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This sermon is about phileo love. For those who have done RELATA, you will recognize this as one component of the paradox of love. Phileo love, as it is talked about in the Bible, is a Greek concept meaning literally, a love between brothers. It’s an archaic term because it doesn’t have to be gendered in any way, but that’s how it goes with the limitations of language. This kind of love is not romantic or unconditional. Those are other types of love.
Phileo love is characterized by friendship, affection, and mutual respect. It can be used to describe the love between friends, like Jesus and the siblings; Mary, Martha, and Lazarus.
Take just a moment to consider the times in your life in which you have experienced this kind of love. It might have been a college roommate, a childhood friend, or a mentor.
These are the relationships where there is a bond of support, guidance, and mutual care. This is a love made up of storytelling and trust. It is a love not prone to jealousy.
Phileo love is one way to describe the relationship I had with my college chaplain. I wouldn’t have described it that way at the time, but it fits. Michael was an Episcopal priest, and he was the catalyst for my going to seminary right after college. I am the age now that he was then.
Twenty years ago, when I was still in seminary, Michael died very tragically, suddenly, and violently. The grief was unimaginable.
I was at a critical point in my formation and discernment, and this loss was the first death I had ever experienced. The moment I learned what had happened, grief settled in my body like a fog. I was numb for days. It felt as if the whole world should stop because of the pain I was in. I remember being bewildered on the day of his funeral because life was continuing on as normal all around me.
Something really strange was happening as well—something in my body. I completely lost my sense of taste and smell. It took a few days to even notice, but then I was painfully aware. This loss of senses lasted weeks, and I wondered if it would ever return. But then, one day, I was eating a simple bowl of soup at lunch with some friends. I was eating only out of habit at that point, not enjoyment. As I began eating the soup, I realized immediately I was tasting it… and smelling it. That was the day I began working through my grief.
Our senses powerfully shape the ways in which we experience the world, both physically and spiritually. Sometimes an enhanced experience of our senses brings about a moment of transcendence or awe. Or, our emotions are so overwhelming that they transmute or diminish our senses in a dramatic way like my experience of grief.
The gospel reading today, the one about Jesus and Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, includes a swirl of emotions and powerful sensory experiences.
The chapter prior to this one is the story of the Raising of Lazarus, and that is important. There are a few details from this story that I want us to notice, and they have to do with touch, smell, and feelings. If you recall, Lazarus is very sick and he dies. Jesus knows of his illness, and yet he doesn’t hurry to Bethany, but takes his time. And when he arrives, Lazarus is already dead and in the tomb. Upon hearing this news, Jesus weeps. John 11:35, the shortest verse in the entire Bible: Jesus wept. He doesn’t get slightly choked up or a little emotional, he weeps.
Jesus’ tears are powerful. When was the last time you wept? Not a time when you got a little teary-eyed watching a movie or watching a grandchild graduate, but really wept. If you can’t remember a time when you broke down in tears, think about that too. It’s okay to cry.
Jesus weeps because his friend Lazarus, the one he loves like a brother, has died. Lazarus’ sister, Mary, is also weeping, as well as the members of the community who are gathered with her at the tomb.
Tears are an outward and physical manifestation of inward emotions. We cry when we are profoundly sad, and we cry when something is hysterically funny. Some people cry when they are embarrassed or angry too. Tears are sometimes within our control and sometimes, they come uninvited in hot waves streaming down our face.
I can feel the grief and sadness in this text, the warm rush of tears on all of the faces. But then, Jesus tells them to roll away the stone that is sealing the tomb. Ever-practical Martha objects, pointing out that he has been dead several days and obviously, it stinks!
Now, we have the sense of smell… and not in a good way. We have the smell of death mingled with the strong perfume used to anoint the dead. It is a mix of spikenard and decay, opulence and rot.
In the face of the open tomb, Jesus roars at death, so loud that he scares death away and Lazarus staggers forth from the tomb.
Following this miracle, Jesus leaves Bethany and the home of his friends and travels to Ephraim in the region near the wilderness where he stays with his disciples. He does this because he knows that his life is in danger. Jesus knows that the chief priests and Pharisees want to kill him and will arrest him at the first opportunity.
With an arrest warrant out on his head, Jesus returns to Bethany to be with his friends. In a time of tremendous stress and anxiety, Jesus leaves his community, the disciples, and goes to the home of his friends. He enters the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, the ones with whom he shares this phileo love.
They throw a dinner party, and there’s Lazarus, seated beside Jesus, still clumsy from his days in the tomb, perhaps Jesus helps him manage the meal, pouring wine for him and passing the bread.
In the midst of dinner, moved by this phileo love, Mary gets up and does something startling. She loves Jesus like a brother, and they all know what is about to happen. They aren’t dwelling in their grief just yet, what with Lazarus freshly returned from death, but they know Jesus’ death is coming. Their dread permeates every action.
Mary takes her bottle of perfume, one pound of perfumed ointment really, the same spikenard that she had used to anoint her dead brother only a week ago. It came from the Himalayas and was quite precious, used only in anointing the dead for burial. That is, until now…
The lavish scent permeates the air, overpowering the smell of the food and jolting Lazarus out of his daydream. Mary, tenderly and lovingly, anoints Jesus’ feet and wipes them with her hair. She anoints him for burial.
Mary uses touch to express her love for Jesus, her phileo love, the love of friendship, affection, and mutual respect. This scene might feel a little awkward, too familiar or intimate, and that is why we must pay attention. Don’t miss this moment.
The full meaning of this scene is not about Jesus reveling in the attention or Mary for that matter. This moment is about God. God is doing something here!
These chapters are luxurious, extravagant, and relentless, and they foreshadow what is to come, which we will dive into in Holy Week. But we aren’t there yet. Today, we are still in this story, in a small house in Bethany, with Jesus and his friends.
These chapters call to mind my own journey through grief, particularly the weeks following Michael’s death when I lost my sense of taste and smell.
Just as Mary used the sense of touch and the overpowering scent of spikenard to express her phileo love for Jesus, my own journey through grief was marked by a profound sensory experience. Losing taste and smell was a physical manifestation of my emotional numbness, much like the way Mary’s actions spoke volumes about her love and understanding of what was to come. It was in the simple act of tasting a bowl of soup that my senses began to return, marking the beginning of my journey through grief.
In the same way, Mary’s anointing of Jesus was a sensory act that signified the beginning of a journey toward understanding and acceptance of what was to come.
As we approach Holy Week, let us remember that our senses can be powerful conduits of love and healing, guiding us through the complexities of life and loss. May we, like Mary, find ways to express our love and faith through the senses, trusting that God is doing something profound in our midst.