LENT 5/CYCLE C/ JOHN 12:1-8/ 3-21-10

     "What is that smell?"  That's a question you've heard many times before in your life, isn't it?  We've heard that question asked with a positive tone of the voice...usually when the smell is coming from the vicinity of the kitchen or the food court at the mall.  There are certain smells that most people find pleasurable.  Did you ever notice that just about everyone enjoys the smell of freshly brewed coffee...even if they hate the taste of coffee?  Real estate agents have known fro some time now that one of the best ways to create a pleasing enviroment in a home that you are trying to sell is to bake bread or apple pie during an open house...or atleast burn a candle that makes it smell like you are baking.

     But there is an unpleasant way to ask, "What is that smell?" too.  FOr several months, the question was being asked of the women's restroom here at church.  But for the most part a new seal for the toilet has alleviated that problem.  Natural gas as it occurs in nature has no smell; that "rotten egg" smell is added to it on purpose so that you will say "what's that smell?" and realize it is a natural gas leak and go to a safer place while the leak is fixed.

      Some smells are so obnoxious that just hearing the cause of them can make your nostril hairs curl.  For instance...all I have to say to you is skumk, and you can smell it just as distinctly as if you had just hit one on the highway.  The smell of death is a smell that you will never forget once you have smelled it.  There is a reason that all of the forensics experts on all of those crime dramas on TV are wearing globs of Vicks under their nostrils...it is because of the smell!

     In today's gospel lesson we have a story of the anointing of Jesus.  It is one of those rare stories in the lfe of Jesus that appears in all four of the gospels.  In the telling of the story from John, we are told specifically where Jesus is eating this meal and who it is that is doing the anointing.  Matthew, Mark, and John all agree that this meal too place in a home somewhere in the town of Bethany.  Luke does not bother to tell you where the event happened at all.

     Matthew and Mark say that the meal was in Bethany in the house of "Simon, the Leper"...whoever he was.  John tells us instead that the home for this meal was the home of Lazarus and Martha and Mary-the only people in the New Testament who are actually referred to as "friends of Jesus". In fact, John begins his telling of the story by saying: "Six days before the Passover Jesus came to Bethany, the home of Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead."

     That reference, "whom he had raised from the dead" is supposed to immediately tie this story to the one that came before it in John 11-the story of the Ressurection of Lazarus.  So to help you make that tie, I will remind you that Lazarus had been dead and in the tomb for four days, and his own sister-Martha-mentions that to Jesus when he commands that the tomb be opened.  Her exact words are these: "Lord, there is already a stench!"

     But nontheless, Jesus re-animates this corpse of a human being...and here we are some days later sitting at his house preparing to eat dinner.  Did the smell of death mysteriously disappear because Lazarus was raised?  We do not know.  Perhaps we have always just assumed that because Jesus raised Lazarua that he took "that smell" away too!  But I'm not so sure.

     IN the telling of the anointing in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, the woman who does the anointing of Jesus is unidentified.  In Matthew and Mark the woman spreads her perfume on the head of Jesus; anointing the head of someone signified that they were either a king or a priest.  In Luke and John, we are told that the woman who anoints Jesus anoints his feet instead, which suggests something more intimate, something more sensual, something more trusting and familiar.

     More specifically, in the telling of this story from John, we ae told that while Martha was serving and Lazarus was sitting at the table with Jesus and his disciples- Mary was taking a pound of perfume and coating the feet of Jesus with it and wiping his feet with her hair.

     "What is that smell?"  It is the smell of Myrrh, the smell of death, the smell of preparation for death.  It is also the smell of love received and forgiveness granted and kindness exchanged.

     But that is not the only smell in that house...there is also a different smell.  it is the smell of misunderstanding and confusion and jealousy and greed.  For Judas Iscariot, (the one who was about to betray him) John tells us, is complaining.  "Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denari and the money given to the poor?"  Judas asks.  The smell of kindness to the poor shold be a pleasing smell, but unfortunately...that is not the smell of which we are getting a whiff.  John tells us plainly, that Judas is not concerned for the poor- he is concerned for himself.  He was the accountant of the group, and liked to rob the common purse when everyone else wasn't looking.  Talk about rotten smells- the smell of greed and the smell of betrayal, all rolled into one!

     The last word belongs to Jesus in this story of his impending death.  He says to Judas: "Leave her alone.  She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial.  You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me."  In other words, the smell of betrayal and death and greed are strong...but the smell of love is even stronger and more lasting and more life-giving.

     It is no accident that of the five senses we humans use to understand our world- the sense of smell is the one that is tied most directly and most strongly to memory.  Matthew and Mark both end this story with the words of Jesus hanging in the air: "Truly I tell you, wherever the good nes is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her."  The fragrance of death and greed and betrayal may seem strong, even overwhelming.  But the truth that Jesus spoke is that the fragrance of life and loving-kindness are even stronger still.  What Mary did in anoint Jesus is but a forestate of what Jesus did in his suffering and death.

     It is at a meal just six days after this one that Jesus will stoop to wash his disciples feet-even the feet of Judas Iscariot.  It is at a meal of salvation that Jesus will share broken bread and the blood of crushed grapes and tell them-do this to rememeber me.

     Let us remember that the sweet scent of forgiveness and grace and love are stronger then the poisonous smell of death and greed and evil.  Let us breathe in this great gift of love, and--like Mary did--let us find ways of giving this sweet-smelling scent of loving-kindness back to our savior in all that we do and say for others in his name. Amen.