February 25, 2024

Luke 10:38-42

Broadway Christian Church

David A. Shirey

This is one of my favorite Bible stories.  And for good reason.  Whenever I read of Mary and Martha, a former parishioner comes to mind.  Bless her heart, June loved Jesus.  But this story stuck in her craw.  Got her goat.  Rubbed her the wrong way.  I can hear June now:  "If I'd been there that day, I guarantee you I would have taken up for Martha!" To which I said, "If you'd have been there, June, Martha wouldn't have had to go to Jesus asking for help because you'd have been in the kitchen helping her from the get-go, your apron dusted with flour, elbow-deep in biscuit dough!  If you'd been there, you'd have had everything ready before Jesus got there.  No last-minute rushing around for you!"

Can you identify with June's grumbling about this passage?  I can. I think it’s been misinterpreted. It’s too often taught and preached as Jesus contrasting Mary with Martha to the praise of Mary and the disparagement of Martha. Mary is hailed as the quiet, contemplative Christian and Martha is frowned upon as a mere busy bee. The question is then asked, "Are you a Mary or a Martha?"  And the inference is: If you're a Mary, God bless you. If you're a Martha, stop your fussing, take a load off, and relax. 

Which is precisely the interpretation June rebelled against.  And rightly so. After all, if you take that interpretation to its logical extreme, dinner would never be served.  Park Martha on the floor – forcibly restrain her if need be – and who's going to prepare the meal?  Why, Jesus himself, when he was teaching down by the Sea of Galilee (John 6) and overheard someone ask, "What are we going to eat?" didn't give the questioner a tongue-lashing. Instead, he put a bookmark in the place where he was, put down the lesson, and turning to a young boy next to him, took five loaves and two fish. He gave thanks, blessed the bread, broke it, and passed it around. They ate!  He fed 5,000.  Which just goes to show to you that it won't do to simply lift Mary's listening and learning way up and put Martha's preparing to serve way down. Jesus himself studied and taught God's Word, set the table and broke bread, each in their own time.

When you read the passage closely, what Jesus rebuked Martha for is not the gracious hospitality that exuded from her servant’s heart, but her being distracted.  Verse 40 – "Martha was distracted by her many tasks."  Verse 41 – "Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things." Last week we focused our attention on what John Ortberg called “hurry sickness,” the distraction our busy, rest-less lives produce in us. We heard his spiritual director’s advice, “You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life.” I trust you’ve done that this week – you’ve given up hurry and busyness for Lent – so I’m moving on this morning to “the one thing” Jesus calls for from Martha, Mary, and us. “Martha, Martha,” Jesus says, “you are worried and distracted by many things. There is need of only one thing." And what is it? 

Well, before we answer that question, it's interesting to note that this story immediately follows the parable of the Good Samaritan[1] (Luke 10:25-37). You remember it. A man asked Jesus, "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" Jesus asked him, "What do you say?" The man knew his Bible and said, "We're to love God with all our hearts, minds, souls, and might and love our neighbors as ourselves." Then, to that man who knew his Bible so well Jesus told the story of the good Samaritan, saying in so many words, "I’m glad you learned the Bible; listened to God’s Word.  Now do it. Love your neighbors. All of them." But to Martha who was busy doing things to the point of distraction, he said, "Don't just do, do, do.  Come sit down, listen, and learn, learn, learn." Placed back-to-back in Luke's Gospel, the two passages remind us to hold in balance the two things that make for eternal life: and service to others and attention to God's Word.  There's a time to act and a time to listen.  A time to go and do-- getting down and dirty with wounded travelers, Samaritans, and such-- and a time to sit down in the comfort of Martha's living room to listen and learn. Loving God and loving neighbor constitute the rhythm of a life of faith: Listen to God’s Word.  Do God’s Word. Not either/or.  Both/and.

Today’s word is listen.  “Mary sat at Jesus’s feet and listened to what he was saying.” 

How are you with listening?   If we’re honest, we’ll admit that when it comes to listening, we’re all hard of hearing. I should say we’re all hard of listening. Hearing is a physical process that has to do with sound waves striking ear drums, but listening is a matter of the heart that has to do with one soul’s desire to be receptive to another. We don’t listen well to each other, let alone to God. Jesus’ brother James writes in his nifty epistle, “Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak…”(James 1:19). Which reminds me of the adage that God created us with two ears and one mouth to be used in that proportion. Do we listen twice as much as we talk?

