There is a posture to worship. Physically, the Bible often describes it as bowing down or prostrating oneself. Of greater import, however, is the posture of the soul. It’s not difficult to see why. One can be flat on one’s face in a setting in which worship is being offered and yet remain bolt upright in heart. An unwillingness to yield to the majesty and worth of God is the essence of rebellion and idolatry, and it is an attitude that can creep into any worship service no matter how quiet or how raucous. Worship, true worship, involves the soul of a person acknowledging the worth of God and giving the honor that is due him. This was the worship Mary offered to Jesus.
It is an extraordinary scene. She enters the room where Jesus is dining and breaks open an alabaster flask of expensive perfume. She then begins to anoint the head and feet of Jesus. Then, and this perhaps the most shocking of all given the cultural context in which this act took place, she assumes the posture of a slave at the feet of Jesus, let’s down her hair, and begins to wipe off his feet with it. Time must have stopped in that room.
Were others embarrassed for her? Perhaps, but she was not, and neither was Jesus. When some (and in particular, Judas) protested, Jesus rebuked the detractors saying she had done something beautiful for him. Whether she realized it or not, she had saved the perfume for his burial, something which was about to take place as he laid down his life “for the nation and . . . to gather into one the children of God who are scattered abroad” (John 11:51, 52).
Mary’s worship was sacrificial. She held nothing back. The perfume used was costly, her servile behavior considered shameful, the cultural barriers breached, scorned. But Jesus was worth it. Her life had been rescued from futility and she had a foretaste of the eternal life that he promised. She had sat at his feet and pondered the ultimate reality he spoke of, she witnessed his heartache at the brokenness of the world, and she was stunned at the power he possessed to overcome sin and death. When the opportunity came, what else could she do but pour out her life at his feet in adoration and gratitude in the posture of worship?
