A Magnificent Obsession

When we are young, we dream great dreams and have great visions.  We will be nurses, doctors, firemen and superheroes.  We will marry Prince Charming and have beautiful children who think we are the most wonderful parents in the history of the world.  As we grow older, we sometimes wake up to find our dreams have faded away...some of us lose sight of our dreams altogether. 

Others of us never really learn to dream, or find the loss of some dreams too painful to risk trying to dream again.

A thought occurred to me just now about the nature of dreaming...when we're in love, we usually dream great dreams about the object of our affection.  What we will do and where we will go...what we will say in a special moment, and just how we will look.  In a word, dreaming is akin to obsession. An obsession that steals us away...lost in imaginative thoughts of happy times and unlimited possibilities.

Do you have any dreams left to dream?  Any magnificent obsessions to steal away your heart and your thoughts?

We read the story today of a sinful woman who bursts in on a dinner party for Jesus, held by a Pharisee in the town where Jesus was teaching.  If you haven't heard the term Pharisee, you may not be alone...perhaps not the most common title these days, a Pharisee was a religious leader and scholar of the Jewish people during the time that Jesus lived.  Certainly it's easy to imagine such a scene...a religious leader of the town has invited Jesus to dine.  I think it's likely this Pharisee had invited other influential men in the community to join in.  After all, Jesus was considered an upstart rebel by many of these leaders, and His teaching was causing quite a stir.

In the 7th chapter of Luke's gospel, Luke tells the story of how Jesus had just sat down at the table to eat when a woman burst in.  This woman was known as having lived a sinful life, in that town.  She would have been known to these people at dinner, and not favorably so.  She brought with her a jar of alabaster perfume, which scholars tell us was likely worth a year's wages at the time.  She wept at Jesus' feet, and dried them with her hair. She anointed Jesus with this most precious and expensive perfume. Oblivious perhaps, to the other people at the table?  We don't really know.  But whether she was aware or oblivious, Jesus was her obsession that night.  Loving Him, demonstrating unrestrained devotion and thankfulness to Him, regardless of the social cost of such a display, was her only thought.

This woman held nothing back of what she could give to Jesus, and she allowed nothing to hold her back from expressing her great love for him.  Nothing was more important to her, least of all how the other people at the table might have judged her behavior.   Her love and gratitude was so great, Jesus Himself became her magnificent obsession.