This is a devotional with my thoughts added to verses from the Bible. I highly encourage you to dig into the word with your own thoughts. The Daily Devotion series is one way to do this. However, I know that sometimes we want to read other people’s ideas about Bible passages, so I am starting the Everyday series. I hope and pray that these posts will draw you nearer to Jesus.
DAY 1–Remember to pray before you begin.
Mark 14:3-9 Expensive perfume
While he was at Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper, as he sat at the table, a woman came having an alabaster jar of ointment of pure nard—very costly. She broke the jar, and poured it over his head. But there were some who were indignant among themselves, saying, “Why has this ointment been wasted? For this might have been sold for more than three hundred denarii, and given to the poor.” They grumbled against her. But Jesus said, “Leave her alone. Why do you trouble her? She has done a good work for me. For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you want to, you can do them good; but you will not always have me. She has done what she could. She has anointed my body beforehand for the burying. Most certainly I tell you, wherever this Good News may be preached throughout the whole world, that which this woman has done will also be spoken of for a memorial of her.”
Jesus was in Bethany. This was His home base when He was in the Jerusalem area. He was most likely staying with His friend Lazarus. In fact, other gospels tell us that Lazarus was there at the table with Jesus during this feast. When Mark tells the story, he focuses on the complaints of the disciples. John pinpoints Judas as the top complainer. Despite the difference in focus between the accounts, all of them agree that when everyone else was against the woman, Jesus defended her actions. We also have times when the world beats us down with criticism. We are not good enough, strong enough, holy enough, smart enough. We try to do what is right, yet it somehow turns out all wrong. It is in these times that we must turn to God for relief. Just as Jesus defended the sincere devotion of the giver of the nard, He will defend us. You do not have to worry about the world’s disapproval when you have Jesus’ smile to brighten your life.
We do not usually see situations as God views them. Others considered the woman’s actions as wasteful and frivolous, but Jesus thought her gift was beautiful. Many times, we see waste where God sees loveliness. We focus on outward actions, but God looks at the inward motivation. We often fixate on the wrong aspects of serving God, and sometimes it takes the outcast to open our eyes to the true blessings God is trying to bestow when we serve Him.
The scent of nard lasts a long time. This event took place shortly before the crucifixion (and people did not bathe every day back then). As Jesus hung on the cross, the smell of this woman’s love would have remained. She truly had anointed Him for burial, but He was able to be comforted by her gift before His death.
One last thought: The all-powerful God of the universe became a weak human. Not counting when Jesus was a child and His mother and Joseph took care of Him, there is only one other human who was able to voluntarily minister to God when He was weak. (Simon of Cyrene did not volunteer.) Only this woman had that privilege; only this woman was aware of Jesus’ necessity and able to serve when Jesus needed service. Only this woman chose to minister to God in His time of trouble.
DAY 2–Remember to pray before you begin.
Mark 14:10-16 Betrayal and Preparations
Judas Iscariot, who was one of the twelve, went away to the chief priests, that he might deliver him to them. They, when they heard it, were glad, and promised to give him money. He sought how he might conveniently deliver him. On the first day of unleavened bread, when they sacrificed the Passover, his disciples asked him, “Where do you want us to go and prepare that you may eat the Passover?” He sent two of his disciples, and said to them, “Go into the city, and there you will meet a man carrying a pitcher of water. Follow him, and wherever he enters in, tell the master of the house, ‘The Teacher says, “Where is the guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?”’ He will himself show you a large upper room furnished and ready. Get ready for us there.” His disciples went out, and came into the city, and found things as he had said to them, and they prepared the Passover.
Just like with the donkey for the triumphal entry, this situation shows the careful advanced preparations that Jesus had made for this final week of His ministry. Either He had secretly prearranged with someone for the use of a room for this last supper with His disciples, or the Spirit had been communicating instructions because the passage says that the room was already furnished and ready to go. Jesus must also have already planned the new symbol of the covenant that He would implement at this time. In this upper room, Jesus would change the Passover meal which symbolized release from slavery in Egypt into the symbols of His death which released us from slavery to sin and death. In many ways, Jesus was not changing the symbol at all but just expanding its meaning. He was taking one symbolic act from among the many that were a part of the Jewish traditional ceremonies and telling His disciples to keep this symbolic act even after the other traditions were left behind.
