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Scripture Reading: Mark 14:1-11
In 13:1—14:42 the Lord Jesus is preparing the disciples for His death. In Mark 13:1-37 He prepares them by telling them the things to come. Then in Mark 14:1-11 He prepares them by enjoying their love, while His opposers conspire to kill Him, and one of His disciples plots to betray Him. In Mark 14:12-26 the Lord prepares the disciples by instituting His supper that they may remember Him and finally by warning them of their stumbling and charging them to watch and pray (Mark 14:27-42). In this message we shall consider the preparation carried out in Mark 14:1-11.
In 14:1-11 three matters are merged: the opposers’ conspiracy to kill the Slave-Savior, the Lord’s enjoyment of His followers’ love, and Judas’ plot to betray Him. While “the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to seize Him by craftiness and kill Him” (v. 1), the Lord’s followers were showing their love for Him. Simultaneously, Judas Iscariot, “one of the twelve, went off to the chief priests that he might deliver Him up to them” (v. 10).
Mark 14:1 speaks of “the Passover and the feast of Unleavened Bread after two days.” Although the chief priests and the scribes wanted to kill the Lord Jesus, they said, “Not at the feast, lest there be an uproar of the people” (v. 2). Eventually, under God’s sovereignty, they did kill the Lord Jesus at the feast (Matt. 27:15) for the fulfillment of the type.
The Passover was a type of Christ (1 Cor. 5:7). Christ is the Lamb of God that God may pass over us, the sinners, as portrayed in typology by the Passover in Exo. 12. Hence, it was necessary for Christ as the Passover Lamb to be killed on the day of the Passover for its fulfillment.
According to the type, the Passover Lamb had to be examined for blemishes during the four days preceding the feast of the Passover (Exo. 12:3-6). Before His crucifixion, Christ came to Jerusalem the last time, six days before the Passover (John 12:1), and was examined by the Jewish leaders. There was no blemish found in Him, and He was proved to be perfect and qualified to be the Passover Lamb for us.
Mark 14:3 says that Christ was in Bethany “in the house of Simon the leper.” Outside of Christ, it was not possible for anyone to find God. This One had left the temple. He had condemned the temple to be destroyed. However, the disciples were still occupied with their religious concept of the temple. According to their understanding, God was in the temple, for it was His house. I doubt that the disciples realized that God had left that house when the Lord Jesus walked out of the temple in chapter thirteen. Since Christ Jesus is God, when He left the condemned temple and forsook it, God forsook it as well. Going to the Mount of Olives with some of His disciples, He prophesied to them that the temple they admired would be destroyed. Furthermore, that temple would be replaced by Christ Himself.
In chapter fourteen we see that after leaving the temple, the Lord came to a house of a cleansed leper in Bethany. A leper signifies a sinner. Simon, as a leper, must have been healed by the Lord. Being grateful to the Lord and loving Him, he spread a feast in his house for the Lord and His disciples in order to enjoy His presence. A saved sinner would always do this.
Today God’s house is with cleansed lepers. As believers in Christ, we all are cleansed lepers represented by Simon.
Simon loved the Lord Jesus and prepared a feast for Him. “When He was in Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as He reclined at table, a woman came having an alabaster flask of ointment, of pure nard, very costly; and breaking the alabaster flask, she poured it over His head” (v. 3). This woman truly loved the Lord. God’s house, the church, is composed of those who love Him. His house is composed of cleansed lepers and those who anoint Him.
The house of Simon in Bethany is a miniature of the church life. According to this miniature, the church life is composed of cleansed lepers who love the Lord Jesus. Those who love Him, as did Simon and as did the woman who anointed Him, take Him as their full replacement. In their heart there is no room for the temple. They would not even be distracted by caring for the poor (v. 5).
Some who were present “were indignant among themselves, saying, Why has this waste of the ointment been made? For this ointment could have been sold for over three hundred denarii and given to the poor; and they were scolding her” (vv. 4-5). Those who were indignant regarded the woman’s love offering to the Lord a waste. Throughout the past nineteen centuries, thousands of precious lives, heart treasures, high positions, and golden futures have been “wasted” upon the Lord Jesus. To those who love Him in such a way, He is altogether lovely and worthy of their offering. What they have poured upon Him is not a waste, but a fragrant testimony of His sweetness.
According to verses 6 and 7, the Lord Jesus said to those who were scolding the woman, “Let her alone; why are you causing her trouble? She has wrought a good work upon Me. For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you want you can do them good; but you do not always have Me.” The Lord’s word, “You do not always have Me,” indicates that we must love the Lord and seize the opportunity to love Him.
Today many Christians care more for works of charity than for Christ. A charitable concern for the poor often replaces Christ. But in Mark 14 the Lord Jesus would not allow the concern for the poor to be a replacement of Himself. Here it seems that He does not care for the poor, but cares only for Himself. He seems to be saying, “Do not trouble this one who loves Me. She has done a good work on Me. If you want to take care of the poor, wait for another time and go to another place. The poor are always with you. But this is the unique time for you to take Me as your replacement and to pour out everything upon Me.”
