The New England Church Pulpit New England Congregational Church UCC Aurora Illinois

The concerned professor makes a valid point, but as I ponder this story in Matthew’s gospel I am confronted with another perspective. As Jesus is on his way to his death to make an excessive offering of his life, an unknown woman enters the home where Jesus is living and pours a vial of expensive perfume over his head, a symbolic action that is those days signified the anointing of a king. The perfume was valued at close to a year’s wages, say $35 - 45 thousand today. She is criticized by the disciples for the waste, but Jesus rebukes them, praising her for her actions and her insight. He had a point to make.

The very foundation of our Christian commitment to human liberation and justice for all is in keeping the proper tension between the world as it is and the world as God intended it. We must live in the world as it is but we exist to model for others what God’s reign would be like: peace among the nations, justice for everyone, where all are included and cared for equally, where politics served the people and no one was sidelined because of their race, economic status, gender, orientation, or religion. To that end, we join this unknown woman in an excessive and proud display of all that is good in the world, from the sweet aroma of perfume to the beauty of music and art that connect us in an existential way to a world of love.

There are some who think we should scale back at New England Church. Should we then have plastic flowers on the altar rather than spending money for real flowers each week? Should we use taped music that would save money on pipe organ expenses and wouldn’t require the expense of hiring talented musicians to give us music in real time? The critics would have a point if we’re talking about utilitarian budget balancing. But it is society that reduces people to utilitarian pragmatic quantities, urging us to adapt to the status quo and keep producing rather than dreaming or singing about the way it ought to be. But for people of faith it is different.

Robert Hovda reminds us that it was the devil who tried to convince Jesus in the wilderness that we live by bread alone; according to the evil one, anything other than the bare necessities is excess. Jesus rebukes him and stands firm: people don’t live by bread alone. Food and housing alone are not the sole justice issue. Bread is necessary to sustain the human body, but bread alone does not meet the deepest hunger of the human heart and soul. There is beauty to behold, the beauty of music that takes us to heaven, of this Tiffany window that sustains us when our souls are beleaguered, of art and the theater and books and nature that give us heaven on earth and nourish our soul as much as bread nourishes our bodies.

William Willimon, of Duke University, suggests that the poorer a person is, the more bleak his or her situation, the more he or she needs the liberation that only the parade and the glorious music of the pipe organ or a well-sung anthem can provide. Instead of feeling embarrassed by the riches of talent here, we should give excessively out of our vast resources to create a parade for those who stand on the sidelines, and invite them to march with us down the center of society’s street.

A middle-class caucasian clergyman questioned a black preacher friend of his as to how the latter’s inner city church could justify spending nearly one million dollars on their church renovation in the midst of one of the poorest neighborhoods in town. The friend replied:
You white folk just can’t stand to see somebody let loose, can you. This church is going to be our protest that it wasn’t God who condemned us to poorness. This church is a sign of our revolution to proclaim our value in the sight of God and remind us that what we don’t have on this earth isn’t the final word.

The litmus test here is how we value the excess we have. Does striving for extravagance become our god or does the excess we have become a gift we share with others? The word ‘pagan’ is the word for living as though things were god....a building, money, our belief system, being right. These are things that should point us to the Holy and be our resources to invite others to encounter the Holy, but if these become for us the holy, then we have become pagans. It is a matter of priority and attitude.

So we sit here with our beautiful building in the state’s second largest city. We have taken an active part in inviting the neighbors in our community to join with us in keeping the integrity of these blocks that surround us. We have made our building accessible to those who can’t do stairs and invested in the art of architecture and landscaping. We invest in small groups that study literature and we remind ourselves each week as we read from other religious traditions that we join hand in hand with all who are organizing this parade of life.

No one can give out of their emptiness. We can only give out of our excess. We cannot be drained of our energy and expect to give much to those who need a shoulder to cry on or someone to lean on. It behooves us, therefore, to receive the bounty that God has given us, not for selfish purpose, but to call others to joy and peace.

The woman who poured expensive oil on Jesus’s head will be remembered for all time because of her outrageously excessive sacrament. Jesus is on his way to his death to do something very excessive for humanity. He invites us to follow him in leading the parade that calls us to live in the tension of this world as it is and the world as God intended it to be. Amen.

–Gary L. McCann

Matthew 26.6-13
While Jesus was in Bethany in the home of a man known as Simon the Leper, a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, which she poured on his head as he was reclining at the table.
When the disciples saw this, they were indignant. “Why this waste?’ they asked. “This perfume could have been sold at a high price and the money given to the poor.”
Aware of this, Jesus said to them, “Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me. When she poured this perfume on my body, she did it to prepare me for burial. I tell you the truth, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.

Bhagavad-Gita 18.3-5
(translated by Stephen Mitchell)

Some sages say that all action
is tainted and should be relinquished;
others permit only acts
of worship, control, and charity.

Here is the truth: these acts
of worship, control, and charity
purify the heart and therefore
should not be relinquished but performed.

But even the most praiseworthy acts
should be done with complete nonattachment
and with no concern for results...

Copyright © 2003 by Gary L. McCann. All rights reserved.

Top of Page

Index of Recent Sermons

Index of Archived Sermons

Return to NECC Home Page