The Tumultuous Life of the Saint

of Luke, we find ourselves one
more week in the 10th chapter of Luke’s gospel. I was talking
with someone this past week that was recounting just how full
this chapter has been, how many different images and how many
different scenes were laid out there before us by Luke. And it has been rich and I hope
profitable for you as well. context of this passage is not
only interesting, but important. We learned last week as we looked
at the passage that was there before us, we looked at the parable,
what most people just know of the parable of the Good Samaritan. Most people, all they think of
when they think of the parable of the Good Samaritan is that
isolated little illustration. And we saw last week, and I hope
it was not only helpful, but instructive, that there’s much
more to that passage than just that little illustration. The
illustration was meant to prove a point that the law is impossible
to live up to, and that was the elevated standard of what is
a neighbor. Nevertheless, and I think I really
believe in my heart that Jesus knew full well the tendency of
the human heart was to take a passage like that and to run with it
and to create ministries. And I think we’ve seen that throughout
the history of Christianity, that ministries have begun up.
We even, I told you, found six or seven with the name explicitly
of Good Samaritan. Good Samaritan outreach, Good
Samaritan ministries. And so Christ knew that ministries
would grow up and that there would be this tendency of ministries
to grow up. And he wanted to balance that.
I believe that there is a tie in to the passage here before
us this morning. As is so often the case, Ministries
begin with a heart for service. They see a need and really the
need and the recognition of it is born out of a good and healthy
spiritual existence. People on their knees praying
for others begin to see a need and then a ministry builds up. But in time, the ministry itself
falls out of balance. It falls out of balance and it
becomes devoted almost entirely to service. With no devotional
life at all, we know it in our day and age, and we’ve known
it for the last several hundred years as the social gospel. It really puts the feeding of
the poor and the care of the needy far ahead of the spread
of the gospel itself. So that in a sense, what you
can do is go around your entire life applying so many band-aids
and no real lasting cure. We know of it as the social gospel,
but it’s far more social than it is gospel. It’s far more practical
than it is truly spiritual. And I believe Christ knew that
even as he imparted to them this high standard. He knew that there
would be those that would try. And he knew that it was just as bad
that to have practical life without a spiritual life, to have a spiritual
life without service was equally bad. To be merely devoted as
the Pharisees were and to have all kinds of religious activity,
but to have no heart for their fellow men, that was evil. Indeed,
that’s what James addressed when he said that we’re not to be
like those that say, be warmed, be filled and to think that therein
is enough. Let me pray for you, brother. The practical, those who lean
more in practical ministry tend to criticize the spiritual. Those
who lean more towards spiritual activities in isolation from
the practical and the spiritual in turn criticize the practical
for being too practical and not spiritual enough. This passage. runs up against
the often repeated phrase, he’s so heavenly minded, he’s of no
earthly good. Have you heard that before? In
essence, what Jesus says that if the man is truly spiritual,
if he’s truly spiritual, he will be a man that is used practically
in his world. In essence, a spirituality that
has no earthly benefit is not true spirituality. That’s what
I believe Jesus would teach. In other words, it’s impossible
to be too heavenly minded because to be truly heavenly minded is
to have an active and a balanced practical ministry in this world.
This passage is against that idea. And it’s against the false
idea, the faulty idea of this rigid dichotomy that we create
the distinction between the sacred and the secular. Because what
Christ, what Scripture, what Paul would all promote is that
there is no difference between the sacred and the secular. That
everything that we do in life is an act of worship. Our service
should be an active worship. It should be born out of a rich
and healthy devotional life. If you would look at verse 38
of Luke’s Gospel, chapter 10, Luke 10, 38. Where Luke records now as they
were traveling along, he entered a village. And a woman named
Martha welcomed him into her home. She had a sister called
Mary who was seated at the Lord’s feet, listening to His Word.
But Martha was distracted with all her preparations. And she
came up to him and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister
has left me to do all the serving alone? Then tell her to help
me. But the Lord answered and said
to her, Martha, Martha, you are worried and bothered about so
many things, but only one thing is necessary. For Mary has chosen
the good part, which shall not be taken away from her. For thousands of years, this
passage has been used and really abused. It has been used by those
who want to distort the Christian life into being one of isolation
and contemplation as over against true and practical Christian
service. But I don’t think that you can
make a case, certainly when you begin to square this passage
with the rest of Scripture. That the Lord here does away
with practical Christian works, he doesn’t do it. John Calvin said it this way.