In verse 8 the Lord went on to say, “She has done what she could; she anointed My body beforehand for the burial.” She anticipated the need, or took occasion, to anoint the Lord’s body for burial. This indicates that she received the revelation of the Lord’s death by the Lord’s words. Hence, she seized the opportunity to pour the best she had upon the Lord. To love the Lord with our best requires a revelation concerning Him.
In verse 9 the Lord continues, “And truly I tell you, wherever the gospel is preached in the whole world, that also which she did shall be spoken of for a memorial of her.” In the foregoing verse the Lord referred to His burial. The word “burial” implies His death and resurrection for our redemption. Hence, the gospel in verse 9 should refer to the gospel of Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection (1 Cor. 15:1-4).
The story of the gospel is that the Lord loved us, and the story of the woman who anointed the Lord is that she loved Him. We must preach both — the Lord loving us and our loving the Lord. One is for our salvation, and the other is for our consecration.
In foregoing messages we have seen that when the Lord Jesus was on the Mount of Olives with four of His disciples, He spoke to them concerning the beginning of birth pangs (13:8). These birth pangs are for the delivery of the new man, a delivery that involves a long process. How can this man be delivered, be brought forth? We have seen that the new man can be brought forth only through the death and resurrection of Christ. Through His death and resurrection He becomes everything in the new man.
After the Lord spoke to His disciples concerning things to come, especially concerning the birth pangs, he entered into Simon’s home in Bethany, where a feast had been prepared for Him. While He was feasting, a woman who loved Him poured out the best thing she had upon Him. This indicates that He was everything to her. The Lord said that this woman had done what she could, anointing His body beforehand for burial.
What the Lord says in verse 8 is crucial, for it indicates that this woman had certainly received the Lord’s word concerning His death and resurrection. I do not believe that Peter received this word, but she received it. She knew that the One she loved would soon be killed and that she would not have another opportunity to anoint Him. Therefore, while He was still present, she seized the opportunity to pour out her ointment upon Him. In doing this, she anointed Him for His burial.
No doubt, this woman had been brought into the death of Christ. Burial, of course, is between death and resurrection. She poured out her best upon the Lord as her all-inclusive replacement, and she did this for His burial. This means that she took His death in order to have the full enjoyment of Him.
If we had only the Gospel of Mark, we would not be able to have an adequate understanding of what it means to be brought into the death and resurrection of Christ. In Acts and in Paul’s Epistles we see the development of this matter. When we are in Christ’s death and resurrection, we can enjoy Him to the uttermost. We can be like the woman in Mark 14, who entered into the Lord’s death and resurrection and thereby enjoyed Him as her full replacement. Within her there was no ground for anything or anyone other than the Lord. Within her there was no room for Moses or Elijah or the temple, and there was no ground for herself. She had been replaced by this lovable One.
This woman had been fully prepared to take the Lord as her replacement. She had passed through all the steps of the process with the Lord. Whereas we may say that Peter was somewhat coarse, she was thorough and fine. For this reason, she was certainly brought into the Lord’s death. She realized that the Lord would be put to death. But this thought concerning the Lord’s death did not get into Peter. Because she took in the Lord’s word regarding His death, she also seized the opportunity to anoint Him for burial. By this one step she took the Lord’s death and was working for His burial. This was the good work she did upon Him. Then a few days later she was among those who entered into the Lord’s resurrection. Hence, she was a forerunner, one of the first to enjoy the resurrected Christ. By means of the Lord’s preparation, she entered into His death and resurrection.
We have seen that in chapter thirteen the Lord was preparing His disciples for His death. He continued this preparation in chapter fourteen. The Lord’s preparation began with His unveiling to the disciples how God’s economy will produce a new man. The birth of this new man requires the suffering of birth pangs.
In Mark 14 the Lord continued to prepare the disciples by enjoying their love. Entering into a home composed of cleansed lepers, He enjoyed the feast and also the anointing. The feast was a matter of inner satisfaction, and the anointing was a matter of pouring out upon the Lord something with a sweet savor. Therefore, in Simon’s house in Bethany the Lord was both satisfied and anointed. He was anointed not by God, but by one of those who loved Him.
In Simon’s home in Bethany, the Lord was the replacement for everything. Those who loved Him did not have anything or anyone apart from Him within them or around them. They had only this wonderful Person, who was everything to them.
We have pointed out that in 14:1-11 we have a miniature of the church life. In particular, we have a miniature of the experience of taking Christ as the all-inclusive replacement. Therefore, in the church life as depicted by this miniature, we have Christ as our replacement. We in the church life are lepers who have been cleansed by Him, and in our hearts there is room only for Him. Within us, around us, and with us there is nothing but the Lord. We take Him as everything through His death and resurrection.
At the beginning of this message we pointed out that in 14:1-11 we have the merging of the conspiracy of the opposers, the love of the Lord’s followers, and the plot of Judas to betray Him. Concerning Judas’ plot, 14:10 and 11 say, “And Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went off to the chief priests that he might deliver Him up to them. And hearing this, they rejoiced and promised to give him money. And he sought how he might opportunely deliver Him up.” The money promised to Judas was thirty pieces of silver (Matt. 26:15), the value of a slave (Exo. 21:32). While one of the Slave-Savior’s followers expressed her love to Him to the uttermost, another was about to betray Him. One treasured Him, and at the same time another was preparing to deliver Him up.
