We spent the last few weeks exploring that fascinating interaction between Jesus and an unnamed Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well. But that wasn’t the only occasion where an unidentified woman had a life-changing encounter with the Son of God – and not the only one whose story would become eternally included in His. Today we’re going to meet another one. And as we discovered in our previous series, when we join Jesus in His world, we find that there’s a lot more going on than there appears to be on the surface. For that reason, we’re announcing up front that this is going to be another one of those “to be continued” posts. This first edition will be devoted to an attempt to set the stage for our story so the action unfolds in its proper cultural framework. We’ll be spending a little more time in Jesus’ world, but as I hope you know by now, extra time spent in Jesus’ world is always an investment that yields eternal dividends.  

Lessons Wrapped in Faith ~
This time we’ll drop in at a Pharisee’s house in Capernaum where we’ll invite ourselves to attend a dinner presumably presented to honor Jesus. We’ll see some unusual behavior and hear some enlightening dialog, but there’s a message that will be delivered in the course of that meal that doesn’t involve a single spoken word, and Jesus doesn’t want us to miss it. At the close of this incredibly dramatic encounter, Jesus addresses the unnamed woman who changed the whole course of the event without opening her mouth. He attributed everything about who she was, what she did, and what it meant, to her faith. The lessons we want to learn are wrapped in the faith Jesus saw in her. So, with that in mind, let’s begin.  

Luke is the only Gospel writer who recorded the event we’re about to invade, and because there were two different occasions that involved Jesus being anointed with oil and they are sometimes confused, a note of clarification might be helpful as we get started.. The incident we’re focused on (Luke 7:36-50) happened in the Galilee region, probably in Capernaum, during the earlier period of Jesus’ ministry, and the woman involved is not identified. The other event, found in Matthew 26:6-13; Mark 14:3-9; and John 12:1-8, took place in Bethany, near Jerusalem, and it was during the last week of His life and was done by Martha’s sister, Mary. 

Luke introduces our story in terms that sound very ordinary and in a way that could hardly be said more concisely. He simply said:

Then one of the Pharisees asked Him [Jesus] to eat with him. And He went to the Pharisee’s house, and sat down to eat. (Luke 7:36 NKJV)

Cultural Context ~
We Westerners often read about events like this in Jesus’ life and picture them in the context of our own experiences in today’s world, but that can often interfere with our understanding. For instance, recognizing the role that hospitality played in Jewish culture has tremendous impact on our grasp of the drama that unfolded during the course of that dinner. For folks like me who grew up in America’s Bible Belt, hospitality might equate to being invited over to Aunt Bertha’s for supper on Sunday evening. But for Jesus, an invitation to dinner at a Pharisee’s house was an event laden with significant potential ramifications on several levels. 

Hospitality Wasn’t an Option ~
For the Jewish people, extending hospitality was more than an optional, neighborly gesture. It was a deeply embedded cultural mandate that had been in place throughout their history. And in Jesus’ day, an invitation to someone’s home for a meal meant that certain established rituals and procedures would be expected. Dismissing them or failing to offer them would either represent social faux pas of memorable proportions, or possibly a way to express significant personal, familial, or religious disdain. If the host happened to be a religious official, like a Pharisee, and the guest was a radical young Jewish Rabbi from Nazareth, the potential impact was exponentially greater. 

Change Begins with Showing Up ~
We should also note that in Jesus’ day, when a person with religious or political status presented a dinner for a noteworthy guest, it was not a secluded, private affair. In addition to other invited guests, people from the community would also gather in an effort to observe the proceedings and listen to the dialog. In this particular event, the status of the people involved would have ensured that news of the event would have spread quickly, and space around the outer portion of the room or courtyard area would already have been filled before the primary guests arrived. That opens the door that will lead us to the first point in the unspoken message mentioned earlier. But first we need to return to Luke’s narrative, which continues like this:. 

