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For the next 3 nights, we are going to walk through 3 different spaces in John’s Gospel – a house filled with perfume, a hillside where Greeks come searching and finally an upper room where betrayal unfolds. In each place, we will listen for the heartbeat of love as it moves toward the cross. And, if you’ll forgive me, we will hear that heartbeat echoing in the songs of Dolly Parton – songs about costly devotion, about letting go, about love that risks being wounded. Tonight, we will stand with Mary as she pours everything out. Tomorrow, we will hear Jesus speak of seeds falling into the earth. On Wednesday, we will sit in the shadow of night as bread is handed even to a betrayer. Together we will trace a pattern: love poured out, love surrendered, love remaining faithful in the dark. And in each moment, we will ask – what does glory really look like?

Holy Monday – John 12:1–11

The Gospel takes us to the day before the entry into Jerusalem. Six days before Passover, Jesus comes to Bethany. That detail matters.

Just six days. The clock is ticking. The cross is no longer a distant horizon. The authorities are plotting. The tension in Jerusalem is thick. And yet – here, in this house, it’s dinnertime – or, since we’re up north, it’s teatime.

John gives us details. John likes details. Lazarus is there. Lazarus, who had been four days in the tomb. Lazarus, whose very breathing is an embarrassment to the authorities. Martha is serving – as she does, faithful and practical. And then there’s Mary. Mary does something unforgettable.

She takes a pound of costly perfume – pure nard. Imported. Rare. Worth a year’s wages. This is not a small devotional gesture. This is her security poured into vulnerability. This is inheritance liquefied.

And she kneels. She anoints Jesus’ feet. And she wipes them with her hair. The house fills with fragrance.

John wants us to notice that. Love has a scent. It lingers. It permeates. It cannot be contained. But immediately the objections begin.

Not compassion but calculation

Judas speaks. “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?” It sounds righteous. It sounds responsible. It sounds exactly like the kind of thing any sensible church treasurer might say.

John, however, does not let us stay at the surface. Judas speaks not from compassion, but calculation. He kept the common purse. He skimmed from it. He sees value in numbers, not in surrender.

And here, in this room, we are given a contrast that will carry us through Holy Week: calculated usefulness versus extravagant love.

Mary’s act is unnecessary. And that is precisely why it is beautiful.

Relinquishment

Twenty years before Whitney Houston made it even more famous, Dolly Parton wrote and released the song ‘I Will Always Love You’ that catches something of this: “If I should stay, I would only be in your way.”

The song is often heard as romantic – and later, famously amplified into Whitney’s soaring vocal power – but at its heart it is about relinquishment. It was written at a moment of parting, when Dolly chose to leave a musical partnership that had, so far, defined her career. It is not a song about clinging. It is about blessing someone’s path, even when it leads away from you. It is love without grasping.

Mary’s love has something of that quality. She is not trying to secure Jesus. She is not bargaining. She is not strategising influence. She is not calculating legacy. She is simply pouring out what she has. And what she has is excessive.

We are uncomfortable with excess in religion. We prefer balance. Proportion. Responsible stewardship. But Holy Week does not begin with moderation. It begins with what looks like waste. Because love in the face of death rarely looks sensible.

Mary senses something the others do not. Perhaps she cannot articulate it. Perhaps she cannot explain it. But she senses that time is short.

Burial

Jesus says, “Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial.”

Burial. There, he names it. While the others still anticipate triumph, he speaks of burial. While the crowds will soon wave palms, he knows the wood of another kind of tree awaits.

Mary’s action becomes prophetic. She anoints him in advance. And notice – she anoints his feet. In the ancient world, anointing the head was kingly. Anointing the feet is intimate. Humble. Vulnerable.

In just a few days, in this same Gospel, Jesus will kneel and wash the disciples’ feet. The roles will reverse. The one anointed will become the one who kneels. Love is already moving downward.

And the fragrance fills the house.

Fragrance

It is worth pausing here. John rarely wastes a sensory detail. The scent is not incidental. In the Song of Songs, fragrance signifies love’s intensity and presence. Here, in Bethany, the house becomes almost temple-like, saturated with devotion.

But the fragrance also foreshadows something darker. Soon the air will carry other smells: sweat, fear, blood, death. Holy Week will not remain perfumed. And yet this scent will cling.

I wonder – when Jesus enters Jerusalem, does he still carry the aroma of pure nard? When he stands before Pilate? When the nails are knocked in and he is on the cross? Does the fragrance of Mary’s love linger even then? We cannot know. But the image is powerful.

Something singular

Love offered in quiet devotion accompanies him into suffering. And Judas cannot understand it.

