is good. His mercy is everlasting and His truth endureth unto all generations. Let us pray.

Almighty God our heavenly Father, we thank Thee that Thou who art greater than heaven and earth, infinite, omnipotent, all wise, unfathomable in Thy majesty art still content to dwell with him who is of a humble and a contrite spirit. We thank Thee that Thou art ever with us, closer to us than we are to ourselves. Lift up our hearts, encourage us day by day that we may serve Thee, that we may ever know that Thy mercies may never fail, that Thou art more mindful of us than we can ever be of ourselves. How great Thou art oh Lord and we praise Thee. In Christ’s name, Amen.

Our scripture this morning is John 12:1-8. John 12:1-8 and our subject: In the Name of the Poor.

“Then Jesus six days before the passover came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, which had been dead, whom he raised from the dead.

2 There they made him a supper; and Martha served: but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with him.

3 Then took Mary a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped his feet with her hair: and the house was filled with the odour of the ointment.

4 Then saith one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, which should betray him,

5 Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor?

6 This he said, not that he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and had the bag, and bare what was put therein.

7 Then said Jesus, Let her alone: against the day of my burying hath she kept this.

8 For the poor always ye have with you; but me ye have not always.”

This episode is often confused with a similar episode in Matthew 26:6-13 and Mark 14:3-9. In that account or those accounts a woman appeared with a costly ointment and poured it over Jesus’ head. The place was at the home of Simon the Leper an ex-leper apparently healed at some time by Jesus. The ointment was in an alabaster box and it was spikenard. In this instance at the home of Lazarus Mary used a pound of spikenard, very costly, to anoint not Jesus head but His feet. Matthew and Mark indicate that in the incident at Simon’s home several disciples protested the waste as they saw it. In the later episode at Lazarus’s home it is Judas who protests the waste. There are very substantial differences as well as marked similarities between these two incidents. Mary obviously knew of the earlier episode and was in gratitude reproducing it. This was just prior to Palm Sunday. Luke tells us that Simon was a Pharisee, the woman he describes as a sinner, she wept as she washed Jesus’ feet and anointed them. Simon felt that if Jesus were a prophet he would know the woman to be a sinner and therefore He would refuse to be touched by her. In Luke’s account the woman was pronounced forgiven and saved by Jesus. In John’s account it is very different, Mary is a saved woman and a friend. The group at Lazarus’ house sat or reclined at the table. The whole house was filled with the odor of the perfume, the cost of the perfume is described as three hundred pence which in our day of inflation might be closer to three hundred dollars but that still doesn’t help us to understand how valuable that perfume was. A pound of it. The three hundred pence was enough to support someone on a modest income for a year.

So it was very costly. Judas Iscariot objected to this act insisting as had others with him on the earlier occasion at Simon’s house why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence and given to the poor. He said this we are told because as treasurer for the group he was a thief. Over the centuries Judas’ comment has been echoed by very many peoples. In fact people who visit medieval churches and cathedrals often comment that they are indeed beautiful but no doubt the poor went hungry. The fact is that the congregations of those ancient cities, churches, were far more generous than our congregations of the second half of the twentieth century. Over and over again believers who have given generously to build God’s house have also been generous in charity and in missionary activities. So that the idea that in honoring Jesus with His ointment or building great churches the poor are not thought of is not true. Those who give generously usually give generously for all of God’s causes. Our Lord rebukes Judas at once. Let her alone, against the day of my burying hath she kept this. For the poor always ye have with you but me ye have not always. This is our Lord says an advance anointing for the day of my burial. Apparently Mary had also used partly of the spikenard, only part of the spikenard, and reserved the rest for Jesus’ forthcoming death and burial. In Matthew 26:6 the word used by the disciples to describe the anointing of Jesus’ head by the costly spikenard was waste. The word used in the Greek text is ‘apoleia’ which means not only waste but also perdition.

It was Judas who was later described by our Lord as the son of perdition. To regard anything that honored Jesus Christ as waste or perdition, to bring out the full force of the word, is indeed evidence of something very wrong. In John 13:29 we see in passing that Jesus was regularly given to caring for the poor. So that when Jesus at the last supper dismissed Judas and said that which thou hast do, do it, the other disciples assumed that Jesus commanded Judas to go out and care for the poor on some project known only to the two of them. This incident has a close relationship to the raising of Lazarus. Both episodes have death in focus. Lazarus died and Jesus raised him from the dead, it was known generally that the religious leaders were preparing to arrest and execute Jesus. For resurrecting Lazarus from the dead Jesus had to die. They even discussed executing Lazarus, after all it was a bit disturbing to have someone alive and well who had been dead four days and buried. Anointing the feet was at the least unusual, wiping the feet with hair, the feet may have been freshly washed and almost certainly were as was the custom, was unseemly because woman did not loose their hair in public. The whole attitude of Mary was one of humility as well as a full awareness of what was being plotted against Jesus. Of the woman who washed His feet in Simon’s house our Lord said that she would be remembered for her action to the end of time, here Mary is named and there is no need to speak of her being remembered because her closeness to Lazarus as well as Jesus made her unforgettable.