And behold, a woman in the city who was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at the table in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster flask of fragrant oil, (Luke 7:37 NKJV)

An Enlightening Illustration ~
This is another one of those texts that needs a little elaboration. When we read that the woman “knew that Jesus sat at the table in the Pharisee’s house,” it sounds like He was already there at the dinner by the time she heard about it. But the culture and a later comment by Jesus make it clear that she was already there when He arrived. Renowned and gifted Middle Eastern cultural and historical scholar, professor, and author, Kenneth Bailey, offers an enlightening and accurate way to approach it. Suppose, he says, a visiting Pastor is coming to preach at your church and someone says, “Who’s hosting the preacher for lunch on Sunday?” Someone else replies, “Oh, he’s having lunch with the Jones family.” That does not mean the preacher’s already there and the meal is underway now. It’s the same situation in this case with Jesus.

The woman heard about the dinner and where Jesus was going to be, devised her plan, procured the perfume, and made her way there. We can picture her standing with other observers, waiting for Jesus to arrive, and expecting the usual procedures to unfold. That sounds like a pretty normal, insignificant thing, but it unlocks the first major point about the faith Jesus commended and the faith we want to emulate. 

Faith isn’t about repeating creeds, acknowledging doctrinal statements, and singing endless stanzas of a praise song. Sometimes the most powerful expositions of faith begin with the courage to just show up, and for this woman, showing up was no minor challenge. We don’t know her name, but the text does reveal how the community referred to her. She’s introduced simply as “a woman…who was a sinner.” A woman being regarded as a sinner in that time and that culture generally meant that she was morally broken and religiously unclean. In any case, her prior transgressions had been exposed and everyone knew it. 

It’s hard for us to grasp the incredible courage it took for this woman just to show up at an event like that, much less draw attention to herself by making a public demonstration of her love for Jesus. Everyone in the community would know about it, and news of her scandalous behavior would spread far and wide and trigger more humiliation and rejection. Choosing to keep her faith and her love to herself would have prevented all of that, but she had a reason for showing up.   

As we’ll see later, the overall context makes it clear that this wasn’t her first exposure to Jesus. The parable He shared made it clear that love is the response to forgiveness, not a pathway to achieve it. She had heard Him before and believed the offer of grace and forgiveness that He preached throughout Galilee, and the faith and love that were born in her then became the force that inspired her determination to show up where He was and make her love for Him known, regardless of the personal consequences. 

We live in a challenging, violent, and oppositional world, and Jesus sent us to change it. And as that nameless woman made clear, the faith that restores hope, overcomes fear, and transforms lives isn’t always about grand, sensational miracles. Sometimes it’s just about having enough courage to show up and to stand with Jesus in the face of a crowd looking for more ways to mock and humiliate Him. 

We don’t know the woman’s name in our story, but we’ll never forget the sacrifice she made for Him. We don’t know the nature of the sins He forgave, but we’ll never forget the depth of the love He inspired. We don’t know exactly where her faith began, but we’ll never forget the courage it gave that brought her close enough to touch Him.

Maybe as we set out to follow Jesus this week, we might look around to see if there are places we should show up for Him, stand with Him, and make our love for Him more obvious …

Next week we’ll dig deeper and pick up our story to see more about what this unidentified, uninvited, but unforgettable guest has to teach us …

“TWEETABLES” ~ Click to Tweet & Share from the pull quotes below. Each quote links directly to this article through Twitter.

• • • “Hospitality was a deeply embedded cultural mandate that had been in place throughout Jewish history. In Jesus’ day, an invitation to someone’s home for a meal meant that certain established rituals and procedures would be expected.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet) 
    • “Failing to offer certain established hospitable rituals and procedures would be expected and would represent either social faux pas of memorable proportions, or possibly a way to express significant personal, familial, or religious disdain.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)
    • “Faith is not about repeating creeds, acknowledging doctrinal statements and singing endless stanzas of praise. Sometimes the most powerful expositions of faith begin with the courage to show up. For this woman, showing up was no minor challenge.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet) 
    • “Love is the response to forgiveness, not a pathway to achieve it. The faith and love born in her became the force that inspired her determination to show up where He was and make her love for Him known, regardless of the personal consequences.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet) 
    • “Faith that restores hope, overcomes fear and transforms lives isn’t always about grand, sensational miracles. Sometimes it’s just about having courage to show up and stand with Jesus in the face of crowds looking for more ways to mock and humiliate Him.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet) 
      

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