A sermon shared
with First Presbyterian Church, Spring City, TN, February 19, 2017.
Imagine chapter 7 of Luke’s gospel
as a sort of a merry-go-round spinning about the core question that John the
Baptist voiced openly half-way through, “Is this the way the Messiah acts in
the world?” The question is surrounded with a kaleidoscopic mirror reflecting actions
of Jesus and faith back at us. Jesus healed the slave of a Centurion and praised
his faith compared to all of Israel, raised the only son of a widow from death,
and blesses a woman who found faith and then “crashed” a banquet for Jesus
at the home of a Pharisee to express her gratitude.
In each case Jesus makes an act of
God motivated by divine compassion towards someone in the social spectrum that most
would avoid, a Gentile Roman soldier, a dead person, a widow and a sinful
woman. Faith is the link. The compassion, of love of Jesus for them creates or
sustains their faith in the good news. Luke’s point is that God gives us salvation
because of his divine compassion for humanity. God loves humanity. The ones who
receive the blessing born of divine love find inspired in themselves love
towards Jesus. The woman at the banquet is the capstone testimony to this
point. The event is a model of how God’s grace bestowed upon us by his own compassion
and Love inspires the same love for others in us.
There is another very important “teaching”
message for modern Christians at the end of the chapter. There we hear Jesus
tell the woman to go in peace, leaving us with the question that I am going to argue
is rhetorical (the question points to its answer), “Where will she go?” How is “Where
will she go?” is its own answer? Let’s
find out.
It may help to understand the
nature of meals, especially the formal dinner or banquet in the time of
Jesus.
In the time of Roman occupation, both
common and formal meals reinforced Jewish community through shared ritual and
social behavior. People gathered and followed the requirements of their faith,
greeting each other, saying a blessing and so on. A family meal usually
involved siting on the floor on a mat.
A formal diner had several social
requirements. First, we have the invitation. The person given an invitation was
expected to refuse it as the host or his emissary insisted on acceptance. This offers
the host the formal “privilege” of “compelling the guest to attend.” (We still
do it today, how often do you first decline an offer of help or someone picking
up the tab for a meal before you defer to them?
“Let me get that tab. No, that’s ok, I’ll get it. No, I insist. Well, OK…”)
When
the guests arrive to enter a home for a dinner, water is offered for the ritual
hand washing (and usually feet) to rid the dirt and dust from the street.
Protocol expects the host to
receive the guest. The specific manner of greeting depended on social status.
Usually the host greeted by bowing, and perhaps kissing the person’s clothing
or even the dust on the foot. The common Semitic form of greeting is still to
kiss each cheek of the person. Prostration was the most reverential manner of
greeting. It was not unusual to anoint the head of the guest with oil as this is
a traditional sign of an honored guest.
The dinner itself was more like a
symposium. The meal was there for eating. Generally, the content of the meal was
appropriate to the social status of the guests, or host. But the essential part
of the meal was the discussion and drinking that ensued afterwards. (This may
be why Jesus got the reputation for being a drunkard and glutton, he often ate
at such banquets.)
The formal meal was segregated,
only males partook. There was a strict protocol for seating. The most important
guests sat near the host and those of lesser importance sat further down the table.
Many upper-class Hebrews had adopted the Roman banquet style of taking meals in
a reclining pose, not seated on the ground on a mat (the informal family
style), or seated in chairs at a table. (seen throughout the NT)
Religious requirements forbid a Hebrew
to eat with a Gentile, or any one considered an outcast, such as a sinner, or
someone who had an illness, deformity or crippling injury.
We see many of these elements of dinner
etiquette in this passage. Simon the Pharisee asked (the implied meaning of the
Greek word is insisted) that Jesus eat with him, and as we read “he took
his place at the table.” All this tells us this is a formal banquet with
some seating arrangement (i.e., guests are present).
Why did the Pharisee invite Jesus?
Simon may he had heard these sayings of Jesus like everyone else and wanted to
know more, even if only how this peculiar man can stir up the crowds with his
words. He has little to lose in affording Jesus the basic treatment as a guest
to find out and shows it by omitting some of the more important protocol
afforded an esteemed guest. Notice that Luke does not report that Simon offered
any act of greeting as expected of a host.
