Hi Everyone,
I hope no one minds if I give my "womanly" thoughts on this because that is what jumped out at me as I was contemplating this thread.
I find it interesting that it was a woman who recklessly ate of the tree, and it was a woman who against logic recklessly spent all she had to lavish love on the Savior. It's like coming full circle almost.
I'm thinking that in this case, Mary represents the Elect...against worldly logic and sensibility she risks everything to follow what is spiritually the only treasure that's important...Jesus:
John 12:3
Mary therefore took a pound of expensive ointment made from pure nard, and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. Our treasure is in Jesus...there is nothing that compares to that. Here's what Jesus had to say about Mary on another occasion, when her own sister complained about her:
Luke 10:38-42
38 Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house.
39 And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching.
40 But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me."
41 But the Lord answered her, "Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things,
42 but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her." Martha reminds me of "the called"...busy and anxious about how to "serve the Lord", while Mary focuses on ONE THING...listening to the teachings of Jesus. She seems to me to characterize an element of the Elect. She gives whatever she has for the treasure of Jesus....and serves him in spirit and in truth...washing his feet (with all that she has).
Luke 7:38
38 and standing behind Him at His feet, weeping, she began to wet His feet with her tears, and kept wiping them with the hair of her head, and kissing His feet, and anointing them with the perfume.Matthew 26:13
13 Truly I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done shall also be spoken of in memory of her.John 13:5-7
5 Then He (Jesus) poured water into the basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded.
6 And so He came to Simon Peter. He said to Him, "Lord, do You wash my feet?"
7 Jesus answered and said to him, "What I do you do not realize now, but you shall understand hereafter."It's like a balance...like a perfect marraige...needing each other, giving to each other, serving each other, loving each other....washing each other's feet.
The Elect, like Mary, must give up everything that is worldly for the sake of the truth:
Matthew 13:44
44 The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.So the woman...Mary...once an adultress, a "whore"...gives it all....becomes the virgin bride...the Elect....from carnal to spiritual...from evil to good...
For by means of a whorish woman a man is brought to a piece of bread: and the adulteress will hunt for the precious life. Proverbs 6:26
How long will you waver, O faithless daughter? For the LORD has created a new thing on the earth: a woman encircles a man. Jeremiah 31:22
I am not saying that there is anything special about being a woman, only that there is something beautiful God expresses through female tenderness and unrestrained passion. Come on girls, isn't it a female tendency to be a hopeless romantic, while males are far more reasonable and logical?? Often a woman needs a man in a different way than a man needs a woman. God needs his Bride, just as the Bride needs her Husband...each is important, together they become ONE.
Genesis 2:23-24
23 Then the man said, "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man."
24 Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.
Interesting, how Jesus' first earthly miracle was performed at a wedding:
John 2:9-11
9 When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was made wine, and knew not whence it was: (but the servants which drew the water knew;) the governor of the feast called the bridegroom,
10 And saith unto him, Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse: but thou hast kept the good wine until now.
11 This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee....And we find at the end...
John 19:25
25 standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.3 women...faithfully by Jesus' side, right to His death...(3=completed process, the Bride, the Elect...enduring to the end...faithful unto death)
Matthew 26:12
12 In pouring this ointment on my body, she has done it to prepare me for burial.What love between a bridegroom and his bride!!
(Okay, yes...I am a hopeless romantic!
Peace,
Diana