Judas is the voice of efficiency. “Why was this not sold?” His concern for the poor sounds biblical. And indeed, care for the poor runs deep in the Bible. Jesus does not dismiss the poor. He says: “You always have the poor with you.”

This is not indifference from Jesus. It is quotation – echoing Deuteronomy, which commands ongoing generosity precisely because poverty persists. But in this moment, something singular is happening.

There are moments when love cannot be deferred. There are gestures that are not strategic but sacramental. There are acts that prepare the heart for what is coming. And Mary’s act is one of them.

Pours it all

Dolly’s refrain echoes through the scene: “I will always love you.” Love sung not in possession but in release.

Mary doesn’t cling to the perfume. She doesn’t store it for later. She does not ration it. She pours it all.

And here we begin to see the deeper theology of this passage. Because this is not only about Mary’s love for Jesus. It is about Jesus’ love for the world.

John’s Gospel will soon declare that having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end – or more literally, “to the uttermost.”

Mary’s act mirrors Christ’s coming act. She pours out what is precious. He will pour out his life. She kneels. He will kneel. She prepares him for burial. He prepares them for new life.

Misunderstanding

This is how Holy Week unfolds: love answered by love, self-gift answered by self-gift. But there is yet another layer.

John tells us that the chief priests are plotting to kill Lazarus as well – because on account of him many are believing. Life itself becomes dangerous. Resurrection is disruptive.

And so, in this house where death has already been reversed once, the shadow returns. Love and threat coexist. Which is often how it is in our lives too.

We love in fragile conditions. We give in uncertain circumstances. We pour ourselves out knowing that it may not secure outcomes. That is what makes love costly.

We prefer love that guarantees return. Love that protects us. Love that can be measured and justified. But Mary’s love is defenceless.

She loosens her hair – another act of vulnerability in her culture. She kneels publicly. She risks misunderstanding. And she is misunderstood.

Holy Week will be filled with misunderstanding. The crowd will misunderstand kingship. Pilate will misunderstand authority. Peter will misunderstand loyalty. Judas will misunderstand purpose.

But Mary, in this quiet house, understands something essential: love must be given before it is too late.

We don’t know how long

There are moments in life when we do not know how long we have. Words left unsaid. Affection withheld. Gratitude unspoken. Sometimes it takes crisis for us to realise that love cannot be stored safely for later use. Mary does not wait.

“I will always love you.” In the song, those words are sung in parting. In Bethany, they are enacted in anticipation of loss. And Jesus receives the gift.

He does not refuse it as excessive. He does not rebuke her for impracticality. He protects her from Judas’ criticism. “Leave her alone.” There is something deeply tender in that defence. Jesus receives love.

That may be harder for some of us than giving it. To receive without embarrassment. To allow ourselves to be anointed. To be ministered to before we minister.

Jesus allows it because he knows what is coming and because this act of devotion is not distraction from his mission – it is part of it. Holy Week does not begin with activism. It begins with adoration.

Before the crowds shout. Before the disciples scatter. Before the trial unfolds. There is a woman kneeling. And the house is filled with fragrance.

Generosity

So, what might this mean for us as we enter Holy Week? Perhaps it means asking: Where are we calculating when we are invited to love? Where are we preserving what could be poured out? Where are we speaking efficiency when devotion is needed?

This is not a call to irresponsibility. It is a call to generosity of heart. Because at the very centre of our faith stands another act that looks, to the world, like waste.

The cross. A life poured out. A future surrendered. A body broken.

Efficient? No.
Necessary? Yes.
Glorious? In John’s Gospel – yes, absolutely!

Mary’s perfume is the overture. The fragrance of costly love precedes the ultimate gift.

Tenderness

And, so, we begin Holy Week not with triumph but with tenderness. With kneeling. With surrender. With love that releases rather than grasps.

“If I should stay, I would only be in your way.” Christ will not stay where we want him – safe, admired, contained. He moves toward Jerusalem. Toward the cross. Toward the hour.

And we, like Mary, are invited not to control that movement but to accompany it with love. To pour out what we have. To bless the path. To let fragrance fill the house.

A Blessing for the Offering

Blessed are you
who pour out what you love
without counting the cost.

Blessed are you
when the fragrance of your giving
fills the room
long before it is understood.

May you trust
the beauty of what is offered,
even when it is questioned,
even when it is misunderstood.

And may the One
who receives such gifts
hold your devotion
as something precious
and never wasted. Amen.

‘Costly Love – or “I will always love you”‘ was delivered by Ian Banks at St Katharine’s, Blackrod, on Monday 30th March, 2026. It was based on John 12:1-11. It’s the first of a three-sermon series in Holy Week.