Intro: When I was in Bible College I meet an interesting young man by the name of Shannon. What made him interesting were his looks. His hair was a different color each week, his ears were loaded with earrings, and he wore the big loose grunge style clothing. But the most interesting point of style was his shorts, and he always wore shorts regardless of the weather. What made his shorts so odd was the way he wore them. You see he always wore his shorts backwards. As you could imagine anyone who dressed like that at a Bible College stuck out like a sore thumb. One day I couldn’t stand it any longer and my judgmental sarcasm got the best of me and I had to make a crack about his shorts. To my surprise he was ready for my criticism. Shannon turned to me and said, “I’ll tell you Grand Saline (that’s what everyone called be in this certain class) just like I tell everyone else who ask me why I wear my shorts backwards. I tell them that God turned my life around so fast that my shorts couldn’t keep up. Something interesting happened as that semester progressed I began to see through Shannon’s actions, class participation, research papers and prayers that he was a very spiritual man. My initial reaction to Shannon was on of rejection, but when I saw past my bias to his heart, my rejection soon turned to respect.
We’ve all used labels. We stick them on jars and manila folders so we’ll know what’s inside. We also stick them on people for the same reason. This past week I was picking up some Baptism certificates for the church and the clerk asked me if I worked with the youth or something. When I told her I was the pastor I could tell by the expression on her face that she thought I looked a little too young to be a pastor. Then with her eye brows furrowed she enquired to my age, with an option not to tell her just in case I was too embarrassed. When I told her I was 32 her face relaxed and she gave me an approving “oh ok then”, while handing me the sack and releasing me out of her custody.
Transition: In our text today we look at a person who approached Jesus who was labeled with a sinful lifestyle. We learn from this text that we not only need to be careful not to judge a person’s outward appearance as well as their heart. Not to say that we shouldn’t be discerning but we need to be careful not to condemn others because only God knows the heart.
The reason we label others is very simple, because it’s easier to label than to love.
Isa 64:6 All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.
1. Only one thing could cause a “sinner” to come into a Pharisee’s house – DESPERATION. (v. 36-37)
The intrusion of this woman was intolerable to the respectable Pharisee because of her evil reputation and because she was not an invited guest. Whenever a Pharisee or an upstanding person in the community would give a party such as this either in the outer courts or around the house or the streets the common people would gather to listen to the conversations of the affluent. In the streets or the outer courts of the Pharisee’s house would’ve been the proper place for this sinful women, for her to enter in without an invitation is the first sign of her heart. For she wouldn’t let the labels that everyone put on her keep her away from Jesus. Her desperation was greater than her fear and her worries of what others might think or do in response to her approaching Jesus.
2. She approached Jesus in humility, sacrifice and adoration. (v.38) To kiss a persons feet was the greatest act of humility known to the pagan. When foreign ambassadors would approach Roman rulers seeking peace with them they would fall to the earth and kiss the feet of the council. Her tears were a sign of her penitence, as she approached the savior she was overwhelmed by her sinfulness and her adoration poured out through her emotions. The sinful woman’s sacrifice is seen in the perfume she willingly poured out on the Lord’s feet. No one asked her to do this, it wasn’t required of anyone who approached Jesus, and she simply poured out the best she had because she wanted to.
2 Cor 9:7 Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
This must have been a premeditated act for the fact that she had the alabaster jar with her. But the tears were not for they are involuntary, and as a result she had no towel which brought about the necessity of drying the Lord’s feet with her hair.
3. The religious label expert. (v.39)
Jesus didn’t meet up to the expectations of the Pharisee. He expected Jesus to reject the woman’s actions as repulsive due to her label “sinner”. At this time rabbis never talked with a woman in public if they could help it and if they did, they were very careful as how they conducted themselves. “IF THIS MAN WERE A PROPHET,” he was thinking that if Jesus were truly sent from God, then He would know the character of this woman and would have rebuked her. “TOUCHING HIM,” The "touch" of a Gentile or a person singularly wicked, they supposed to be polluting, and the Pharisees avoided it. Now the Pharisee believes he ses through Jesus and places a condemning label on the Lord. But Jesus is the one who sees through the Pharisee and now through a parable is going to let the Pharisee pronounce judgment on himself.
4. We all owe God a debt we can’t pay. (v. 41-42) It’s easy to see the moneylender represents God and the one who owes five hundred denarii is the sinful woman, while the one who owes fifty represents Simon. Although in comparison Simon’s debt is much smaller than the sinful woman’s, neither had the resources to pay God for their sin debt. The point is clear, all of us stand condemned before God and without His mercy we all will perish. Regardless of it being a little sin or much sin, all the ground beneath the cross is level your either a sinner or a saint, your either lost or saved.
5. Simon the selfish. (v. 44-47) The fact that Simon didn’t wash Jesus’ feet was a breach of etiquette on Simon’s part. Jesus could have considered this an insult being a guest of Simon’s. YOU DID NOT GIVE ME A KISS. In the East today men frequently greet each other by a kiss on the cheek. It was a common polite greeting of friends in Jesus’ time. YOU DID NOT PUT OIL ON MY HEAD. A touch of perfumed oil would have been a part of the preliminaries to the feast, but Simon had omitted even this inexpensive favor. The woman had used costly ointment. Jesus contrasted Simon’s lack of courtesy with the devotion of this woman, and implied that Simon had not experienced a deep forgiveness. The reason behind Simon’s small experience of forgiveness was his shallow understanding of his sinfulness. He perceived himself to be a righteous man with very little need of God, and that’s exactly how much of God he experienced.
