In 13:1—14:42 the Lord Jesus is preparing the disciples for His death. In 13:1-37 He prepares them by telling them the things to come. Then in 14:1-11 He prepares them by enjoying their love, while His opposers conspire to kill Him, and one of His disciples plots to betray Him. In 14:12-26 the Lord prepares the disciples by instituting His supper that they may remember Him and finally by warning them of their stumbling and charging them to watch and pray (14:27-42). In this message we shall consider the preparation carried out in 14:1-11.
In 14:1-11 three matters are merged: the opposers’ conspiracy to kill the Slave-Savior, the Lord’s enjoyment of His followers’ love, and Judas’ plot to betray Him. While “the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to seize Him by craftiness and kill Him” (v. 1), the Lord’s followers were showing their love for Him. Simultaneously, Judas Iscariot, “one of the twelve, went off to the chief priests that he might deliver Him up to them” (v. 10).
Mark 14:1 speaks of “the Passover and the feast of Unleavened Bread after two days.” Although the chief priests and the scribes wanted to kill the Lord Jesus, they said, “Not at the feast, lest there be an uproar of the people” (v. 2). Eventually, under God’s sovereignty, they did kill the Lord Jesus at the feast (Matt. 27:15) for the fulfillment of the type.
The Passover was a type of Christ (1 Cor. 5:7). Christ is the Lamb of God that God may pass over us, the sinners, as portrayed in typology by the Passover in Exodus 12. Hence, it was necessary for Christ as the Passover Lamb to be killed on the day of the Passover for its fulfillment.
According to the type, the Passover Lamb had to be examined for blemishes during the four days preceding the feast of the Passover (Exo. 12:3-6). Before His crucifixion, Christ came to Jerusalem the last time, six days before the Passover (John 12:1), and was examined by the Jewish leaders. There was no blemish found in Him, and He was proved to be perfect and qualified to be the Passover Lamb for us.
Mark 14:3 says that Christ was in Bethany “in the house of Simon the leper.” Outside of Christ, it was not possible for anyone to find God. This One had left the temple. He had condemned the temple to be destroyed. However, the disciples were still occupied with their religious concept of the temple. According to their understanding, God was in the temple, for it was His house. I doubt that the disciples realized that God had left that house when the Lord Jesus walked out of the temple in chapter thirteen. Since Christ Jesus is God, when He left the condemned temple and forsook it, God forsook it as well. Going to the Mount of Olives with some of His disciples, He prophesied to them that the temple they admired would be destroyed. Furthermore, that temple would be replaced by Christ Himself.
In chapter fourteen we see that after leaving the temple, the Lord came to a house of a cleansed leper in Bethany. A leper signifies a sinner. Simon, as a leper, must have been healed by the Lord. Being grateful to the Lord and loving Him, he spread a feast in his house for the Lord and His disciples in order to enjoy His presence. A saved sinner would always do this.
Today God’s house is with cleansed lepers. As believers in Christ, we all are cleansed lepers represented by Simon.
Simon loved the Lord Jesus and prepared a feast for Him. “When He was in Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as He reclined at table, a woman came having an alabaster flask of ointment, of pure nard, very costly; and breaking the alabaster flask, she poured it over His head” (v. 3). This woman truly loved the Lord. God’s house, the church, is composed of those who love Him. His house is composed of cleansed lepers and those who anoint Him.