This chapter is full of little pictures of Christ helping people see that He is about to go to the cross. They did not grasp what they were about to see, but later they would recognize that Jesus was saying all along. Jesus came for the purpose of saving the world though through His teaching many did not give Him the time of day, or they were so caught up in their evil desires that they could not grasp what He was saying. Judas for example in the first section here contrasted with Mary was focused on Jesus as to what he could gain from Him. Sometimes we follow Jesus because we look good in certain respects or selfishly get some gain from it. Then we become solely focused on the stuff we can get from Jesus rather than Jesus Himself. Mary here received much love from Jesus and her response was to love Jesus back not with the goal of getting more back, but with the desire to glorify Him. Jesus constantly spoke about loving and caring for the poor, so He is not going against that here in verse eight. Rather Jesus is pointing to Himself as the one who we should all seek to love first. So often we try to live our Christian lives by doing some task or being involved in some action. While these are good, they must be out of response to what Jesus has done for us, rather than a tool we use to try to earn His love. I think of Matthew 6:33 as I read this passage. May we not become focused on anything that might distract us from glorifying Jesus.
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