The Sixth Sunday After Pentecost, 07/21/2019

Sermon on Luke 10:38-42, by Hubert Beck

Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching,. 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.” But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.”

THE OLD ADAGE “FIRST THINGS FIRST”

REQUIRES IDENTIFYING WHAT “THE FIRST THING” IS

A HIGHLY ALTERED VERSION OF LUKE’S TEXT:

Imagine how different the unfolding of this story about Martha and Mary would have been if Luke had seen and heard it in the following way, recording it for us as follows:

Martha and Mary, two sisters, had often discussed and agreed upon the way to properly conduct the entertainment of guests in their home. A perfect opportunity to carry out their agreement rose in the form of an unexpected visit by Jesus who had just come by “on his way” to somewhere or other.

Although Jesus had surprised them when he arrived unannounced, Martha immediately took up the responsibilities they had mutually agreed upon earlier by making their home presentable and preparing the meal for guests while Mary, recognizing, in turn, the need to honor their guest by giving him her undivided attention, took up her mutually agreed upon place for respecting their visitor by seating herself in a full listening position at Jesus’ feet. After all, he was well known everywhere as a man of great wisdom and she devoted herself to learning everything she could from him while Martha took up the task of physically preparing the home in such a way as to satisfy the needs of the guests who had come with him.

This mutual agreement required a strict division concerning the responsibility of each, but each willingly gave herself to that for which she had made herself accountable according to their earlier joint agreement. Once, with sweat pouring over her forehead and dripping into her eyes, Martha nodded approvingly at Mary as she sat at Jesus’ feet, saying, “I am so glad that you have an opportunity to speak with Jesus at such length, Mary. How I wish that I could do that myself, but I must do that at another time, for surely everybody is quite hungry at present and I must have the food ready and on the table in only a short time from now.” So she returned to her work while Mary continued listening to Jesus.

Can you imagine that exchange – even if such an arrangement had been made much earlier?

What a difference it would have made if the lesson had been given to us in that way, though! We would have been able to take wonderful instruction from such a reading. Just think! On the one hand housework would have been recognized as honorable and even necessary – on an even plain, in fact, with giving attention to God’s word! Hard physical labor would have been blessed as godly as – no more than, but no less than – when one reads, hears, listens to and mulls over the word of the Lord! Each has its place but each is as pious and saintly as the other – and each would be practiced as being on the same plain of significance.

So-called “women’s work” would have been elevated to a very high position equal to and / or even higher than any supposed “godly work”! Glory be!

LUKE OFFERS A VERY DIFFERENT TEXT FROM THAT ALTERED VERSION, HOWEVER

Alas, Luke’s version is very different from the “invented text” quoted above – as you undoubtedly recognize! According to Luke Jesus was “on his way” with his disciples to somewhere or other when, upon “entering a village” a prominent woman in that village named Martha “welcomed him into her house.” She had evidently not planned for this. It was just a happenstance that Jesus was passing through that village. And it was an “off the cuff and unplanned” invitation that had brought him to Martha’s home.

She could blame no one else for the upset she felt, for she had opened her mouth in that serendipitous moment when Jesus appeared in the village. Perhaps she didn’t even think he would pay attention to, much less accept, her invitation. No matter what, though, there he was – and there she was, having to make the best of a very trying situation. For that reason she was exceptionally busy getting everything together in a hospitable way for receiving this unexpected guest along with still others in her house and at her table.

A THOUGHTLESS SISTER

Martha got very ticked off at her sister Mary, (the mutual agreement suggested in our earlier made-up tale was certainly not in effect in this real-life setting!) for failing to help her in these nerve-wracking circumstances that sent her here and there busily serving people and preparing the meal. It would have been bad enough if Mary had just popped in from next door or if she was just sitting around doing nothing but watching her. But when Martha had to practically step over and around Mary sitting at Jesus’ feet “listening to his teaching,” it all just got to her.

This was the point at which one could wish to have actually been there, for sight must have accompanied the sound of Martha’s voice boiling over in fury. One could wish in the same way to have seen and heard the way that Jesus responded to Martha’s sudden and violent outburst.

First of all, Martha’s anger was fundamentally directed at Mary, but she didn’t say a word to Mary so far as we are told. Martha spilled it all out on Jesus! “Do you not care?” she began. He must surely have seen Martha’s frantic efforts, but he paid no attention to them whatever. He had just shuffled over a bit when Martha needed to get by or around him. So Martha felt perfectly justified in putting the basic blame on him for just disregarding her busyness while engaging in conversation with Mary.