Some scholars believe that the supper may have included more than Lazarus, Jesus and the disciples since we are not told who made Him a supper. This is possible but it is not important. What does stand out is that Jesus normally being very mindful of the poor says plainly the poor ye have always with you but me ye have not always. The bible very strongly stresses charity, it created an office exclusively for the care of human needs, the office of deacon. About a hundred and fifty years ago an English scholar, Dean Stanley, called attention to the fact that the office of deacon was becoming less and less important and was really of not much consequence and yet he said over the centuries the most important single office in the Christian church has been the office of deacon. It has been the great arm of the church in witnessing to the fact that Christ through His kingdom is concerned about human needs. Now it is a virtually forgotten office. Jesus tells them the poor you have always with you but me you have not always. What this means is that while scripture from beginning to end stresses charity very strongly it does not permit a man centered perspective. The priority of God the Son to the poor is very bluntly stated. Apart from being a thief Judas was man-centered in his perspective. He saw the use of the spikenard as a waste, as perdition, and humanists in our time view all Christian worship and action as perdition, as contrary to human welfare.

Yet it is ironic Judas was a thief and our modern sources of charity, the statist agencies are thieves also. One of our number not with us this morning who lost his mother not too long ago was billed for her care in a preposterous way. A small can of baby food also used to build up strength with very sick people which costs at most a dollar and twenty five cents at a drug store was billed to him for three hundred and seventy one dollars a can, three hundred and seventy one and they certainly got it wholesale which would mean not much more than seventy cents apiece. Now that’s stealing from you, from the taxpayer, from everyone, that is modern charity via the state! Welfarism inducted by the son of perdition in our Lord’s day. What came into focus at the supper in Bethany as before in the house of Simon the Leper was a conflict between two alien faiths, what is more important, God’s requirements or human need. If priority is given to the poor it must be denied to the kingdom of God. And if it is denied to the kingdom of God, what will prevail, man’s nature and you will bill a little can that costs not much for three hundred and seventy one dollars. And this is done routinely from coast to coast. Several years ago a book was published about investigations about this type of billing all over the United States. What did it accomplish? No sooner was it concluded and a few hospitals punished then it resumed again.

John tells us that to give priority to the poor is a pretext for theft in too many cases. In our century we see the systematic looting of the public treasuries in the name of the poor, in the name of the earth and other like reasons. Our Lord here more deeply concerned for the poor than any of us can ever be all the same said that there was to be a priority, He is the king, and His word and His requirements must have priority over us. Let us pray.

Our Father, keep us from false priorities lest we become like Judas and so many others sons of perdition. Having a wrong calculation of what is waste, perdition, in life. Teach us always to make the Lord and His law word our priority so that with all our heart, mind and being we may serve Him as we ought. Grant us this we beseech Thee in Christ’s name, Amen.

Are there any questions now about our lesson? IT is important to note the place that John gives this in his apostle, in his gospel, shortly before the triumphant entry into Jerusalem and the Last Supper and the events of Passion Week. It is because John who stresses the things of this life so much, he does not permit us to become too spiritually minded so that we are of no earthly good.

He cites as the first miracle the turning of water into wine that God is concerned not only with the fulfillment of our needs but the fulfillments of our joys. In light of this this episode tells us that we are not to be too much focused on human need forgetting God’s priorities. Next week we will continue with the march into Jerusalem, the king’s march, which openly brought into focus the rival claims, that of the leaders religiously who felt they were the arbiters who with God incarnate who said I am the way, the truth and the light and who said that there was no other way of salvation because He is the way, the truth and the life. Yes?

[Unintelligible Question]

[Rushdoony] Yes because of course the real enemies, the total enemies, are the Sadducees and the Pharisees. It warped things a bit but it does help us to understand them, the Sadducees could be called possibly the modernists of their day and the Pharisees the fundamentalists, the orthodox. But these people felt that God had to conform to them, not they to God because it was obvious by this time that Jesus was God Incarnate. There was no mistaking it, again and again He had set it forth very clearly, very bluntly. His miracles were also parables in life of what He was.

So when He said I am the resurrection and the life He was not mouthing words, He was the one who could make the dead come back. So we have church officials of the day and an official, the only one with a post in the circle of the disciples, all involved in the execution of Jesus. So you are right of course, it calls attention to the conflict between ecclesiastical authority and the living God. This is something that has occurred again and again, yes?

[Unintelligible Question]

[Rushdoony] Does it what?

[Unintelligible Question]

[Rushdoony] Oh yes most emphatically. Because liberation theology says that there can be no saving a man until you have first ministered to his economic needs. So any attempt to preach or to teach the poor until you have made them economically prosperous is really sinful. So liberation theology is really Marxism and I have read a number of the liberation theologians, they are very intense and passionate people, very self-righteous, and they feel that salvation begins with economic reconditioning of everything.

Well if there are no further comments or questions let us conclude with prayer.

Our Father we give thanks unto Thee that Jesus Christ has come. That He has set forth the way of man as perdition, that He has declared the priority of His kingdom, His justice, seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. Oh Lord God open the eyes and ears of the church that they may see and hear. And now go in peace, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost, bless you and keep you, guide and protect you, this day and always, Amen.