When the verses about Judas going to the high priests to betray Jesus and how he started looking for ways to accomplish this are taken into consideration, the secrecy that Jesus was employing makes perfect sense. He knew what was going on, so He made preparations for the Passover meal without even letting any of His disciples know the specific location. He could not warn them away from Judas and indeed He planned to have His turncoat disciple with Him at the Last Supper, so He could make one last appeal to Judas. Thus, He could not let Judas have a chance to interrupt this final meeting with His disciples. Jesus was planning a farewell meal with last-minute instructions and a new covenant symbol, so He needed the location to be secret and secure from the Jewish leaders. Jesus limited the information that could get back to the high priests by sending only two of His disciples into town and keeping the rest with Himself. Thus, any watchers would remain focused on Jesus. According to Luke, those two disciples were Peter and John. “So Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, ‘Go and make preparations for us to eat the Passover meal’” (Luke 22:8).
There are many times when we feel that the role that Jesus has given us is unimportant, and we do not understand how our actions fit within the overall scheme of God’s plans. Just as Peter and John would have thought that they were simply performing the role of servants when they could be where the action was with their Master, so we often believe that God has sidelined us and that the actions that we are performing are mundane and irrelevant to God’s plans. Peter and John did not see that they were chosen because of the trust that Jesus had in them. In the same way, we do not see Jesus enlisting us to fill certain positions because He trusts us to take care of them for Him. We should view every situation that Jesus places us in as a task of importance to His plans that we are uniquely qualified to fill. We should be thankful for every act Jesus requests from us because it shows that He trusts us to be His good and faithful servants.
DAY 3–Remember to pray before you begin.
Mark 14:17-21 Dipping bread
When it was evening he came with the twelve. As they sat and were eating, Jesus said, “Most certainly I tell you, one of you will betray me—he who eats with me.” They began to be sorrowful, and to ask him one by one, “Surely not I?” And another said, “Surely not I?” He answered them, “It is one of the twelve, he who dips with me in the dish. For the Son of Man goes, even as it is written about him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would be better for that man if he had not been born.”
The preparations for this Passover meal took all day. During that time, Jesus stayed outside the city with ten of His disciples. He may have been keeping to public places so that there would be no chance to secretly arrest Him. About 5:30 or 6:00, Jesus started to make His way to the house where the preparations had already been made. It is quite likely that Judas had tried to subtly ask about Jesus’ plans during the day, but if so, he was met with defeat.
Jesus and the ten disciples made their way to the upper room where Peter and John were waiting for them. Everyone took their places around the table. John was sitting near Jesus. Judas was also keeping close and sat on Jesus’ other side. This put Peter down one seat away from Jesus. John tells us that the foot washing happened next. Then they began to eat.
They had started eating the lamb and the bread already when Jesus interrupted their meal to announce that one of them was a traitor. Jesus’ words caused each person to ask if he was the one who would betray Jesus. Although Jesus would later secretly identify Judas to John, He did not denounce Judas to the others at this time. Jesus kept His accusation general. Why did Jesus publicly announce that there was a traitor while not identifying the traitor? Maybe, Jesus wanted the others to understand that He was not fooled or tricked, that He was in control of the situation. This might have provided comfort for them later. On the other hand, He may have been attempting to make them examine their own hearts because in some ways they all would betray Him. They all ran rather than staying and being arrested with Him. After getting them to think, Jesus said the words that would show that He was speaking about the specific betrayal of one man and not general cowardice.
There are two ways to view Jesus’ last words about the traitor when He said that it would have been better never to have been born. One way is to look at them as a sort of curse for Judas, but that does not seem to align with Jesus’ other words to Judas where He would later call Him friend. It is more likely that these words resulted from Jesus’ pity for Judas. This was His last attempt to turn Judas from his downward path. Subtle attempts had not worked, so now Jesus used a kind of direct confrontation without identifying Judas. Jesus was focusing on all the potential that Judas had had to be a son of God and regretting that it was all wasted and in fact, never having existed would have been better for Judas than the destination he was headed for.
Betrayal often comes from self-deceived people who believe that they are acting righteously. Judas must have believed that his actions were reasonable and intelligent. He may have felt that He was putting Jesus in a situation where He would be forced to become the Messiah that Judas believed He should be. In other words, Judas felt confident in his actions as he tried to manipulate God. Unfortunately, it is easy for us to act with the same attitude as Judas, substituting our own ideas of what is best for those that Jesus has provided. It is important to examine our motivations and actions to see if we are in alignment with God’s word or simply doing what we think is “best.” Our judgment is suspect unless it is backed by Jesus’ teachings.