“Do you not care?” she said with the sweat pouring down her forehead and into her eyes! “Do you not see what a burden I am carrying in getting all this together and then preparing a meal for all these people on a last-minute notice such as this? I need all the help I can get – and you just sit there talking to the ‘help’ that would be of the most obvious sort (jerking her neck toward and nodding at Mary) as though she were more important than I, who am the mistress of all that is going on, am! What do you plan to eat if I don’t manage to provide it? I desperately need some help (nodding even more conspicuously toward Mary) to get it all together.” Can’t you just hear her “insides” talking?

Not a direct word to Mary, though! All this venom was poured out on Jesus, himself!

One is struck by the way she was emphasizing her need with a threefold reference to herself! “My sister left me to serve alone.” “Tell her to help me.” It was Jesus’ fault for talking with Mary, thus leaving Martha to her own devices. So it was up to Jesus to chase Mary away from him so that she could do what she was supposed to be doing. Mary was the guilty person but Jesus was being blamed – and he was being flogged because she, Martha, was doing all the suffering!

What a strange confluence of events!

A KIND AND GENTLE BROKER

Jesus didn’t question Martha’s work as such, not her need, nor her irritation, nor her well-intentioned mindset – not even her placing the blame on himself nor her hospitable goals. They were all valid. She was doing important --- even valuable – work. Her objectives were well-meant. None of these things were in question, nor did Jesus suggest that.

Mary’s choice of the moment was neither better nor worse than was Martha’s complaint, for that matter. Mary’s “listening” would eventually lead her to do what was necessary, for it was not laziness nor lethargy that put her at Jesus’ feet. Her listening was every bit as much a part of hospitality (for nothing is more INhospitable than to pay no attention to a guest, especially such a one as Jesus!, and what he had to say) as was Martha’s busyness. Mary’s listening was the driving force for her later activity.

It was the order of their importance that was at issue. “First things first” is a regular way of “sorting things out.” The problem in “sorting things out,” however, lies in one’s preconceptions, one’s pre-determined state of mind, the basics upon which choices are regularly made on particular occasions. For people do respond to circumstances and verbal expressions in ways based on earlier experiences and situations and the kind of “mindset” that had been established in those experiences.

In Martha’s pre-conceptual apparatus, the kitchen and the table were dominant ways of expressing hospitality. In Mary’s pre-conceptual apparatus, listening to the words of a guest – especially such a special and honored guest as Jesus – dominated hospitality. Neither was necessarily better nor worse in themselves, neither was superior or inferior to the other, for both were essential elements of human life. Is “social life” expressed over a table to be preferred over a “godly life” devoted to listening to the Lord? Or does a “godly life” given to listening over-rule “social life”? Those are entirely different questions, but Mary answered both by positioning herself at the feet of the one who had made it clear that it was through him that a “godly life” was to be defined and exercised.

A CHOICE IS NOT NECESSARILY AN EITHER - OR

Mary’s recognition of “the good portion” was commended by Jesus – and Mary’s listening to it “was not to be taken away from her.” On the other hand, it must be noted that while she was commended by Jesus for her decision, Jesus never rebuked Martha in direct fashion for her choice either. He only pointed out that her decisions easily and quickly led to and yielded to “distractions” from “the good portion,” calling a person away from them. “First things first” needs a definition, and in Martha’s home Mary’s answering definition raised some strongly expressed tensions!

Distractions such as those that were filling Martha with such anxiety were the things against which one must carefully guard against. “You are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary,” Jesus said to her. It was not as though he did not appreciate what she was doing, but she was choosing to do only secondary things when put up against that which is most necessary for life. It was not a “put-down” for serving or preparing meals. It was, rather, a matter of “putting first things first” in a person’s life. It was neither an “either – or” nor a “do this – or – do that” kind of assertion. It was, however, a statement on the importance of establishing priorities in what one does.

Martha’s activities were, in her mind, so important as to drive her to the exasperation she expressed. Jesus, however, as good as said, “Mary is doing something as important as what you are doing, Martha – or possibly even more important. It is, to be sure, causing her to pay no attention to your immediate

needs, Martha, but you must take a lesson from Mary by the way she is establishing her priorities every bit as much or even more than you are by recognizing what the guest in your house has to say about such things. Hospitality requires one to choose the ‘good portion’ of giving your guest your full attention by listening to him as much or more than by preparing a meal. Meals come and go, but your guest is here only this once!”

