Lent 5C’25
6 April 2025
John 12.1-8
St. Luke’s Episcopal Church
North Little Rock, Arkansas
The Rev. Carey Stone <+>
See what love the Father has lavished upon us [given us], that we should be called children of God; We Love God, because God first loved us. Amen – from I John 3.1; 4.19
This weekend marks the wedding anniversary of two ‘crazy kids,’ our office manager, Julie Pozza and her husband Rick, who because of their great love, 55 years ago, found their way to the altar, and they’ve never looked back!
It’s interesting to that two words that don’t seem to go together, actually go together – Crazy and Love! From popular music to the Song of Solomon in the bible, it really is a thing. In Freddie Mercury’s rockabilly song: Crazy Little Thing Called Love he wrote:
This thing called love (called love)
It cries (like a baby), in a cradle all night
It swings, it jives
Shakes all over like a jellyfish
I kinda like it
Crazy little thing called love1
Then there’s the rock anthem by Michael Lee Aday, better known as Meatloaf:
Maybe I’m crazy, but it’s crazy and its true
I know you can save me, no-one else can save me now but you
You’d better believe it
I would do anything for love.2
And of course, Patsy Cline in her iconic country music anthem “Crazy,” sang “I’m crazy for loving you.”3
In the Song of Solomon or Song of Songs from the bible we find written:
You are altogether beautiful, my love; there is no flaw in you…
Who is this who looks down like the dawn, beautiful as the moon, bright as the sun…
Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it.
In today’s gospel we witness a scene of lavish love that Judas Iscariot thought was absolutely crazy. Jesus after Passover, had come back to the home of Lazarus, and his two sisters, Mary and Martha. As you may recall, at an earlier time, Jesus had visited the home of his three close friends to bring brother Lazarus back to life after being dead in a tomb for four days. Now Jesus is back. Can you imagine the great love that must have filled the house that day. Such love, such gratitude, Mary and Martha’s brother had been dead and Jesus brought him back to life. There would be no way to repay such a debt of gratitude. Mary, seized by her great love for the Savior, had been saving a very costly ointment called Nard, that was enriched with a fragrant aromatic spice that she planned to anoint Jesus’ body after his death, but found that she couldn’t wait, and decided to go ahead and anoint his feet with it while Jesus was still alive. When she broke the wax seal on the alabaster jar the fragrant began to waft throughout the house. This enraged Judas who thought what she was doing was crazy: “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?” But as the scripture reveals he was really angry because this was money, (approximately $30,000 in modern currency) that he could have embezzled.
But it’s true with God, wherever there is great love there is great sacrifice. What great love Jesus had shown to this family of three living in Bethany, and the even greater love that he was about to demonstrate by the offering up his very life for their sins and for the sons of the whole world. What gift of gratitude could ever be too much for Mary to spend in order to show the love her and her family had for Jesus? Jesus was about to head toward Jerusalem to spare no expense in order to demonstrate his great love for the whole world: “Greater love have no one than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15.13) Jesus was about to spare no expense, what response can we possible make, what gift can we possibly give?
Jesus strongly rebuked Judas that day and told him to “Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial.” Not even Judas’ argument about serving the poor didn’t hold up to this gratuitous gift that Mary offered, “You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.”
As the flowers are blooming in the gardens and fields this spring and the diverse varieties of birds fill the trees, we are freshly reminded of God’s crazy love for us.
I had the privilege recently at the Cathedral of meeting the former Presiding Bishop Michael Curry and it is from his book Crazy Christians: A Call to Follow Jesus: “We need some Christians who are as crazy as the Lord. Crazy enough to love like Jesus, to give like Jesus, to forgive like Jesus, to do justice, love mercy, walk humbly with God— like Jesus. Crazy enough to dare to change the world from the nightmare it often is into something close to the dream that God dreams for it. And for those who would follow him, those who would be his disciples, those who would live as and be the people of the Way? It might come as a shock, but they are called to craziness.”4 Amen!
1 Freddie Mercury, Queen, 1979
2 Jim Steinman, I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That) lyrics © Edward B Marks Music Company
3 Gian Piero Reverberi / Brian Joseph Burton / Gianfranco Reverberi / Thomas Decarlo Callaway Crazy lyrics © Emi April Music Inc., Cord Kayla Music, Lbn Publishing, Ghetto Pop 2000 Music Inc., Sweet Science, Universal Music Publishing Ricordi Srl., Chrysalis Music Ltd, Warner/chappell Music Publishing Ltd, Warner Chappell Music Publishing Ltd
4 Michael Curry, Crazy Christians: A Call to Follow Jesus (Church Publishing: New York, 2013)