By David ReayThursday 29 Aug 2013LifeWords DevotionalsFaithReading Time: 0 minutes
Transcript:
Read Mark 14:3-8
3 Meanwhile,Jesus was in Bethany at the home of Simon,a man who had previously had leprosy. While he was eating,a woman came in with a beautiful alabaster jar of expensive perfume made from essence of nard. She broke open the jar and poured the perfume over his head.
4 Some of those at the table were indignant. “Why waste such expensive perfume?” they asked. 5 “It could have been sold for a year’s wages and the money given to the poor!” So they scolded her harshly.
6 But Jesus replied,”Leave her alone. Why criticize her for doing such a good thing to me? 7 You will always have the poor among you,and you can help them whenever you want to. But you will not always have me. 8 She has done what she could and has anointed my body for burial ahead of time. (NLT)
We are each called on to do good. We each have to decide what good we will do. None of us can do all the good we would like to do or all the good that needs to be done. This unnamed woman did a good thing for Jesus. It was not the ‘good’ of giving money or the ‘good’ of healing the sick or the ‘good’ of verbalising the message of salvation. It was the ‘good’ she was able to do. It was her own uniquely good deed.
Some of us offer practical help to the homeless. Some of us send money to the people who provide such help. Some of us preach the good news of Jesus in public. Some of us care for the aged and infirm. Some of us teach disabled children. Some of us offer marriage counselling. No one individual can do everything. We seek to be like this woman in the story: she did what she could.
It is necessary that we do good. It is not at all necessary for us to imitate the good that others are doing or to feel guilty for not emulating them. Let God carve out for each of us those good works he has prepared for us to walk in. In doing good,we march to his drumbeat,not to the excessive expectations of others or to the demands of our sometimes oversensitive consciences. We do what we can,not what we can’t.
Blessings
David Reay