Third Sunday After Pentecost

June 17, 2007

This morning, we have heard about Jesus going to a dinner party hosted by Simon, one of the leading citizens of Jerusalem. In the middle of the meal, something unexpected, something astonishing happened. A woman crashed the party. And not just any woman. A woman from the streets; a notorious sinner…a prostitute. She walks in and starts pouring expensive feet. Then she begin to cry, her tears falling on his feet. She begins to wipe his feet with her hair.

The actions of this woman broke just about every social custom of that day. Beyond that, it broke most of our social customs today.

Imagine if this happened to you. You’re having dinner, and a woman you’ve never seen before suddenly bursts into the dining room, and begins to wash your feet with her tears. I don’t know about you, but I’d be terribly embarrassed. What are people going to think? Aren’t they going to wonder how I came to know such a woman? This is going to destroy my reputation. Someone call 911. Get this crazy woman out of here.

That’s probably how Simon, the host of the party, saw things. He’s outraged by the whole thing. He thinks to himself, "If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him-- that she is a sinner."

And sometimes, I think that is how the Church responds to some people. Not all the time, but sometimes. When we throw open the doors of the Church, and send out the message that are a welcome to join in the feast, some people may respond to that invitation that may make us feel uncomfortable. They’re different. Their a little strange. They don’t look like most of us. They dress differently. They talk differently. And maybe we know some of them to be notorious sinners.

And when persons like the woman in this morning’s Gospel story show up, they feel our reaction to their presence. The sad truth is that much too often, people who, like her, were drawn to Jesus too often avoid the church today.

Phillip Yancey tells the story of a friend of his in Chicago who worked with poor persons in the city. He was visited once by a prostitute who was in dire straits. She had been renting out her two-year old daughter to men for sex in order to support her drug habit; and she was homeless, sick, and unable to buy food for herself or her daughter. Yancey's friend asked if she had thought about going to a church for help, and the woman seemed horrified. "Church?! Why would I ever go there? I was already feeling terrible about myself. They'd just make me feel worse." She had experienced church as a place of judgment and inhospitality.

How can we be more hospitable to the stranger in our midst, even if we feel uncomfortable? We may want to take a closer look at Jesus’ response to this woman.

Instead of worrying about himself and his reputation, Jesus immediately jumped to the defense of this woman. We're not told exactly what had happened to this woman before she showed up at the party, ; but, obviously, something had taken place that was absolutely life-changing…life changing enough for her to kneel at Jesus feet and weep. Somehow, she had become aware of the love and mercy of God. Since it was to Jesus that she offered her gift of perfume, it must have been ministry of Jesus that was the catalyst for her change of heart.

Somehow, this woman had come to see that God's goodness is always bigger than our sinfulness. This woman had come to understand that there is nothing we can do to make God love us any more than God already loves us, and there is nothing we can do to make God stop loving us.

So how did Jesus respond to Simon’s outrage? He said to him, “"Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has bathed my feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little."

Her sins have been forgiven; hence her great love. There’s a point here that we need to make sure we get straight. This woman was not trying to earn God’s forgiveness by washing Jesus’ feet. God’s grace is a free gift. We don’t deserve. And we can’t get it through good works. The woman in this story had already experienced God’s grace, God’s forgiveness. The act of ministering to Jesus was in response to this gift of grace. It was an act of thanksgiving for the good thing that god has already done.

When we find a stranger in our midst here at church, we need to always remember that God has already touched their lives. They wouldn’t be here otherwise. Our role is to celebrate with them the good thing that god has already done, and love them with the love of God.

In his commentary on this Gospel story, Fred Craddock wonders where one goes when told to go in peace as Jesus instructs this woman to do at the end of our story. "What she needs," Craddock says, "is a community of forgiven and forgiving sinners. The story," he says, "screams the need for a church, one that says you are welcome here."

There is an old legend about Judas that Madeleine L'Engle tells. The legend is that after his death Judas found himself at the bottom of a deep and slimy pit. For thousands of years he wept his repentance, and when the tears were finally spent, he looked up and saw way, way up a tiny glimmer of light. After he had contemplated it for another thousand years or so, he began to try to climb up towards the light. The walls of the pit were dark and slimy, and he kept slipping back down. Finally, after great effort, he neared the top and then he slipped and fell all the way back down to the bottom. It took him many years to recover, all the time weeping bitter tears of grief and repentance, and then he started to climb up again. After many more falls and efforts and failures, he reached the top and dragged himself into an upper room with twelve people seated around the table. "We've been waiting for you, Judas," Jesus said. "We couldn't begin till you came."

So many people are looking for a community of forgiven and forgiving sinners. May they find such a community on the corner of Main and Cedar in downtown Tuckerton.