I think interpersonal conflicts would go a long way toward being resolved if each of the parties involved would listen twice as much as they talked. How many arguments are stirred up because the parties involved are quick to argue their point of view but slow to listen to the other's perspective?  

I think of the study done among couples that measured the average amount of time per day partners engage in attentive conversation with each another. The study said on average six minutes per day. (That sounds high to me.) In addition, the study reported that most of the exchanges were one-way salvos-- talking at rather than with each other. Given that the perennial #1 presenting complaint marriage counselors report is "lack of communication," James’ words sound all the wiser: "Be quick to hear and slow to speak."

But whereas listening to another human being is one thing, listening to our Creator is another. “Mary sat at Jesus’ feet and listened to what Jesus was saying.” It’s no coincidence that a chapter earlier in Luke’s Gospel is the story of the Transfiguration where Peter, James and John hear God’s voice from on high say, “This is my son, my Beloved, listen to him” (Mark 9:35).  And it’s no coincidence one of the central texts in the Old Testament, Deuteronomy 6:4 is simply referred to as the Shema – the Hebrew word for listen: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.” And it’s no coincidence that when Jesus began his teaching ministry via teaching the parables the first word out of his mouth was “Listen! A sower went out to sow” (Matthew 13:3), a parable that ends with him saying, “If you have ears, hear!” (Mt 13:9).  All ears on Jesus this morning as he teaches us “the one thing needful” is listening.

I think the one needful thing we must have in order to practice the one needful thing of listening is a teachable spirit. Do you have a teachable spirit? Here’s the test: when someone else is talking, what’s going on in you? Are you thinking of something else? Are you composing what you want to say? Are you readying a rebuttal? Are you interrupting, looking away, or taking a peek at your cellphone?  Or are you leaning in intently to listen carefully? The time-honored prayer of St. Francis begins, “Make me an instrument of your peace” and moves to the petition, “O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek … to be understood as to understand.”  Listening in order to better understand. It’s a prayer for a teachable spirit. 

And I hasten to add: a teachable spirit is a fruit of humility. Humility as in: I don’t know everything there is to know so I need to listen to learn. “I don’t know” doesn’t mean you’re ignorant.  It could mean you’re a disciple – which means learner. What makes us genuine disciples of Jesus Christ is not that we know everything there is to be known about him but rather that we don’t know everything and know that we don’t know, so we’re always listening to learn. A disciple isn’t somebody with a head full of knowledge.  It’s someone with a heart full of humility eager to listen and learn. God may be doing a new thing we’ve not yet perceived. The Holy Spirit may be teaching us something we’ve not yet comprehended. The person across the couch, the kitchen table, the table in the Large Conference Room, across the aisle in Jeff City or Washington D.C. may have a point I ought to make a point to listen to and learn from. A little humility, please!  None of us have the corner on truth and no one bandwidth on the theological spectrum, no denomination has the corner on God’s Truth. It’s been said, “An inerrant and infallible Bible, if there was such a thing, would require inerrant and infallible human beings to interpret it.” There’s only been one of those and you’re not him! So, a little humility please when you say, “The Bible says … ” So, I humbly remind us all that Paul wrote toward the end of his letter to the Corinthians, “Now we see in a mirror dimly, but then we shall see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known” (1 Corinthians 13).   

Put it all together: Humility leads to a teachable spirit which leads to being a lifelong learner and careful listener which leads to being a doer of what has been learned in the listening.

Jesus tells the parable of the Good Samaritan: Do God’s Word. Love your neighbor.

Luke tells the story of Mary and Martha:  Listen to God’s Word.  Learn from the Lord. 

They’re side-by-side in Scripture:  Doing out of love and Listening to learn.  Martha and Mary are sisters. Biologically and theologically. The Christian life is both active loving and quiet listening.  For everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under heaven.  A time for listening, Martha.  A time for doing, Mary.

And a time for dinner. Would you look – As we've made time to sit still and listen to Jesus speak to us through Scripture, our sister Martha has set a table for us in honor of our Lord.

Look – Bread and cup.  Linen tablecloth.  Candles.  Polished silver.    

Martha asks, "Can you stop talking now please, close your book, and come to the table?"

“Thank you, Martha. We hear you. We’re going to sing and then we’ll come eat."

Let all who have listened and learned from Martha and Mary and Jesus say AMEN.

[1] I am indebted to Fred Craddock’s insightful commentary on the juxtaposition of these two passages in his Interpretation Series commentary on Luke.