Women in white raiment

by John Lemley

But there was one soul that saw the cross—Mary. Never forget it, you men; it was a woman that saw the cross and went into the shadow of it with Christ, as it was a woman who became the first human preacher of the resurrection when He came back again. So while He “sat at meat,” in the house of Simon the leper, with the man whom He had cured of the most terrible of diseases upon one side, and the man whom He had raised from the dead on the other, and the disciples on either side of these, Mary looks into the faces of the guests, and they all were happy, as men usually are with a feast spread before them, and even Christ, though fully conscious of his approaching death, and all the humiliation accompanying it, did not abandon Himself to melancholy feelings or looks, yet with that deep intuition that is only born of the highest and the holiest love, she sees what no one else sees, that on His heart is the shadow of a great sorrow. And she is thinking, “What can I do? Can I do anything that will let Him see I know something of His pain? Can I go into the darkness with Him and share in that sorrow?” And when love does this kind of thinking it is always extravagant. She slipped away from her sister’s side in serving, hastened to her room, where the precious treasure was kept, and seizing the alabaster box of spikenard, for which she had paid more than 300 pence, she hastened back to the feast, saying to herself, “I will give Him this; it is the choicest thing I can get hold of, and I want to pour it out upon Him, for He knows I can see His sorrow and pain.” So speaking, she fell at His feet and poured the perfume on His head and feet. It was a lavish waste of love—nearly $1,000 expressed in our money now. But nothing is wasted that is done in love for our Lord. Some murmured, others “had indignation,” and Judas spoke right out, “Why this waste?” Poor Mary, she had never thought of there being any waste to her act of love. “Three hundred pence!” Judas had quickly ciphered out the contents of the broken alabaster box, and just now, at the expense of Mary, was very benevolent. The unbroken box of ointment might have been sold, and the money “given to the poor.”

But, in a moment they were hushed. “Let her alone,” said Jesus. How fortunate for Mary that she had a more righteous Judge to pass sentence upon her action. “Against the day of My burying hath she kept this.” Nobody else understood it. The motive determines the act. “Nothing can be wasted that love pours upon Me, because love enters into My suffering and sorrow, and that is what it meant.”

“She hath done what she could.” O, what a precious revelation! Jesus is fully satisfied with the limit of our ability to serve Him. And the sequel showed that she met her Lord’s future as no other of His disciples had been able; anointed His brow for the thorns, and his feet for the nails, that both thorns and nails may draw blood in the perfume of at least one woman’s love.

In this act of love done for Jesus she has erected to herself a monument as lasting as the Gospel, for the Master declared, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, wheresoever this Gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall this also, that this woman hath done, be told for a memorial of her.” Mary had loved wiser than she knew, but then it is just like Jesus to pay back into our hands a hundredfold more than the most liberal of us ever bestowed upon Him. The sweet story of that beautiful act of the breaking of the alabaster box will be told as long as there is a Gospel to be preached or a soul to be saved. The wonder of wonders is, that in this world of sin and suffering there are not more Marys to break alabaster boxes over the world’s burdened laborers.

We now pass to notice another beautiful womanly character in White Raiment, namely, Salome. Her name means “peaceful,” and, though she developed considerable womanly ambition, her name quite describes her character. She was the wife of Zebedee, a well-to-do fisherman on the Sea of Galilee, and the mother of James and John, two of our Lord’s best loved disciples; two who, with Simon Peter, one of their business partners, constituted the inner apostolic circle. She had not only given two sons to the ministry, but she herself accompanied Jesus in His Galilean ministry, and, with others, ministered of her substance in meeting the expenses of His journeys. She must, therefore, not only have been a woman of means, but liberal in her use of it. No doubt she was a quiet, home-loving body; but she liked so well to listen to those sayings of our Lord that she was glad to leave her pleasant, comfortable Bethsaida house beside the beautiful “blue sea of the hills,” to go about hither and thither with her sons and drink in the wonderful words of Christ.

Salome is best remembered as coming to our Lord, on His last memorable journey to Jerusalem, with the strange request that her two sons might sit, the one on the right hand of Jesus and the other on the left, in His kingdom. Just as in the Sanhedrin, on each side of the high priest there sat the next highest dignitaries, so here she requested the two highest places for James and John. However, perhaps, this was not a selfish ambition, since the request is made for others. Some one has said, “Plan great things for God, and expect great things from God,” and an apostle has said, “Covet earnestly the best gifts.” O, these mothers, when there are seats of honor to be given out can not only “covet,” but “earnestly” ask for great things for their sons.

These two disciples had already been favored. They were with Jesus when He raised Jairus’ daughter from the dead; they were with our Lord on the Mount of Transfiguration, and, later on, in the Garden of Gethsemane, and witnessed His agony. Though of the inner circle, yet they possessed characteristics of their own. They were more eager for extreme measures for pushing their Master’s cause than was even the tempestuous Peter. Their self-poised love of the truth made them zealous. It was they who rebuked the one who cast out demons in Jesus’ name, because he did not follow them. They requested Christ to call down fire from heaven to burn up the Samaritan village that refused to receive them on account of an old prejudice against the Jews. If these disciples could have had their own way, that village, with all its inhabitants, innocent and guilty, would have speedily been reduced to ashes. How little they understood their Lord, or even themselves. They did not get the idea from their Lord, for He came to save men’s lives, and not to destroy them.

Possibly Salome may have thought her sons had some claim to these honors. The family had some business standing. They had partners and servants. John had some acquaintance with the High Priest, the great head of the Hebrew Church. They had left all to follow Jesus, giving up not only their business prospects, but their friendship with ecclesiastical aristocrats, and now she was looking out for a good place in His kingdom for her sons.

Probably the two brethren had directed this request through their mother, because they remembered the rebuke which had followed their former contention about precedence. She asked simply, directly, humbly, nothing for herself, but what she thought was her due. He gave her no rebuke, as He would have been sure to do if she had asked through any selfish motive. Turning to James and John He questioned them about their fitness for such promotion. Could they drink of His cup and be baptized with His baptism? They thought they were able. They knew better what He meant when Herod beheaded James, and John was banished to Patmos.

Salome remained true to her Lord. When the terrible death-hour came she stood beside the cross, held there by her faith and love through the jeers of the mocking crowd, the dying agony of her Saviour, and the darkness which veiled His terrible suffering.