As we begin the story we do not know if Luke didn’t report a greeting because
it was as perfunctory as a nod or slight bow, or there was no greeting at all. We
find later that he does not greet Jesus with the kiss of friendship, nor offer
water to wash the dirty of the street from feet and hands.
Then a very unusual thing happens.
A woman identified as a sinner hears that Jesus is at this banquet and enters
the room. That she is identified as a “sinner” is clearly important. We have no
idea of her error but often such language implies she has committed some type
of moral indiscretion such as infidelity, prostitution, robbery. We just do not
know the nature of the sin, we only need to know she (and the Pharisee) think
hers are great. For the Pharisee, her sin was far greater than any of his could
possibly be. Although the degree of the sin is important for the Pharisee, for
Jesus all sin has the same effect, a separation from God. (My joke is Jesus was
a democrat because he says all sin is equal.)
Why did this woman come to this
banquet? I lean to conclude that she had heard Jesus tell of his sayings, as
did everyone else according to the first few verses of the chapter, and had
faith in the truth of what she heard. Faith is a powerful motivator and hers
must have been great to enter this formal banquet of men, approach and touch
Jesus. It required great personal strength. As a woman and a sinner, she had
already violated two principal qualifications that exclude her from worship and
social interaction at a banquet, (1) she is a woman among men, and (2) she is
unrighteous among those who see themselves as righteous. She had much to lose
to enter the room and them go and touch a male guest.
Her insult to manners and custom goes
even further when she opens an expensive alabaster jar of
ointment, and while weeping, bathes the feet of Jesus with her tears and dries
them with her hair, continually kissing and anointing his feet with the
ointment and head with oil. An unseemly display of affection.
There are versions of this story in the other gospels
although the time, attendees and location vary. Mark’s gospel describes this scene
in graphic terms, the woman does not open the jar as if uncapping it, she smashes
open the jar of this very expensive perfume probably breaking off the neck of
the jar rendering it useless for anything else. The guests are shouting in
outrage over her presence and the waste of value. Mark paints a picture of the
woman’s presence and actions creating pandemonium among these men. (Note: Some scholars insist these stories of a
woman anointing Jesus are separate and unrelated.)
Luke does not focus on the riotous
situation, but on the woman’s powerful experience of compassion her faith in
Jesus has evoked. It isn’t proper to read that her compassion caused her faith
and forgiveness. Rather, her faith and gratitude motivated her compassion and
thanksgiving for Jesus. Her gratitude to the one who forgave her overpowers any
sense of fear of social stigma or guilt she may have felt otherwise.
Jesus tells Simon that she has
done this because her sins are forgiven. Unlike the woman, the Pharisee and guests can
only remark in disbelief, or sarcasm that reflects denial, “Who is this who even forgives sin?”
Jesus points out to Simon the
embarrassing contrast of the faith, love and thanksgiving towards Jesus by the
woman and him.
The reaction of Jesus to the woman
is much like his reaction to the Centurion. He tells Simon a parable whose
point is that while Simon thinks he has little to be forgiven and consequently
has less desire to share compassion and recognition to Jesus, the woman has
experienced forgiveness of the great debt of sin (that we all carry) and is greatly
thankful. She sets the bar for gratitude for grace. Jesus tells Simon through
this riddle that his self-assessed minor sins are as deadly as those big ones
of the woman. All sin, no matter the degree, separates us from God. Forgiveness
unifies us with God.
On first blush, the final blessing
of Jesus on this woman, “Go in peace,” leaves us with that lingering,
rhetorical question, “Where will she go?” Back out on the streets to her
old way of life? No, I don’t think so.
If the whole series of events in this chapter pivot
around John the Baptist’s rhetorical question, “Is this the way the Messiah
acts in the world?” and the answer, “Yes,
and you should do likewise,” then the answer to the question “Where will she
go?” is not “Back to the streets and old ways,” but “To a sustaining
congregation of believers.”
Of all that is in this passage,
the important message for us today is to look around and ask: “Do you have such
a sustaining, actively grace filled congregation of believers? If not, find one.
If so, work to make it better and keep the doors open for the wandering spirits
like this woman. Because we are all wandering spirits on the way home in
gratitude to God.
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