Mark 14:3b-9

"... a woman came having an alabaster flask of very costly oil of spikenard. Then she broke the flask and poured it on His head. But there were some who were indignant among themselves, and said, 'Why was this fragrant oil wasted? For it might have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor.' And they criticized her sharply.

But Jesus said, 'Let her alone. Why do you trouble her? She had done a good work for me. For you have the poor with you always, and whenever you wish you may do them good; but Me you do not have always. She has done what she could. She has come beforehand to anoint My body for burial. Assuredly I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be told as a memorial to her.'"

Mary, sweet Mary, always expressing the profound depth of her love for Jesus without a care for anyone else's thoughts of her. There's no guile in this woman, much like Nathanael (cf. John 1:47), there's no holding back, and there's no earthly possession that could capture her heart like Jesus did. She probably had no idea Jesus was about to die, and while her sacrifice (which was no sacrifice to her because when you really love you give, and that gift is never something that you'll miss because it gives you greater joy to see them have it than for you to possess it) was ordained as a symbolic act of burial preparation, her act of love was merely an expression of how we all ought to be when we consider the presence of Jesus.

By extreme contrast, the self-righteous indignation of Judas and the other disciples that surely chimed in, was a horrific stench mingled with the pure oil fragrance just poured on Jesus' head. Jesus' rebuke was more than warranted.

'My God, how about me? What am I holding back from You for fear of what others might think? What am I thinking when others express the fullness of their love for Jesus? Does jealously or self-justification creep in? I don't need to answer these questions, nor do You. We both know the answers; You even more than me. I want to be like Mary. What I lack in love for Jesus I pray You'd give me just like You did Mary. Reckless abandon, that's what I desire. I eagerly await that day when I can meet Mary in heaven and tell her how much I appreciate her example, and how I long for that day that I can express my love to Jesus without any sinful inhibitions. If the world could see it then, I'd be called a fool.'