When the Wild Heart Opens

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.