When the Wild Heart Opens
Mark 14:3-9
Reverend Joe Cobb, MCC of the Blue Ridge
05.21.2017
Mary Oliver asks in her poignant poem,
The Summer Day,
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
For my part, I want to host dinner parties
like the one we just listened in on.
From the start, we get a glimpse that this
is no ordinary dinner. The host is a man
named Simon, who is a leper. Generally
speaking, leprosy and dinner don’t go together.
Even more compelling is that an upstart
revolutionary rabbi named Jesus has been
invited to dinner in Simon’s home because
he dared to break open the rigid religious laws
of the day and not only touch someone
considered unclean (as was anyone with
leprosy) but also have dinner with them.
Throw into the mix some of Jesus’ disciples,
men who up and left their professional
vocations, threw caution to the wind of an
unknown Spirit, and answered his call to
go into the unknown to break open the
world to a new relationship with God.
Then, there are the crafty religious leaders
of the time, both curious as to what this
Rabbi is saying and doing, and also looking
for ways to call him out and trap him for
going against their understanding of the law.
Then and now, this is head-spinning,
or head-scratching.
To top it all off, like biting into a dense
dark chocolate mocha truffle torte with
a drizzle of raspberry glaze and a dollop
of whipped cream, from the corner of
the room, a woman appears carrying
a jar made of what appears to be alabaster.
She approaches the revolutionary rabbi,
lowers the jar to the table corner, breaks
it open, and in a swift and gentle motion,
lifts the jar above his head,
pours the ointment out so lavishly
that it drips down,
down, down, down onto his forehead, over
his eyes, the bridge of his nose, his
beautiful lips.
As the ointment drips from his chin, Jesus
looks up, into her eyes, and smiles.
How does one witness a moment like this
and not be broken open?
It’s like the moment when my writing mentor,
Natalie Goldberg, experienced a sudden,
awesome storm near a volcano in Costa Rica,
and reflected as it cracked open her mind:
I thought, some divine structure has just
whipped through here.
That which manifests from nothing,
changes everything and then is gone. (*Natalie Goldberg, Thunder and Lightning)
This is one of the wildest, untamed moments
in all of scripture. And, it is also provides one
of the quickest attempts in all of scripture to
tame what is wild because this wild Love leads
us to do unbelievable things.
No sooner had Jesus looked up into the woman’s
eyes and smiled, than several murmuring voices,
likely from the motley gathering of religious leaders
who were piling up evidence about Jesus wild
actions, uttered loudly: Why was the ointment
wasted in this way? This ointment could have
been sold for more than three hundred denarii,
and the money given to the poor.’
And they scolded her.
Ouch.
Not only did they not recognize her act of
Authenticity, they acted as though she wasn’t
even in the room.
Jesus, calm as ever, reached under the
table, pulled out his pink pussy hat,
put in on and said, Leave her alone.
She has done a beautiful thing for me.
I love Jesus for always bringing it back
to who and what is essential. Her act
of love was never about what they
think she should have done but what
she did purely and generously and
extravagantly for the One she loved
more deeply than she could ever
fully express.
The moment we try and tame what
God intends to be wild, we are messing
with God’s Spirit, which to be frank,
will keep messing with us!
Wildness, according to author Christine Painter,
is that which cannot be tamed.
We try so hard to domesticate our lives,
the world around us, God.
Yet wildness continues to call to us,
to reject those places where we have
narrowed our lives and refused to consider
that more expansiveness awaits us than
we can imagine. (*Christine Valters Painter, Presence)
The woman in this story did her necessary one thing.
She tapped into her wild heart of Love, which had
been tapped by the Wild Heart of Love, broke it open
and poured it out. This was her widow’s mite – all
that I have is yours. This was her parent waiting on
the porch for a long-lost child and upon seeing him
racing to embrace him and lavish him with an
extravagant love that cracked him open and set him
free. This was her new prayer for Jesus – an anointing
for his authentic self as he prepared to leave what
everyone around that table had come to know and
make room for the fullness of God’s Spirit to make
a new way.
From the first moment I opened the door on Kirk
Avenue not far from here and heard the jingle of
a bell to this moment sixteen years later, we’ve
shared countless dinner parties around this table.
I’ve seen God’s Spirit break open and loose,
pour out and on, set free and unleash Love.
I’ve seen many attempts to resist this wild
side of Love, to domesticate, to tame,
to dampen, to hide.
Yet, in the end, as is always the case, Love
will not be closeted, or contained, or pushed
aside, or diminished or demeaned.
As the Wild Heart we know as Jesus reminded
those gathered around the table then and now,
we will always live with the stark and daunting
realities of poverty – whether poverty due to
income inequality, lack of access to equal rights,
or even more essential, the inability to see each
other as beloved. We can use our resources to
tend to these matters and that is good. What
is even better though, is how we shape the
resources of our own wild hearts to love in
ways that break open injustice and pour in
justice.
When we do this, we are anointing Jesus’ body
here and in everyone we touch, with Love
that will transform our lives and transform this
world.
And this, according to Jesus, is what will be
remembered.
Love is wild.
Love is I’m ready. Are you?
Amen.