He identified that there were some men driven by ambition to
withdraw from the ordinary course of life. What he speaks here
is the whole monastic order, the Roman Catholic system that
would have men hold up in buildings in prayer and in meditation and
devotion. And he said, when these peevish
men gave themselves to solitude and indolence, the resolution
to adopt that course was followed by such pride. He says that’s
the natural outcome of this activity, because you actually begin to
think that you’re doing something better in your devotion to God. He says, on the contrary, we
know that men were created for the express purpose of being
employed in labor of various kinds. And that no sacrifice
is more pleasing to God than when men than when every man
applies diligently to his own calling and endeavors to live
in such a manner as to contribute to the general advantage. It’s foolishness to say that
this passage does away with practical Christian works and calls us
merely to an isolated life of contemplation, the life of the
monastery. It’s not what he’s teaching.
I think the issue is simply this. There are essentially two modes
of worship. All of life is to be an active
worship, but it comes in two modes. One mode is the devotional
life of the believer, prayer, meditation, reading our Bibles,
even fellowship, prayerful communion with other believers. And the second mode of worship
is service. Everything else that we do. taking
care of our home, taking care of our family, taking care of
others’ needs, creating some type of a ministry to the community.
Those are all, even our work, even the job that we do is an
act of devotion. It’s an act of worship. It’s
not supposed to be out of balance, these two modes of worship. We’re
supposed to have a full devotional life and we’re supposed to be
fully active. We can do both at once, but it’s
common. It’s very common. In fact, I
think this is the regular disease of humanity that we get out of
balance. We either begin to lean one way
or the other. We put too much effort into our
activities and our things and say, we don’t have time enough
to pray. God would have me more doing
this than that. Or, we do the opposite. and say, Lord, the Lord would
have me more at prayer than he would in service. We begin to
lean out of balance. That’s the tendency. And when
we fall into that tendency, the immediate outflow of that is
that we tend to criticize others for not functioning like we do.
Isn’t that right? We look at anybody And if we’re
spiritual, they’re not spiritual enough. If we are serving practically,
then by golly, why won’t they roll up their sleeves and help
us? And I think that’s exactly the situation before us. Some
people criticize others for not serving. Some criticize others
for not serving. And there are plenty of examples
of each throughout Scripture and even in our own lives. What I want to look at this morning
is what I’ve entitled the tumultuous life of the saint. Because I
don’t believe this was ever intended to undergird Martha’s testimony,
I don’t think that it was meant to obliterate her profession
of faith. I think this is a Christian woman.
And you know what? She’s exactly like us. This is
us. And that’s why I generalized
it to say the tumultuous life of a saint, because we go through
this on a regular basis. This is part of the difficulty
that we live in as Christians. What I want to give you this
morning is three symptoms. Three symptoms of a Christian
in turmoil. And that’s what Martha was. She’s not a heathen. She’s not
living like a heathen, even in her rebuke of the Lord himself. I don’t say that to justify what
she does. I just say it to tell you that
that is the life of a saint. We do grow frustrated. And you
know in your hearts that you’ve challenged God even without speaking
it with your lips. When you look at the lives of
another, James says, when you criticize him, you criticize
God. Look at verse 38. A troubled Christian, first of
all, is preoccupied by earthly concerns. He’s preoccupied by
earthly concerns. Look at verse 38. Now, as they
were traveling along, he entered a village and a woman named Martha
welcomed him into her home. It’s an interesting thing throughout
Scripture, and we don’t have enough data to make heads or
tails of it, but some have suggested that since she almost is always
mentioned first whenever she’s mentioned in Scripture, John
11, 5, Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. This
was a family that was very dear to Christ. And Martha was at
the forefront. John chapter 11 later on in verse
19. Many of the Jews had come to
Martha and Mary to console them. Verse 20 Martha, when she heard
Jesus coming, she went to meet him. John chapter 12. Jesus, therefore, six days before
the Passover came to Bethany where Lazarus was. This had risen
from the dead. Always Martha is in the focus
of these passages. This was a woman who was dear
to Christ. Verse two of that passage, they
made him a supper there and Martha was serving. And this Martha welcomes Christ
into her home. And so most have surmised that
Martha must have been the oldest. We don’t have the data to make
that kind of determination. Verse 38 goes on. And what these verses will tell us
is that these sisters were very different. They were just different
people, same family, the different personalities entirely. Look
at verse thirty nine. Pardon me. She had a sister called
Mary, who was seated at the Lord’s feet, listening to his word.
We’ve met this sister before and we’ve noted her before. Matthew
26 presents her. Two times in Scripture, she’s
presented before us. Two times she’s rebuked and two
times she’s vindicated by Christ Himself. One time the rebuke happens among
the twelve. And here, she’s rebuked by her
own sisters. But in both cases, the act is
for an act of love to Christ. Remember, the first time she
was anointing Jesus’ feet and the criticism was she was wasting
this expensive perfume. Here in these verses, we’ve got
a clear sketch of this little family. We see a great difference between
these two sisters. One characterized them this way.
