We want to thank you for listening to this week's sermon from Harvest Bible Chapel, Kansas City. We pray that you will be encouraged and challenged by God's Word today. If you would like more information about Harvest, please visit our website at www.harvestkansascity.org. This is maybe one of the most beautiful passages that really outlines an act of love, an act of worship that you'll see in Scripture. And so it's a very special passage in that way. So what we're going to look at today is really two different examples of selfless devotion and service. And then we're going to look at one very negative example as well, which seems unfortunate, but required. So first, let's look at the context of this story, this passage from verse 1, so you get a better idea and understanding of what has happened, what's happening now, and where it's going, like what's going to happen in the future. So verse one says, six days before the Passover, Jesus therefore came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. So it says six days before the Passover. Many of you know what the Passover is, but I'll explain it if you don't. The Passover is the Jewish celebration of God passing over Israel, excuse me, while they were in Egypt. And so hundreds of thousands, if not million, you know, somewhere in that range, Jews would come back to Jerusalem to basically worship, to come together. And so that's what's happening during this time period. This particular Passover was especially important, truly, because it was, for Jesus, his last Passover. He'd celebrated 32, somewhere in that range, you know, 30 Passovers, and this is his last one. Because in fact, within one week of this event, he would be crucified for the sins of the world. So I'm sure that kind of weight was upon him as he entered back into Bethany. So again, he was in Bethany, which is a suburb of Jerusalem, about a mile and a half, two miles outside the city. If you remember, from chapter 11, this is where Lazarus was from. This is where his tomb was located. Now Lazarus was the man who was sick, you know, very sick. And then Jesus hears about it. He decides to stay a few more days and hang out, maybe watch movies, Star Wars or something. And then he decides finally to head towards Bethany and then Lazarus dies. And then Jesus weeps, Jesus wept, right? The passage that every kid has memorized. Jesus weeps and then he comes there, he raises Lazarus back to life. Lazarus, the brother of Martha and Mary. This event was maybe Jesus' most public and bold and amazing miracle that he performed while he was on the earth. Raising a man who had been dead for days back to life. So many people saw it. So it's hard to deny. So what happens in turn with this event is that people don't like it. That often happens when amazing things happen. So a council gets convened. Excuse me, need some hot coffee. Really hot coffee, these things work well. Oh, did you hear that? Nice. So a council gets convened, and hopefully I'll be able to finish the message here. And they come together, they're like, what are we going to do about this Jesus guy? You know, he's raising people back from the dead. What are we going to do about him? And so they meet, and it's not one of those happy council meetings where it's like, oh, everything's roses. No, it's not that way. It's like a really angry homeowners association meeting where it's like people are mad about house colors and things of that nature. It's not one of those happy meetings. So the high priest of that year basically determines that somebody's going to die for the people. And it's a very ominous kind of prediction because they want to kill Jesus. It's very clear. And so after that, Jesus has to depart. So he goes to a place called Ephraim, which is 15 miles or so from Jerusalem, which he has to withdraw. And then he makes his way back to Bethany. And then they go to a house of a man named Simon the leper. It doesn't say that here in John 12, it says it in the parallel account. You can actually find the parallel accounts in Matthew chapter 26 and Mark chapter 14 or 13, I'm forgetting at this moment. But there are parallel accounts that give you more details as well. So it's here where we dive into the characters of this story, this event. And so first let's look at Martha. She was an incredibly hard worker. A servant. And in this new year, your desire and my desire should be to serve Jesus like Martha. Serve Jesus like Martha. Verse two says, so they gave a dinner for him there. Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those reclining with him at the table. What a phrase that is, Martha served. Martha served. There's so much time, energy, devotion, passion wrapped up in that one small statement. Martha serving here means that she's giving humble, loving assistance to the at least 16 guests that are in this place that she's serving this meal. But really for Martha, did she ever really do anything other than serve? That's what we see of her a lot is that she is, she's a servant. That's the way that she seems to roll. Martha was always serving. Her name is synonymous with it. Her motives were in the right place in this instance. She was serving from a place of selflessness. The word that's used for serving here is the same as in Matthew 20, 28 and Mark 10, 45, where Jesus says that the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. Her motivations were pure, which always isn't an easy thing, right? Because Martha is a very works-focused person. She's all about the task. And one of the dangers of being a works-focused person is that you could really miss the whole point. You can get lost in the work itself. You could become obsessed, angry, distracted, even if it's in ministry. You want to keep your finger on John 12 and flip over to Luke chapter 10. Luke chapter 10 verses 38 to 42. We're going to spend a couple minutes there. Luke chapter 10 is where we see Mary and Martha introduced to us. This is probably the first time that Jesus has been inside Martha's home. He's maybe met her before, but this is the first time we see it in scripture. Verse 38 says, Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village, and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. What an interesting idea that verse 40 brings forth, that Martha was distracted with much serving in this instance. This word for distracted is the idea of being anxious, frantic, overwhelmed by the task. She had worked herself into a tizzy. She was truly overwhelmed. I imagine a woman in a kitchen with like pots everywhere, things are burning, you know, she's got the chef's hat on and like, you know, I can't even say it. The face is all flush, you know. Struggling through making the meal for so many people. That's Martha in this circumstance. The same Martha that we see in John 12, but this is a very different situation. So how could someone be distracted with much serving? Let's think about that. I'll give you three reasons. Number one, they're too focused on the task. Kind of mentioned this already, but they're missing the point. They're missing the point. They're missing the Savior that they're serving. They're too focused on other people's actions, number two. Why aren't they helping me? What are they doing? What's going on with them? Too focused on other people. And number three, what it really comes down to is that they're too focused on themselves. You'll become distracted by serving when you're doing it for who? Yourself. For the show of it. Another definition of the word distracted that I found is the word, is the idea of being drawn away. Isn't that interesting? That if you serve in this way, you'll actually be drawn away from the Lord. Who here has been on a mission trip before? Three of you? Come on, who's been on a mission trip before? Okay. I've been on like 30, I don't even know, a lot. You know, when you're serving in student ministry, you just, you go on a lot of mission trips, right? So I've been on a lot of them. And I know there's been times where I've served, but I've been missing the whole point, and I've been actually more distant from the Lord at times during the trip. And He has to kind of reel me back in. You know, like, why are you doing this? Why are you here? What's the point? It's very easy to let that happen. Martha lets her expectations regarding serving get her all riled up and she was in the wrong place in her thinking and it comes out of her mouth in her words towards Jesus. She didn't like the fact that Mary was at Jesus' feet. And she says, Lord, do you not care? Imagine the complaint being breathed out, like just, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me. Kind of sounds like a five-year-old little girl maybe yelling at her brother to clean up the toys, wash your hands, you know. Like telling Jesus this, like how crazy is that, right? I often try to picture Jesus' reaction to these things, and in this instance, I imagine him being like, seriously? Like, come on, you know? Like reacting almost in frustration, but does he react that way? I don't believe so. And he stops what he's doing, and he looks her in the eyes, and he says, Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion which will not be taken away from her. In this loving and patient moment, I think this had a profound effect upon Martha's life. I think she would look back to that event and be like, man, I didn't get it. I didn't get it. I imagine her stopping what she's doing and kind of looking down and being like, man, I didn't get it. Realizing her error, repenting. So jumping back to our John 12 passage, there's No mention of Martha serving in this way any longer. It just says simply and beautifully, Martha served. That's it, Martha served. She's learned her lesson and is simply and beautifully working hard, serving her Lord, and for maybe the first time that we see, she's not worried about what her sister is doing. She's not letting that distract her also. And that's a good thing. Some of you can relate to the way that Martha is wired, task-oriented, driven, making checklists. Getting to cross things off the checklist, is that exciting for you? Some of you maybe? Maybe writing finished checklists and crossing that off? That's really nerdy. Nobody does that, right? Except half of you probably do. If that's you, my encouragement to you is this. Don't miss the beauty of sitting at Jesus' feet, serving Him well in 2017, of calming your soul, of serving Him in a way where it's not about you, it's not about others and what they're doing, but it's about loving Him through serving