Genesis 18.1-10a; Luke 10.38-42
“Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things.” Maybe so. But it’s easy to have natural sympathy for Martha. The world depends on people like her to get things done. Where would holiday meals be without Martha and her kin, preparing food in the kitchen, and cleaning up afterwards, while guests enjoy each other’s company in the living room and don’t think twice about what’s going on behind the scenes. That’s how today’s gospel looks—Mary sitting at Jesus’ feet while Martha serves. We need people like Martha to get things done, churches included. Who sets up coffee or the altar and cleans up afterward? Martha and her descendants. Who serves meals at Salvation Army and Churches United? Martha. Her aggravation at the circumstances of today’s gospel is justifiable, understandable and, from our perspective, forgivable. So before we get to Jesus’ gentle correction of her, we need to say a word on Martha’s behalf.
The Bible has a good word to say on her behalf. The gift of hospitality is praised by the scriptures. In today’s first reading, Abraham and Sarah show what biblical hospitality looks like. Three strangers stop by Abraham and Sarah’s tent and are welcomed and served a meal. What’s on the menu? An entire cow, along with some milk and cheese, and bread made from so much flour that, when we do equivalent measurement and scale it out, each of the three visitors had 10 to 12 loaves of bread to eat each.
An ancient commentary on the story of Abraham and Sarah invites all the faithful to share this generous spirit. “Let us too, my beloved, imitate the hospitality of the patriarch Abraham.” The Bible itself has good things to say about Martha and her kin. The New Testament continues the theme when it tells Christians to “extend hospitality to strangers.” In the biblical world, hospitality wasn’t a commercial industry but a reflection of the character of God. Just as God cared for the Israelites when they were strangers and aliens in the land of Egypt, God’s people are meant to do the same in response. Hospitality is expected of every and any person, and for every and any guest, even beyond the Israel’s borders. “The foreigner who resides with you must be treated like a native citizen.” To do that, you need Martha.
And biblical hospitality isn’t only a response to God; it is a way to meet God. In the New Testament, we read that when we entertain strangers, we entertain angels without knowing it. The invisible beings that inhabit our world are made visible through the presence of visitors and guests in worship and in the people we serve at Salvation Army and Churches United. So before getting to Jesus’ correction of Martha it is important to know that the scriptures speak a word on her behalf.
All that positive biblical background means, I believe, that we can say with confidence that Martha’s problem is not the serving itself. Now it is true that we often make today’s gospel account of sisters Mary and Martha a ‘compare and contrast’ story: the contemplative life on one side and the active on the other with Mary’s contemplation coming out on top. “Mary has chosen the better part, and it will not be taken from her.”
Yet when Jesus says this, he doesn’t deny the value of what Martha is doing, only how she’s doing it. “You are worried and distracted by many things.” That’s the problem—not the serving but the worry and distraction. Today Jesus hints at something he says two chapters later in this gospel. “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear. For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing…Strive for the kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.” Worry and distraction have kept Martha from the one thing that matters, the one thing given in Jesus when he comes to her home, the kingdom of God present in Jesus now with Martha in her life that reprioritizes all of life.
There are other ways that Gospel of Luke highlights this idea that worry and distraction, not the hospitality and the serving, are why Jesus gently corrects Martha. The Gospel of Luke has positive things to say about ‘doing.’ Last Sunday, we heard the parable of the Good Samaritan. That parable is about a person who actively cares for someone in great need; it ends with Jesus saying, “Go and do likewise.” Doing in and of itself is not the problem. Faith is active in works of love.
The Gospel of Luke then follows the Parable of the Good Samaritan with today’s account of Mary and Martha. They’re right next to one another in the Bible, one following the other; they belong right next to one another in shaping our faith. Listening without doing becomes a mockery of faith. The New Testament reminds us that “faith without works is dead.” And there is so much need for Christians to join in doing good works in our communities and in the world, not merely sitting still and missing out on the God-given opportunity to, the New Testament reminds us, “do good works for everyone.” Yet doing without listening can become mere busyness, frenetic activity with no sense of value and purpose behind it, leaving us exhausted and burned out. That’s what we see in Martha, worried and distracted, so busy doing that she forgets the reason she is doing it at all. How often do we get so busy living that we lose our focus on the source of life? St Ambrose reminds us, “Do not let service divert us from the knowledge of the heavenly Word.” Jesus at the center of life is “the one thing needful,” Jesus who comes to us. In him, the kingdom of God is present and that kingdom and reprioritizes all of life.
Now about the worry and distraction that displace a single-minded focus on God’s steadfast love and faithfulness in Jesus, I think we all have experience. That may be one of the reasons we have natural sympathy for Martha. Worry and distraction are the symptoms of our age. I know how this works out for me. At the beginning of a day with a full calendar ahead, what gives way? It’s so easy to forego time for prayer in the morning, for example, because there is a list of things that need doing. What is this like for you? Is it possible to take time for thirty minutes of prayer each day, divided equally between morning and evening; twenty minutes of quiet time once a day; ten—is there any time at all? Only at the end of the day when I check my phone see how much screen time has been devoted to social media, podcasts, a daily puzzle, or just general scrolling, I discover that I could have used all that time and prayed like a monk!
Now electronic distraction gives a kind of immediate bump of satisfaction that reading scripture doesn’t. But only one of those choices has the power to sustain over the long run; only one will put into perspective all the pressing needs of the day, the anxieties and fears of the moment; only one will renew us in the “spirit of our minds,” as Ephesians puts it, so that we who are created in the likeness of God can live a life rooted in God, a life that is holy. Early in his ministry and teaching, Jesus tells a parable about a sower who sows seed. Some seed falls among thorns. When Jesus explains the meaning of this parable, he says the seed is the Word of God and the seed that falls among thorns is a picture of people who hear the word. But because of life’s worries and distractions that preoccupy them, the seed does not flourish; the word is ‘choked’ by the thorns, by the worries and distractions of the present moment. That’s Martha. Is it you? Mary, in contrast, has chosen the better part, holding fast to the word. She is attentive to Jesus at the center of life who reprioritizes all of life.
Throughout the gospels, Jesus calls us to single-minded focus on God’s steadfast love and faithfulness. “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear…Strive for the kingdom.” And today, “Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken from her.” Jesus himself is that better part. He is the one thing that sustains our lives over the long run; the heavenly Word made flesh who put into perspective all the pressing needs of the day, the anxieties and fears of the present moment; roots us in God and makes us holy in the world and fruitful in our lives.
Rather than being worried and distracted with many things, today we see that all our works and all our life receive life and purpose from Jesus as the source of life. “Do not let service divert us from the knowledge of the heavenly Word.” Because the one thing that the heavenly Word gives—the one thing Jesus gives—is his life for us, even now at his table in bread and wine. He is the better part that will not be taken from us.
Write a comment: