Looking at Things as Jesus Sees Them

(Mark 14:1-9)

In some of my recent posts I have alluded to the way that the Lord does not look at things as man does. The Lord looks at things from a spiritual perspective, but man sees things in a physical way. Naturally this is because Jesus is spirit and man is flesh. So man sees things and perceives the world through what can be understood using his five senses. He makes decisions, assessments and judgements based on what he sees, hears, feels and so on as things exist within the physical realm.

But Jesus looks at all things as God looks at things. God is spirit and so too is Jesus, so he sees, perceives and understands things in a spiritual way which is beyond what a man can understand just with his senses.

Jesus taught this principle saying that we too need to perceive things in a mosr spritual way. In John 7:24 he said, Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgement.” Again he emphasised this principle in John 8:15 while upbraiding the Pharisees saying, “You judge according to the flesh; I judge no one.” This same principle is repeated many times throughout Jesus’ ministry and we see it in action in the things Jesus said and did in various situations.

One such situation is this one in Mark 14:1-9. Here a womand brought a flask of costly ointment, pure nard, which she broke open and poured on Jesus’ head anointing him with it. Some of those about him were indignant saying to themselves, “Why was the ointment wasted like that? For this ointment could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor.” (Verse 4-5)

This is typical of the way man sees things. It’s all about making a profit. Where can there be a dollar made in this thing! And we know from other versions of this event that it was Judas Iscariot who made these comments, not because he cared for the poor, but he was a thief and he stole from the money bag. (John 12:3-8)

But then we see Jesus’ response. He said to leave the woman alone for she had done a beautiful thing to him. He said you will always have the poor and can aid them at any time you want, but that he would not always be there and the woman had done what she could for him. In essence when you come down to it, Judas had no right saying or thinking that the woman should sell the ointment and give it to the poor. It was her ointment and she had the right to do with it as she pleased. Sure she could have given it to the poor, but that was not what she wanted to do. She wanted to give it to the Lord and He saw it as a preparation for his imminent death and burial and that she would always be remembered through the scriptures for this beautiful sacrifice she had made for the Lord’s sake.

So we see in Jesus words and behaviour an entirely different perspective to that of the men. Jesus saw a beautiful action done for him, the men saw waste and a loss of potential profit. Jesus saw a gift bestowed upon him out of love, joy and adesire to please the Lord. The men  saw it as foolishness and a senseless loss of a profit making opportunity.

How different these two responses are from each other. And it is the Lord’s desire that as we grow and mature we too will think as Jesus did. That as we develop the fruit of the Spirit described in Galatians 6, we too will see the beauty and blessing in things where man sees the opposite. It never ceases to amaze me when I see these types of examples and look at the world today. The things prized by men are considered worthless and useless in the eyes of God. Indeed many of the highly thought of professions will not even exist in the kingdom of Heaven. There will be no doctors, no lawyers, no judges and so on for there will be no sickness or disease, no criminals or evil and God will judge the people.

So as we grow and mature in the Lord we need to focus on maturing and looking at the things around us from that same perspective as the Lord has. We need to learn to think as Jesus thinks so that we can become like he is. This is the aim for all of us, to be transformed into the image of Christ, which is to think, speak, act and behave as he does in any and all circumstances.