Thurs, July 6, 2023
Eva Lee Matthews
The Rev. anne williamson
Matthew 26:6–13
While Jesus was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very costly ointment, and she poured it on his head as he sat at the table. But when the disciples saw it, they were angry and said, “Why this waste? For this ointment could have been sold for a large sum, and the money given to the poor.” But Jesus, aware of this, said to them, “Why do you trouble the woman? She has performed a good service for me. For you always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me. By pouring this ointment on my body she has prepared me for burial. Truly I tell you, wherever this good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her.”
Today’s gospel takes us back to the final week of Jesus’ earthly life, the week leading up to Good Friday and the crucifixion. Jesus has made his triumphal entry into Jerusalem and in the Gospels of Matthew and Mark, this story of the anointing at Bethany takes place in the house of Simon the Leper (he must have been someone healed by Jesus, or yet to afflicted…otherwise he wouldn’t have been there!). It is an enacted ritual of his impending death, a ritual of anointing which Jesus describes as preparing him for his burial. There is outrage at the extravagance of this gesture but Jesus tells those gathered two important truths – the poor will always be with them (and us) which is a reminder that those who follow Jesus are to have concern for the poor, and this unnamed woman would be remembered wherever the Gospel is proclaimed, which she is!
This Gospel imperative of concern for the poor was the life’s work of Eva Lee Matthews, whose feast we celebrate today. Matthews was born in Ohio and her father was a Supreme Court Justice. She was a lifelong Episcopalian and devoted her life to helping others. Matthews worked in Nebraska and latterly moved back to Ohio where she worked in Cincinnati at Bethany Mission House. With a coworker, Beatrice Henderson, Matthews founded a new Episcopal religious order, The Community of the Transfiguration, for the expressed purpose of assisting the poor in Cincinnati, especially disadvantaged children. Matthews led the Community from 1898 until her death in July 1928, and the Community’s work of obedience to Jesus’ call to serve the poor continues today.
How easy it is to be so wrapped up in our individual concerns and interests that we lose sight of the Gospel imperative to direct our attention to the least, the last and the lost. I pray that God will redirect my attention, redirect our attention, as is appropriate for each of us at this moment, to the people and situations God wants to place on our hearts. May we each be paying attention to where we are invited to bear the light of Christ into the shadows of this world, bringing hope to the least, the last and the lost.
O God, whose blessed Son became poor that we through his poverty might be rich: Deliver us from an inordinate love of this world, that, inspired by the devotion of your servant Eva Lee Matthews, we may serve you with singleness of heart, and attain to the riches of the age to come; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.