Six days before the Passover, Jesus arrived at Bethany.. Here a dinner was given in Jesus’ honour. Martha served, while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with him. Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume….. Judas Iscariot objected, “Why wasn’t this perfume sold and the money given to the poor?”… “Leave her alone”, Jesus replied. “It was intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial.”

(Jn 12.1-7)

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death… What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all – will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns?

(Rom 8.1&2, 31-33)

Dear Lord, your child so often trembles under the assault of accusing words, of silent judgement and implied criticism, of scorn and derision. Her wounds are known to you and precious; her grief and fear is known to you and pitied; her weariness at failure is known to you and met with your compassion and strength.

Have mercy on your child in her distress, for Lord, you know that often the voice which speaks so bitterly is her own. Lord, have mercy, strengthen your child in your love and hold her tight.

I write this week with some trepidation, because this is very personal to me. And I write almost hoping that most of my readers will not recognise the experiences of which I write because I would not wish anyone to share them! Words, the power of words to heal or to harm; the depth to which they can cut and leave scars which never fade.. and the sad fact that those words may be my own, as I lash out against myself in vicious condemnation. Friends, for some people this is real, and while I pray you may not know it in your own life, perhaps you have family or friends who do, and I pray your compassion for them.

The story of Mary anointing Jesus’ feet with perfume and drying them with her hair is familiar, and yet it was only recently that my attention was drawn to those beautiful words of Jesus as he rebuked Judas – “Leave her alone!” Can you hear the power in his voice? Can you feel the protection which he thus puts around Mary, clothing her shockingly intimate act of worship with glory and denying all others the right to criticise or judge her? And those are the words which Jesus speaks over me too…

The Lord speaks to silence the bullying, vicious voices of condemnation – from outside and from within. And as Paul writes to the believers in Rome, if God refuses to condemn us, then who else may do so?!

Like Mary, I am fully known and utterly loved – Jesus, my defender, my champion, my lord and master rejoices to call me his own, and to reserve to himself alone the right to rebuke me, to discipline and correct my path. No other has authority to speak over my life but the voice of love; no other has the right to do so, because no other has died for my sake, in order to make me pure and clean at last.

Jesus stands between me and my accusers – even when it is my own voice which would condemn. In Jesus, I can be glad and free and proud, knowing that it is only his opinion of me which counts, and he has shown me his love. I have been singing this old hymn all my life, always thrilling to the imagery of the opening words which well express what I have tried to articulate today. May they bless you as they do me!

Jesus, thy blood and righteousness, my beauty are, my glorious dress; Midst flaming worlds in these arrayed, with joy shall I lift up my head.

Bold shall I stand in that great day, for who aught to my charge shall lay? Fully absolved through Thee I am, from sin and fear, from guilt and shame.

When from the dust of death I rise to claim my mansion in the skies, e’en then this shall be all my plea, Jesus hath lived, hath died for me!

(NL von Zinzendorf 1700-60; translated by Jn Wesley 1703-91)