Him. And that's enough. So let me turn this toward you here for a second. What does your serving look like here at Harvest? What does it look like? Some of you are very much like the good version of Martha here at Harvest. You are tireless, you pour out your time, you pour out your energy, your treasure, your everything. You give your all here. And if you do, I want to say thank you. Jeff did that first service. He said thank you to the people that are serving. We had like vomit going on and people missing. I mean, it was all out anarchy out there, but our volunteers make it happen, right? And we need more people like that. There is a small group of people that tend to do most of the work in churches. There's that whole 20-80 rule, like 20% of the people do 80% of the work. And I don't think that's true here. Praise the Lord, I don't think that's true here. I think there's a larger percentage of people that are involved in serving. But where do you need to grow in this? There's opportunities all over the place. In our student ministry, on our connected teams on Sunday morning and in our children's ministry, maybe more than anywhere. There's always need for servants in children's ministry, right? I mean, we do have this whole building thing that's going on, right? We're gonna be in a school. We're going to be. That's just the reality for a period of time. And there's a lot of work that's gonna have to go into getting a school building ready to be a church on Sunday morning. So we're gonna need more hands, right? Because many hands make light work. Okay. Thanks, Sally. So if service didn't characterize your 2016, then jump on board in 2017. Don't miss out. So jumping back into John 12, it's a good thing that Martha is no longer focused on what her sister is doing because Mary, is about to do something that is scandalous for this time period. And it definitely would have bothered her in a huge way before. If you look at verse three, it says, Mary therefore took a pound of expensive ointment made from pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. Oh, that you and I, in 2017, would love Jesus like Mary. We would love Jesus like Mary. Mary had a special love in her heart for Jesus. If you remember in Luke 10, she was the one who was sitting at his feet listening to him. And it wasn't just like a wah, wah, wah type of listening, like maybe some of you are doing to me. It was like listening intently on the edge of your seat, like waiting for the words to come out of Jesus' mouth. I so want to be like Mary, but I get distracted like Martha very easily. Mary had a closeness with Christ, which should be our goal, and she had a selfless type of love and devotion for him. And this type of devotion is costly, financially costly, especially in this event. There's a financial cost. So she wanted to show him her love, so she does it with a very special and expensive bottle of perfumed ointment called nard. Any commentary you look at that talks about this, talks about how this nard was from a very remote location in the Himalayan mountains. It had to be put on a camel and marched somewhere, so it was really, really expensive, over miles of terrain. It had a value of 300 denarii, which is basically a year's wages. Perhaps it represented Mary's life savings. Imagine taking everything that you make for a year, or maybe what you've been slowly putting in retirement because you have kids and you don't have a lot of money, and just spending that all for Christ, to worship Him, to pour out your love and devotion. This should challenge the way that you and I give. Our giving should be sacrificial and reflect our love for Christ. Mary truly lived out Matthew 13, 44, which says, The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy, he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. The question that you must ask yourself is, do I love Jesus more than my money and my possessions? Do I love him more than the blessings that he's provided? I would like to say yes all the time for me, but the reality of my life is that sometimes I love the stuff, the people, the things that he's given to me more than I love him. I think we can be vulnerable in church. I'm sure many of you can share that with me. And if you say yes, I do love him more. The deeper question is, does your spending and your giving reflect that? Because that's where the rubber meets the road. We can say all day that we value him more than our stuff, but when our stuff is threatened, do we still give it? Is he still worth more? So what we see Mary do next with this costly ointment carries with it an incredible social cost as well. Not just financial, but social. So while Jesus is reclined at the table, she bends down and she breaks the bottle and she pours it over his feet. We also see her, in some of the other accounts, pouring it over his head as well. And she doesn't just wipe his feet with a towel, but with her hair. The hair of a Jewish woman is truly her glory. It's her crown, it's called. It's a thing that is incredibly valued by a woman during this time period. And not only was she using her hair, but she had to unbind her hair. Like, women didn't just have their hair out like they do here, right? It was covered up, it was treasured. In one commentary, I read the