Luke 7:36-50
One of the Pharisees asked Jesus to eat with him, and when he went into the Pharisee’s house he reclined to dine. And a woman in the city who was a sinner, having learned that he was eating in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster jar of ointment. She stood behind him at his feet, weeping, and began to bathe his feet with her tears and to dry them with her hair, kissing his feet and anointing them with the ointment. Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw it, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him, that she is a sinner.” Jesus spoke up and said to him, “Simon, I have something to say to you.” “Teacher,” he replied, “speak.” “A certain moneylender had two debtors; one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they could not pay, he canceled the debts for both of them. Now which of them will love him more?” Simon answered, “I suppose the one for whom he canceled the greater debt.” And Jesus said to him, “You have judged rightly.” Then turning toward the woman, he said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has bathed my feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven loves little.” Then he said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.” But those who were at the table with him began to say among themselves, “Who is this who even forgives sins?” And he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”
I have memorized nearly every word of the musical Les Misérables. And safe to say, it
was one of the best Sunday School classes a middle schooler could ever have.
The story if you don’t know it is about Jean Valjean. He spends nineteen years in prison for stealing a loaf of bread. When he is released, he has to carry a yellow passport marking him as a criminal. He is free but not welcomed which is another kind of prison. Doors close. Faces harden. He wanders through the cold with the weight of his past hanging around his neck.
Finally, one door opens. Bishop Myriel sets a place for him at the table. Gives him a bed. Calls him brother. And a cynical Valjean repays his kindness by making off with his silver. He is caught. Hauled back. The sack clanks with evidence.
Shockingly, the bishop tell police, “No, no. I gave it to him.” Then he says, “But you forgot these.” And he adds the silver candlesticks. The bishop tells Jean Valjean, “Remember this my brother, see in this some higher plan. You must use this precious silver to become an honest man. God has raised you out of darkness. I have bought your soul for God.”
An act of extravagant grace changes the trajectory of his life. This is the Gospel. Grace bursts in for all the people the world might treat as disposable. The orphan, the criminal, the prostitute. And grace arrested the heart of middle school me.
Grace understands that people rarely change for the better by being told they are the worst. Grace understands that we are rarely shamed into goodness, instead, we are loved into it.
That is exactly what is unfolding in Luke 7.
A Pharisee throws a dinner party. Everything is curated. Respectable. Predictable. And in she comes. A woman known in the city as “a sinner.” She lets down her hair. She cries on Jesus’ feet and pours oil on them from her big jar. It is awkward. It is public. It is sensual. It is excessive.
The Pharisee wants to call security. He clicks his tongue. If this were Les Miz, he is giving Javert energy. He whispers, if Jesus were a real prophet, he would know what kind of woman this is. Save your breath and save your tears. Honest work. Just reward. THAT’S
the way to please the Lord.
But then Jesus says, “Simon, a word please.” He tells a story not about God but about finance. I guess we all understand silver. Imagine two mortgages, Jesus said. One has maybe $200 left on it. One is enormous, with college debt and medical bills and credit card bills stacked on top of it. Both people have their debts canceled. Which recipient will love that moneylender more? That’s a softball question. Simon answers correctly. And then Jesus asks the sharper question:
“Do you see this woman?” Not: Do you see her sin? Not: Do you see the optics? Not: Do you see the disruption? Do you see her? And then Jesus turned it around. Because Simon, she sees me. She sees mercy. She sees dignity restored. She sees a door opening. She is not auditioning for forgiveness. She is responding to what is given already.
And then it becomes clear this story is not simply about this woman but about Simon. For all his effort to be a host, he was being taken to welcome school. Simon learns that all his spiritual bookkeeping has diminished him. He cannot experience love fully because he does not think he has ever really needed mercy. And that has made his life smaller. It is cold and lonely on the moral high ground.
It is easy to see in this story a tidy moral lesson. Be welcoming. Be merciful. Don’t be that hypocrite who wants to be exclude social misfits and sit at the table of virtue at the same time. We love this story as long as we assume we are not Simon. We assume we would welcome the woman. We assume we are not the judgmental type.
But what if the woman is not just a character in the room? What if she is the part of you you try to keep hidden? The regret. The insecurity. The failure. The part of you that bursts in loud with habits life a scarf of red flags that still trips you up. You come to church. You try hard to be decent. You balance your moral budget. And then in she comes, the part of you you cannot stand and she kneels at Jesus’ feet. You are embarrassed, rolling your eyes. But Jesus does not recoil.
He does not say, “Get yourself together.” He says, “Do you see her? The part of you that is her? Can you see the flash of shame you carry? For many people, it’s the temper or that pesky perfectionism or control issues… the rolling river of resentment or the old trauma or that big secret. This story asks, what if that part of you could be here? Could be forgiven? Could be free? Could even be honored for teaching your heart how to love and how to finally let go of your anger about how things should have been? Can you see Jesus at work in the spreadsheets of your soul, your metrics of the finance of fairness, and realize that you too weep for forgiveness – for yourself and the people who have wronged you and others? Jesus says what he always says. Forgiveness extended, both inside you and outside of you, is not some great social cost but it is to your benefit.
This story does not end at Jesus’ feet or at church or in therapy. It spills into the street. Into musicals and anthems that stir our soul. Into the most powerful acts of kindness in this world. People who give not out of duty or condescension but out of the clear vision that probably came from their own tears. People who realize that when Jesus asks, do you see her, he also asks do you see me?
In Matthew 25, Jesus says: “I was hungry and you gave me food. I was thirsty and you gave me drink. I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” He does not say, “I was impressive and
you were in the photo with me. “I was the sympathetic character and you noticed that early.” “I was morally satisfying, your best life now, and a thousand-watt smile.” He says, “I was hungry.” “I was lonely.” “I was in prison.” If you’ve listened to anything Jesus ever said, it is, I am near the heartbroken places and people, often the ones you find hardest to love and the ones who make your dinner parties weird and the ones whose suffering is undeniable.
To be a Christian is to claim that how you respond to the least of these is how you respond to almighty. To be a Christian is to be fully vested in God’s financial system, where giving is what yields more love in your own life. As Ann Lamott said, “We think we are
hungry for all that we do not get. We are actually starving for what we do not give.”
For I was the child with a negative lunch balance, and you paid it. I was the single mom
choosing between eggs and insulin, and you stocked the shelves at ECHO. I was the middle
schooler scrolling at 1:00 a.m., aching to hear “You are enough,” and you showed up as a
confirmation sponsor. I was the exhausted nurse. The furloughed worker. The immigrant laborer sleeping in the hypothermia shelter. I was imprisoned by addiction. By grief. By policies that erased my dignity. And you saw me. You refused the easy math where something for me meant something taken from you.
Father Greg Boyle ministers among former gang members in Los Angeles. He has seen thousands of gang members leave a life of violence to work side by side with former rivals making loaves of bread or selling t-shirts. Along the way, they heal from trauma, provide for their families and experience jaw-dropping jar-breaking welcome. It is like Les Miz in L.A. He said, What if we ceased to pledge our allegiance to the bottom line and stood, instead, with those who line the bottom?
Then let the jar break, let the tears fall, lets gather at this big table where courageous love is the only math that counts.
Amen.