Year C
Luke 10:38-42
The Rev. Denise Vaughn
Focus on Jesus, Then Go and Do
The Gospel readings for the past three Sunday’s have come from Luke’s travel narrative remember Jesus has set his face to Jerusalem, and each week has had discipleship as its theme. Today we hear the very familiar gospel story of Martha and Mary another story about discipleship. This familiar story has been known to evoke strong reactions, both positive and negative. Some will agree that it is one of the most liberating texts for women in the Gospels in that it reflects an opening for women within the circle of Jesus’ disciples and challenges traditional expectations about women’s roles. Others find it oppressive in that it seems to pit sisters against each other, setting up a good woman-bad woman scenario, and it seems to present an ungrateful Lord as demeaning the hospitality that a hardworking woman offers.
If reactions to the story are strong it may be because its setting is familiar to us, we can relate to it. We are all familiar with the everyday setting of household living, or the idea of men and women’s roles in the house and in the world. That Martha and Mary are women in this story does suggest to us that among Jesus’ followers the ways of Christian discipleship is open to both men and women. The central message of Luke’s Gospel is that Jesus has brought the Good News of salvation to all? For Luke, the importance of these sisters and their example to us is found in their devotion to Jesus, seen in Martha’s hospitality, Mary’s interest in his teaching and Martha’s calling him “Lord”. The point of Luke’s story is how are we to show hospitality when the kingdom of God comes near? Martha’s first impulse, like many of us, when Jesus decided to drop in on them, was to get something going in the kitchen.
In doing this, she was being faithful to the tradition of hospitality begun long ago when Abraham welcomed three guests to his tent as we read in the OT lesson. Just as Abraham turned to Sarah to assist with the duties of hospitality, Martha expected Mary to do the same. But Mary, apparently eager to be a disciple, sits at Jesus’ feet attentive to what Jesus had to say which as we read did not please her sister at all. I’d like to believe that Jesus smiled when he said, “Martha, dear friend, you are worried and distracted by many things.” His words indicate he is not going after busy Martha, but worried and distracted Martha. He is speaking to a dear friend who has worked herself into a state of anxious distraction over the meal she wanted to have for him while, Mary emerges from this story as the star pupil.
Unfortunately, this story has been known to drive a wedge between thinkers and doers as if women or men have to choose one over the other. It has been interpreted to say the better life was the life of prayer, the contemplative life over the active life. However, many scholars believe, as I do, that this story does not necessarily affirm the contemplative prayer life over the active life. In English, we hear that Mary has chosen “the better part,” but in Greek the word better is translated as “good”. Mary has chosen the “good” part, meaning she has chosen “the connection to God who is good; a God who calls us to sit at the Lord’s feet and also who summons us to work through our service to bring about a world of justice, mercy, and peace, sustaining us while we serve. This story is not about reinforcing a Martha-Mary dichotomy but calling for a recognition that God is both inside and outside. It is not an either/or message but a both/and message.
There is a time for hearing and a time for doing and both are needed to complete the work of the kingdom. My personality of doer relates to Martha somewhat better than Mary. An example of my Martha, several years before I went to seminary in Austin, I became very involved with our companion diocese the Dominican Republic. Over a four year period, I lead over 50 people from my deanery in the diocese of Southwest Florida, on ten different short-term missions to Santo Domingo. We completed two major construction projects at Episcopal Church’s in Santa Domingo and raised over $200,000 among 6 churches to build a parish hall, pews, an altar, a second floor for a school, a playground, along with a lot of painting. Most of it was hard work but great fun. It fit the Martha in me. But none of this could have happened without our spending time at the feet of our Lord in prayer and I can tell you several stories that will confirm this is true.
In our common life together, some of us prepare meals, count money, care for the homebound, organize outreach to the poor, and others are disciples in service to the word: study and prayer, worship, preaching and teaching. Luke will acknowledge the need for both later when he writes the book of Acts and tells of the twelve apostles after Pentecost calling the whole company of disciples together and saying, “It would not be fitting for us to neglect the word of God in order to assist in the distribution. Therefore, friends pick seven men full of the Spirit and of wisdom and we will appoint them for this duty.” We see the ministry of service ‘diakonia’ and the ministry of the word, working together to bring about God’s kingdom. As Christians we are called to both listen to Jesus’s words that give us what we need to work hard to communicate God’s words for the world here and now.
When we feel overwhelmed with activity, worry or distractions, perhaps the best thing we can do is sit to collect, refocus, and then to listen as Mary listened to Jesus’ words. Once we listen, we can choose the good portion that Christ serves up, reclaiming God’s promises to us, and affirming our vows to make God the center of our lives. When we do choose the good portion, we can return to our serving and tasks with renewed peace and joy. Today Christ is among us as one who serves. This story offers us an ongoing plea from our servant Lord to focus on him, and to point to him through our deeds. Martha’s work is ‘diakonia’ and by welcoming Jesus into her home, she shows her openness to the word and the work of God. God calls us to both Mary and Martha. Jesus said sit down, listen, and learn, focus on me, then go and do. May God help us to rejoice in the good portion that Christ serves to us.