Mark 14:1-11
A Jar Worth a Year of Wages
1Now the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread were two days away, and the chief priests and scribes were looking for a covert way to arrest Jesus and kill Him.
2“But not during the feast,” they said, “or there may be a riot among the people.”
3While Jesus was in Bethany reclining at the table in the home of Simon the Leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of expensive perfume, made of pure nard. She broke open the jar and poured it on Jesus’ head.
4Some of those present, however, expressed their indignation to one another: “Why this waste of perfume?
5It could have been sold for over three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor.” And they scolded her.
6But Jesus said, “Leave her alone; why are you bothering her? She has done a beautiful deed to Me.
7The poor you will always have with you, and you can help them whenever you want. But you will not always have Me.
8She has done what she could to anoint My body in advance of My burial.
9And truly I tell you, wherever the gospel is preached in all the world, what she has done will also be told in memory of her.”
10Then Judas Iscariot, one of the Twelve, went to the chief priests to betray Jesus to them.
11They were delighted to hear this, and they promised to give him money. So Judas began to look for an opportunity to betray Jesus.
Berean Standard Bible
Mark sets two people beside each other here and never tells us what to make of it. He opens with the officials. Passover is two days off and the chief priests and scribes are hunting for a quiet way to take Jesus without starting a riot at the feast.
Then the scene changes to a dinner in Bethany, in the house of a man Mark calls Simon the Leper, and a woman walks in carrying an alabaster jar of pure nard. She does not measure a little of it out. She breaks the neck off the jar and empties it over his head, so that nothing can be put back and nothing is kept for later. Mark says the perfume could have been sold for over three hundred denarii, and a denarius was roughly a day's pay, so about a year of wages goes over his head.
The room turns on her. Why this waste, they say, when the money could have gone to the poor. They scolded her.
Leave her alone; why are you bothering her? She has done a beautiful deed to Me.
Then comes the sentence people lift out of here and put to bad use.
The poor you will always have with you, and you can help them whenever you want. But you will not always have Me.
He is quoting Deuteronomy, where God says the poor will never cease from the land and therefore you must open your hand wide to your brother. Everybody in that room knew how the verse finished. The line he reaches for is a command to give, and what he adds is the part they could not have known: they were running out of time with him.
Then he tells them what she has actually done, which is anoint his body ahead of his burial. Whether she understood that, Mark does not say. But pouring oil on a head has a history in Israel's own scriptures. Samuel poured a flask of oil on Saul's head. A prophet poured oil on Jehu's head and told him he was king over Israel. The word Christ means anointed one, and when the anointing comes it is done by a woman nobody names, at a dinner party, days before he dies.
He says that wherever the good news is told, what she did will be told with it. Her name is not in the account. Her deed is.
Then Mark turns to Judas, who goes to the chief priests. They are delighted and promise him money. She gave a year of wages away for him and Judas took a price for him. Mark lays the two down and walks off.
How We Know
Verse 5 puts a number on the jar: it could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii. Matthew 20:2 records a denarius as the agreed daily wage for a laborer, so three hundred is about a year's work.
That is a real sum, not a figure of speech, and it explains the anger in the room.
Verse 3 records that she broke the alabaster jar, and the price in verse 5 is the only valuation the passage offers. The figure supports a scene reported by somebody who was there.
Questions
1 Think of something somebody once gave you that cost them more than it should have. How did that feel to be on the end of?
AnswerEverybody will have a different one, and the point is to hold it in mind for the rest of this. Somebody almost certainly told that person they had overdone it.
2 What does the woman do to the jar, and why does it matter that she does it that way?
AnswerShe breaks it open instead of pouring out a measure. Nothing can be held back and nothing can be saved for another day. It is all of it, in front of a room of people who called it waste.
3 What is Jesus doing when he says the poor will always be with us?
AnswerQuoting Deuteronomy, where God says the poor will never cease from the land and therefore you must open your hand wide to them. The verse is a command to give. It was never permission to stop.
4 What does Mark put on the page immediately after this dinner?
AnswerJudas going to the chief priests, who are delighted and promise him money. A woman pours out a year of wages on Jesus, and one of the Twelve sells him. Mark sets the two beside each other and says nothing about it.
What This Means for Us
She did something that could not be undone, and the room called it waste.
The objection sounded responsible, which is how those objections usually sound. The money could have gone to the poor is a good sentence, and it was not the true thing to say that night. He defended her, and he called what she had done beautiful.
Somebody here is holding something back from God because giving all of it would look extravagant, and extravagant looks unwise. That instinct is not always wisdom. Sometimes it is fear in better clothes.
The perfume is long gone. What she did is being read out loud in this room tonight.
Prayer
Father, thank you for a woman who did not calculate. Thank you that your Son called it beautiful when the room called it waste. Show us where we are holding back and calling it good sense. And make us glad to give what we cannot get back. Amen.