On Holy Wednesday Jesus stayed out of the public eye and
dined in the house of Simon the leper in Bethany. There, Mary of Bethany, the
sister of Martha and Lazarus, poured out her perfume on Jesus, anointing Him
with her oil of great value. Anointing with oil is a common theme in Scripture
when people are set apart for God's special purposes.
Mary is immediately criticized by the disciples because
the oil could have been sold, and the money given to the poor. In fact, the
ointment of pure nard could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii.
A denarii would have been about a day's wages, so this flask was worth almost
an entire year's worth of money!
But Jesus says,
"She has done a beautiful thing to me. For you will
always have the poor with you, and whenever you want, you can do good for them.
But you will not always have me. She has done what she could; she has anointed
my body beforehand for burial. And truly, I say to you, wherever the gospel is
proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of
her."
We also remember on Holy Wednesday that Judas betrayed Jesus. Some traditions refer to Holy Wednesday as “Spy Wednesday” because Judas, a spy among the disciples, betrayed Jesus, and that led to the following events of Holy Week.
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