gospel according to John, he says that respectable Jewish women never let down their hair in public. In fact, it was considered a mark of a woman of loose morals. People thought something very negative about Mary, about what she did. The fact that she would wipe his dirty and blistered and smelly feet, and yes, Jesus had smelly feet. Though we don't quite think that, we think like pure, white, you know. She wiped it with her hair, wiped his feet with her hair, showed her humility. The feet are truly focused upon in this account. It shows the loving posture and the humility of Mary. Mary's act of love isn't limited by using a small amount of the nard. $40,000 worth of nard, right? A lot. She uses all of it. She pours it all out. It's not like a diluted mixture. Like, this is a lot. A lot of ointment, a lot of nard. She empties the contents onto him. She uses the full bottle. She pours out her full worship before him. The fragrance of this incredible perfume spreads throughout the whole house. This act of love and service unto Christ was public. It was unashamed. She didn't care. She wanted people to know, even though it had this great cost. It would be told to billions of people thousands of years after it happened. But did she know that? No. She didn't know that. She was just pouring out her love. I sometimes think, you know, would I love Christ that much if he was right here before me? Or would I be ashamed of what other people would think of my love? You should ask the same question. The reality that we must all wrestle with is that he is here. Amen? Like he's here with us. And he is awaiting your unashamed adoration, just like Mary offered without fear of what others will think. I looked up that phrase, unashamed adoration, and what came up was actually some harvest churches, and I don't know if they trademarked that phrase or something, but Harvest Spring Lake and also Pastor James in Rolling Meadows. And they went through kind of four different examples of what worship should be. They say it should be vertical to God, to him, not for us. Number two, it should be simple, clear, but not shallow. Number three, it should be emotive, expressing emotion. What a concept that is. I think in our context here, a little bit, Kansas City, there's maybe a struggle with the emotional side when it comes to worship. To worship him in spirit and truth involves all of those things. Your spirit should be moved emotionally by worship. That emotion may be joy, it might be lamentation, need for repentance, but it should never be indifference. And number four, it should be physical. It should be loud. It should use our hands. There's knees involved sometimes. There's dancing involved sometimes. Oh, snap. I said dancing and worship. Now I'm not proposing some kind of a wild dance party worship thing going on or something like that. That's like what we do in student ministry, right? No, we wouldn't. But it's okay to move when you're worshiping, right? And I think some of you do move. There's a little of this going on sometimes. It's like a slow dance for worship. So it's not like a fast dance, but it's a slow dance. So some of you are dancing in your worship. I hate to tell you that. So don't stop moving because of that, okay? But worship should be physical. And I think Ben and our worship team do an incredible job of leading us in worship on a weekly basis. But where do you need to grow in your worship? Is it physical? Is it emotional? Is it removing distraction? Is it maybe sitting in the back so that there's not people looking at you from behind, you know, you're not distracted by the people behind you? Pastor Jeff has been very open to how he's grown physically as a worshiper, and I would challenge you all to ask the Lord where he would desire to grow you in that way too. So let's jump back to John chapter 12. So I'd encourage you to serve like Martha, to love Jesus like Mary, and next I will encourage you to respond to Jesus, not, N-O-T, like Judas. Respond to Jesus, not like Judas. Verse four says, but Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples, the one who was about to betray him, said, why was this ointment not sold for 300 denarii and given to the poor? Judas was not concerned for Christ. He was not concerned for the poor. He was concerned for himself. It was about how he could line his own pockets. Unfortunately, Judas is the spokesperson in this circumstance, and they define why. It says in verse 6, he said this not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief. And having charged the money back, he used to help himself to what was put into it. He skimmed off the top. He was guilty of extortion. Few pennies here, few pennies there. Judas justified his behavior. His extortion, his disobedience, his stealing, and his lack of real transformation through the gospel, through the one he spent time with, leads to an eventual betrayal of Christ. If you want, go ahead, turn over to Matthew 26. You can, you don't have to, I'm gonna read it, but Matthew 26, verse 14. It says, You notice the contrast? A jar of perfume ointment that's worth $40,000, 300 days wages versus 30 pieces of silver? It's not even a fathomable comparison, but that's all it costs for Judas to betray Christ. But why now? Matthew 26, why now? What