When I was in Wales, I had three friends who lived together in one of my three parishes. There was a man who was a retired priest, and his two sisters, one a retired teacher, the other a retired social worker who had been a missionary in Africa. They brought to mind Jesus' friends, Mary, Martha and Lazarus. Theirs was a home where Jesus was welcome, and it was probably very useful for him to retreat there, being at Bethany, just a few miles out of the busy city of Jerusalem.

Today's story is set by St John six days before Passover. St John always has his own profound scheme of things. For him the Last Supper was before Passover, not an actual Passover meal, as it was in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. So, for St John, in his Gospel, Jesus died on the Friday afternoon, very symbolically, at the very same time as the Passover lambs, which would be eaten at the upcoming Passover meals. Be aware that the Gospels are not exactly the same in details, but that can actually give us more than one useful insight.

In any event, our story today at Bethany is described by St John, as shortly before Jesus enters Jerusalem, which we mark on Palm Sunday next week, and only days before the Crucifixion. So things are reaching their climax, and St John is wanting to portray how absolutely special Jesus is, by the way he tells things.

As a diversion, notice that this is a prime example of our need to know and compare the different accounts in the New Testament. St Luke has Jesus in a Pharisee's house, having his feet washed and anointed by an unnamed notorious woman. Matthew and Mark, in their Gospels have Jesus in Bethany alright, but in the house of Simon the Leper, not Lazarus, Mary and Martha, having his head anointed by an unnamed women, who is, apparently, not especially sinful. We also know that Jesus was a friend of Mary Magdalene. He had helped her with a troubled past. But it's not clear that she was a notorious sinner, and not clear that she has anything at all to do with today's Mary, or any of these anointing stories!

The job, always, is to ask, 'What is the Gospel writer trying to point us to, in the way that he is telling his tale?' And St John does things particularly profoundly.

So, in today's story, we need to remember that St John is the one who has recently told  us that Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead. For St John that was the climax of six great 'signs' which he describes, beginning with the turning of water into wine at the wedding. Lazarus, of course, will die again. The real climax for St John will be a final and even greater sign - Christ's resurrection, - never to die again!

When Jesus had come to visit the two sisters after the death of Lazarus, he had talked with Martha, encouraged her faith in him, and told her he was the Resurrection and the Life, and she had come to accept that he was the Messiah. This was shortly before Jesus raised Lazarus. With Martha coming to that huge estimate of Jesus, and Jesus performing that colossal miracle, it is not surprising that, in today’s sequel Martha got a good meal for everyone, and that her sister Mary went overboard with the ointment.

There will always be the urgent need to care for the poor, but the colossal status of Jesus is something that Mary had to respond to. Normally they would anoint someone after death. But Jesus, the Resurrection and the Life, is already somehow beyond death, no need to wait to anoint him. And our Easter Candle, used at baptisms and funerals is a sign that we are united with the risen Christ who is beyond death, whatever happens.

It is to that colossal status of Jesus that St John wants to point us in these last days before Holy Week and Easter, and St John uses what stories he has, to do that. The writers do not always have full historical details of everything that Jesus did, but they each have their important understandings of what God was about, to pass on to us, using the stories as best they can.