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“Then took Mary a pound of ointment of spikenard…and anointed the feet of Jesus…and the house was filled with the odor of the ointment” (John 12:3).
Yesterday we saw that when the holiness of God was displayed in the temple, the “house was filled with smoke.” The smoke was a warning to man that God could not be directly approached in those days, and that a sacrifice was needed. Here we find that another smell filled a house—the house where Mary, Martha, and Lazarus lived in a town called Bethany.
This was a different kind of smell—an odor that people would love to smell. It was the smell of a precious ointment that was poured onto the feet of the Lord Jesus. The Lord Jesus was a guest in the house, and Mary took this opportunity to honor Him in this way. Mary understood clearly that the Lord Jesus needed to go to the cross, and she came ahead of time to anoint his feet as a token of her love for Him. This smell was a picture of what the work of Christ is to God; it is a sweet smell, for our Lord Jesus was perfectly obedient to His Father’s will, even though this obedience took Him all the way to the cross. We will see another verse about this tomorrow.
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