happened that would cause him to want to betray Christ at this point? Well, notice it says the word then. Then one of the twelve went to the chief priest. Whenever the Bible says then or therefore, you need to look what happened before. What happened in that previous circumstance or story? You can see in Matthew 26, 6-13 that Mary had just anointed Jesus through in the same way. her act of worship pulled, pushed Jesus, pushed Judas, not Jesus, pushed Judas over the edge to outright betrayal. Now, I often think of Judas, and I have a little bit of pity on him, because I'm like, is he so different than us, right? If you look at the course of Peter and Judas, both betrayers of Christ, right? But Peter had a genuine relationship with Christ. He had been changed by Christ. Judas had not been. He was there when people were healed. He was there when people were fed. Judas was there when Lazarus was raised from the dead. He was there for all of it. And he missed the point. He missed the one who caused all of those miracles to take place. He was a man who had every opportunity to respond to Jesus with love, devotion, surrender, and instead he chose betrayal. He ends up feeling guilty over what he's done and he tries to take it back. Matthew 27, three to five, talks about how he goes back to these priests and he throws the money back in their face. I don't want it, I don't want it. But it's too late, right? He seems to be sorrowful, but it was a worldly sorrow. And 2 Corinthians 7.10 says that godly sorrow produces a repentance that leads to salvation. Think about Peter in that circumstance. without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death." Judas. He goes on to commit suicide out of his worldly grief. Judas wasn't repentant. He never turned from his sin. He simply felt bad about it. He never surrendered to the one that he had spent three long years with. Some of you sitting here have been around Christ, around Christian people for a long time, but you are missing it. And I would ask the Lord to search your heart, because He's the one that knows, and you might know too. Maybe you've been living as a fraud, as a fake. The thing about a really good mask is that when you're far away, it's hard to tell that it's fake, right? Like somebody could look like, I could look like Jeff Terrell if I put a mask on from far away. I'd look like him, right? But when you're up close, you're like, ooh, not the same thing. You could tell that it's a fake, right? Judas' response to Mary's act of worship and to Jesus makes all the sense in the world when you think about all this. January 1st, 2017 could be a life-changing day for you. A day when you stop being a fake, when you stop being a fraud, and you fully surrender your life to Him. This is maybe the response that you need to Jesus, not like Judas. Now, I know New Year's resolutions get a bad rap nowadays because, again, they seem unmeasurable at times and what people decide they're going to do. But I like the idea of a resolution. And I named this message Rendering Resolutions because mainly it's cool alliteration, because that's what you do in the harvest world, but I love the word rendering. Because one of the definitions of rendering is the action of giving, yielding, or surrendering something. Doesn't that sound like what you need to do to start off 2017? Give something to the Lord, yield to the Lord, surrender something to the Lord. You're resolving to make a change in your life going forward. And what better day to do that than New Year's Day, right? There's a newness. You could start new. What I love about the Holy Spirit is that He's very specific with us at times, right? Like, the enemy gives us this big general, like, you stink in general. You stink in all these ways. Change it, you know? But the Holy Spirit's very specific. Like pushing a button of where you need to change, whatever that is for you. Maybe that's in the way that you serve, or don't serve, I guess. Maybe it's in a way that you love Christ, that you spend time with him. Or maybe it's in the way that you respond to your sin, respond to the Lord. So what we're going to do to end this message is I'm going to give you 30 seconds to basically write a resolution, a faith resolution, if you will, on the bottom of your message notes. And I want you to write something very specific, like, I will serve the Lord by doing this. Don't just say it generally. I will love the Lord more by doing this. I will respond to the Lord by doing this. I should go ahead and take a minute to do that. Lord, I thank you so much for this time where you've given us an opportunity to examine ourselves, to examine where we're falling short, and also to examine whether we're in the faith. So God, I pray that you would just continue to stir these thoughts towards you, Lord, as this day goes on. May we not forget what it is that we're committing to as we walk out these doors. Lord, we commit to you afresh, Lord, that we need you, and we want you, and we want to be different in 2017. Lord, we pray that you would help us to grow as worshipers. Give us an opportunity, even now, to grow as worshipers, Lord. We thank you for your son. We thank you for his sacrifice. We thank you for the fact that he calls us to himself. Praise in Jesus' name, amen.