The Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread was very near. Many went to Jerusalem before the Passover in order to purify themselves.
The people were looking for Jesus and wondering out loud if He would come to the feast.
The people knew that the religious leaders were actively looking for the opportunity to arrest Him.
Six days before the Passover, Jesus arrived in Bethany.
Bethany was where Jesus had raised Lazarus from the dead and was very near Jerusalem.
When Jesus was in Bethany, they made a supper for Him in the house of the man called “Simon the leper.” Simon had been healed by Jesus and loved Jesus and was good friends with Lazarus whom Jesus had raised from the dead and his two sisters, Mary and Martha.
Martha served the dinner and Lazarus, whom Jesus raised from the dead, Mary and Simon and his household were all present along with the disciples of Jesus.
While Jesus was sitting for the meal, Mary, the sister of Lazarus, carried an alabaster jar of exceedingly costly perfume and broke it and poured it over the head of Jesus.
She then anointed His feet with the expensive perfume and wiped it with her hair.
The house was filled with the smell of the ointment.
But Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve disciples and the one who would betray Jesus, said,
‘Why wasn’t this ointment sold. The perfume is worth three-hundred days wages, and the money could have been given to the poor?’
Judas was the one who carried the purse for Jesus and the rest of the disciples, and he regularly stole money for his own purposes.
Jesus heard this and said,
“Leave her alone. She is pouring this ointment upon my body in preparation for my burial.
The poor you have with you always, and you can do good to them whenever you want.
The truth is that wherever the good news is preached, what Mary has done today will be spoken about in memorial to her.”
The common people, meanwhile, learned where Jesus was and they came to see Him and Lazarus.
The chief priests, the Scribes and the Pharisees were conspiring to put Lazarus to death.
They hated Lazarus and wanted to destroy him. It was because of Lazarus that many had believed in Jesus.