AND WE? WHAT ARE WE TO MAKE OF ALL THIS?

The problem, therefore, laid in the “distractions,” not in the “necessities of physical life.” This account addresses us today on the level of asking what / where / how do our energies and busynesses get in the way of doing much more important things than those things that take up so much of our time and efforts? We place a huge value on “doing things” (it is the American “way of life”) and far less value reflecting on why we do what we do. Instead of doing “first things first” we tend to do “whatever lies at hand to do.”

The episode to which we are giving our attention this morning, then, is challenging us to keep our concerns in life in proper order. We get so wrapped up in what we are doing at a given moment, no matter what the moment may be, that our entire focus is placed on what we are doing as though it were so important that it demands our entire attention – even if it be at the expense of other things that may be far more important than what we are doing while they are being overlooked or ignored.

It does not diminish the importance of what we are doing in that moment, however, for it may, indeed, be as important as preparing a meal for Jesus – and who would say that was UNimportant? But if others find equally important things to do, so long as they are as important as listening to Jesus – we must recognize that their priorities are equally as important as ours may be.

It is astonishing, though, how many of our priorities are centered on “ME” (“MY sister has left ME . . . Tell HER then, to help ME”) without any serious consideration of the fact that the priorities of other people may be equally as important – or perhaps, of even more consequence – than my own are.

A FINAL WARNING

Note well: Martha is no exception to the norm. In fact, she is the norm!

Mary is the exception!

In Mary’s mind it was more important to speak with Jesus as an honored guest than it was to prepare the meal that was keeping Martha so busy. (NOTE WELL: There is no suggestion in the text that Jesus and Mary were talking about “things of salvation” or “divine truths”! “His teaching” was the issue, to be sure, but that is a broad-based word and does not necessarily speak of “weighty things” or “godly revelations” of some sort. It just means that she was giving her full attention to one from whom much wisdom was to be gained, and she was a “ready learner”! The question was one of hospitality, not necessarily importance!)

We are, therefore cautioned to examine our priorities over and over again, for a good decision at one time is often over-ridden very subtly by later decisions – sometime good ones and at other times bad ones. What holds “first place” in our lives over and above any and all other things? How can one maintain that “first place priority” when all kinds of other possibilities challenge it – things that, in themselves, often appear to be even better or more important?

This small slice of Mary and Martha’s lives is filled with unexpected challenges, for there is no end to the number of “important things” that manage to cram themselves into our everyday lives, distracting us by

insisting on holding first place in the number and type of things we do. “First things first!” is a great adage – so long as one is sure of what the “first things” truly are and maintaining them!

Every time we read this story, then, it asks us whether the meal we are preparing along with Martha is as important as we have made it out to be? (It may, indeed, prove to be that important, but one must always “check things out.”) Or the text asks us what kinds of envies and jealousies crowd into our minds when we see or hear of things that others like Mary are doing or experiencing that we, ourselves, would so much love to do or to have similar opportunities in which to participate – but we are just too busy to take part in them? I.e., what tempts us to say with Martha, “If only someone could see what a heavy burden I carry while so many others spend their lives with so many fewer or lighter encumbrances and responsibilities and obligations to fulfill – people like those sitting at the feet of Jesus”? It is in the lives of others that we often find our many reasons to complain about what is lacking or what is more troublesome in our own lives while they seem to go ‘scot-free’.”

As if our lives are so unique from anyone else’s lives, much of which we actually know nothing. But if we would know about what fills their lives, our complaints might change drastically!

So speak on Martha! Speak on while you see the ever-so-much-better or ever-so-much easier lives that others have! You are doing good things without doubt, Martha, and nobody should say otherwise or take those things away from you any more than Mary’s “portion” was not to be taken from her.

Continue to speak until you momentarily lose your voice with your constant complaining, giving you opportunity to hear another voice. Not yours this time. It will be the voice of Jesus saying, “You are anxious and troubled about many things. But one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion. Always remember to ‘keep first things first,’ Martha.”

While Martha was doing very good things, Mary had found marvelously wonderful things to do also. May nobody nor anything ever take your “good portion” away from you, for there is a multitude of distractions that regularly talk up and show up around and within you begging for their attention! I.e., “Keep first things first!”

Keep sitting at the feet of Jesus like Mary did! It, above all, is the “one thing necessary”!

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit! Amen.

Pastor Hubert Beck
Austin, Texas, USA
E-Mail: hbeck@austin.rr.com

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