Conclusion: In his marvelous book, The Kingdom of God is a Party, Tony Campolo tells a story that illustrates how I believe the church must begin to live out our witness in the new millennium. Campolo was attending a Christian conference in Honolulu, Hawaii. Since there was a six-hour time differential between Honolulu and his hometown in Pennsylvania, on his first night there Campolo experienced some confusion in his sleep pattern. He woke up about 3 o’clock in the morning and couldn’t get back to sleep. So he got up, got dressed, and left the hotel where he was staying, searching for a place to get something to eat. Eventually he found a tiny coffee shop that was open. Here is his description of what happened there: "The fat guy behind the counter came over and asked me what I wanted. I told him I wanted a cup of coffee and a donut. As I sat there munching my donut and sipping my coffee at 3:30 in the morning, the door suddenly opened, swung wide, and to my discomfort in marched 8 or 9 provocatively dressed and rather boisterous prostitutes. It was a small place and they sat on either side of me. Their talk was garrulous, loud, and crude. I felt completely out of place. I was just about to make my getaway when I heard the woman next to me say, ‘You know, tomorrow is my birthday. I’m going to be 39.’ Her friend responded in a rather nasty tone, ‘So what do you want from me? A birthday party? What do you want? You want me to get a cake, and sing happy birthday to you?’ ‘Come on,’ the woman sitting next to me said, ‘why do you have to be so mean? I’m just telling you that it’s my birthday. Why do you have to put me down? I don’t want anything from you. I mean, why should I have a birthday party? I’ve never had a birthday party in my whole life. Why should I have one now?’ Campolo says, "When I heard that, I made a decision. I sat and waited until the women left, and then I called over to the fat guy behind the counter and asked him, ‘Do they come in here every night?’ He answered, ‘Yeah.’ ‘The one who was sitting right next to me, does she come in every night?’ ‘Yeah,’ he said, ‘that’s Agnes. Yeah, she comes in every night. Why do you want to know?’ ‘Because,’ I replied, ‘I heard her say that tomorrow is her birthday. What do you say we do something special for her? What do you think about throwing a birthday party for her right here in the coffee shop?’ A cute kind of smile crept over that fat man’s chubby cheeks. ‘That’s a great idea,’ he said. ‘I like it. That’s great. Agnes is one of those people who is really nice and kind. I don’t think anybody has ever done anything nice and kind for her.’ ‘Well, look,’ I told him, ‘if it’s okay with you, I’ll be back here tomorrow morning at 2:30. I’ll decorate the place. I’ll even get a birthday cake for her,’ ‘No way!’ he replied. ‘The birthday cake, that’s my thing. I’ll bake the birthday cake myself.’ "At two thirty the next morning," Campolo says, "I was back at that coffee shop. I picked up some crepe paper and other decorations at the store, and made a sign of big pieces of cardboard that said ‘Happy Birthday, Agnes!’ I decorated that diner from one end to the other. I had it really looking great. The word must have gotten out on the street, because by 3:15 that morning every prostitute in Honolulu was in that place. There was wall-to-wall prostitutes – and me. At 3:30 on the dot, the door of the diner swung open and in came Agnes and her friend. I had everybody ready… When they came in we all jumped up and screamed, ‘Happy Birthday, Agnes!" Then we sang to her. And you know, I’ve never seen a person so flabbergasted, so stunned, so shaken. Her mouth fell open, her knees started to buckle, her friend had to offer her arm to steady her, and I noticed she had started to cry. When the birthday cake with all the candles was carried out, that’s when she lost it. She started sobbing. Harry, the fat guy behind the counter, gruffly mumbled, ‘Blow out the candles, Agnes, blow out the candles.’ Then he handed her a knife and said, ‘Cut the cake, Agnes, cut the cake.’ Agnes looked down at that cake, and without taking her eyes off it, she slowly and softly said, ‘Look, Harry, is it okay with you if I, I mean, if I don’t, what I want to ask, is it okay if I keep the cake for a little while? Is it okay if we don’t eat it right away?’ Harry shrugged and answered, ‘Well, sure, Agnes, that’s fine. You want to keep the cake, keep the cake. Take it home if you want to.’ ‘Oh, could I?’ she asked. Looking at me, she said, ‘I just live down the street a couple of doors. I want to take the cake home, okay? I’ll be right back, honest.’ She got off her stool, she picked up that cake, and she carried it out of the diner like it was the Holy Grail. She walked slowly toward the door, and we all just stood there, speechless. When the door closed behind her, there was stunned silence in the place. Not knowing what else to do, I broke the silence by saying, ‘What do you say we pray together?’ Looking back on it now, it seems more than a little strange that a sociologist from eastern PA would be leading a prayer meeting with a bunch of prostitutes in a diner in Honolulu at 3:30 in the morning. But I prayed. I prayed for Agnes. I prayed for her salvation. I prayed that her life would be changed, and that God would be good to her. And when I finished, Harry leaned over, and with a trace of hostility in his voice, he said, ‘Hey, you never told me you were a preacher! What kind of preacher are you anyway? What church do you belong to?’ In one of those moments when just the right words come, I answered him quietly, ‘I belong to a church that throws birthday parties for prostitutes at 3:30 in the morning.’ Harry thought for a minute, and then almost sneered as he answered, ‘No you don’t! There is no church like that. In fact,’ he concluded, ‘if there was, I’d join it.’