J.C. Ryle summarized it this way. The two sisters were both
faithful disciples. Both had believed. Both had been
converted. Both had honored Christ. Both loved Jesus. And Jesus loved
both of them when few gave Christ true honor. Yet they were evidently
women of very different mindsets. Martha was active and stirring,
impulsive, feeling strongly and speaking out all that she felt.
Martha was quiet, still and contemplative, feeling deeply, but saying less
than she felt. Martha, when Jesus came to her
house, rejoiced to see him and busied herself with preparing
a suitable meal. Mary also rejoiced to see him,
but her first thought was to sit at his feet. and to hear
His Word. Grace reigned in both hearts,
but each showed the effect of grace at different times and
in different ways.” And people, that’s the point that Ryle is
making here, is that that’s the Christian life. We are going
to react to the Lord differently. And absolutely, did Martha sin
in this passage? Yes, I believe she did. She fell
out of balance. But that’s not to say that service
is to be thrown out the window, as we’ve already said. In fact,
with Martha, given the nature that we see in her, the characters,
characteristics that we see in her, two of the most marvelous
professions of faith found in all of Scripture come from her
heart. They come from her mouth. John chapter 11. Remember, Lazarus
has died there. Martha comes to Jesus and she
says, Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died.
This is somebody who’s speaking passionately from the heart.
She trusted in the Lord enough to say, if You had been there,
I know he wouldn’t have died, but there was a rebuke in it.
Lord, where were You? And then she finishes her thought,
even now. Even now, I know that whatever
you ask of God, God will give you. I believe she believed in
her heart that Christ, something she’d never seen done. Christ
could raise him from the dead. She believed this was a believing
woman. John, chapter 11, the culmination
of that passage. Martha said to him, yes, Lord,
I have believed that you are the Christ, the Son of God. Even
he who comes into the world, there was no doubt in her mind. This is Martha. This is our saint
in view. This is the one who is just like
us. She believes fully. But she can
have a moment. She can have a moment of doubt.
She can have a moment of irrational behavior. And I think that’s
exactly what we see in this passage. And so we meet with Mary. And
it’s not surprising how we find her listening, it says, to his
word, listening to Jesus. And think of it, people, which
one of us, if we knew then Knowing if we were there, knowing
what we know now, wouldn’t we do the same thing? Perhaps Mary
had a clear view of Christ and his destiny. She broke up a vial
and worshiped the Lord. When she sat here at Jesus’ feet,
knowing that he was just weeks that this God who had taken on
human flesh was now just weeks before going to the cross and
returning to His Father. Going on her behalf. What an
incredible opportunity for her to sit and to hear God’s own
Son teach. Wouldn’t we have done the same
thing? Perhaps. to hear His words, it would have
been the greatest privilege that man has ever known, to sit at
His feet, to perhaps ask questions, to sit in devotion as a listener
to Christ, being instructed by the One who is most qualified
to teach anybody about anything. Oh, what a great place. She sat
listening to His Word. But realistically, I want you
to think realistically. Is that how you started the day?
Is that how we conducted our week? Were we devotional? Or were we just too typically
like ourselves? And like Martha? That realistically,
most of us would choose another course. And we do. We would opt
rather than being served by sitting at Jesus’ feet, listening to
His Word, we would opt rather to do something for God. And
I’ve told you already, it’s not bad. Some act of kindness, some
little duty, some great banquet or some thing. And it isn’t bad,
it’s just not the best. But look at verse 40. Verse 40 begins, she was preoccupied. She was preoccupied with earthly
things. Verse 40 says, Martha was distracted
with all her preparations. This little word is an interesting
word. It meant that her mind was not
only occupied, you know, there’s this debate running around in
our church whether or not men can multitask or not. Now, there are some people who
meet for Bible study on Wednesday nights. who think that men can’t
multitask. And that is essentially Martha’s
shortcoming here. She was having a difficulty multitasking. I’ll let you find the examples
of the men in Scripture that seem to struggle in this regard.
Because this is the only time in Scripture that this word is
recorded. The word literally means to be dragged in different
directions, stressed out, distracted. that you can’t even get anything
accomplished because you’ve got so many irons in the fire. Martha was eager. She wanted
to give our Lord a warm welcome. She wanted to open her home to
Him and give Him a beautiful meal and show hospitality towards
Him. And who wouldn’t? If you got
a call at 9 o’clock this morning, And you knew that the Lord Jesus
Christ was going to be a guest for lunch. Would you have come
to church? Or would you have stayed vacuumed
and dusted and clean and make sure that pillows are all straight
on the couch? That’s the rule in our house.
I mean, this is us, isn’t it? If you’re having somebody for
dinner, don’t you just go bananas, cleaning and organizing and everybody,
you know, the whips cracking and you’re dancing and you’re
getting the list done? That’s Mary. That’s Martha, rather.
And she was troubled. She looked about. She was distracted. She had so many things going
on. She feels like she needed help. This word, as I said, is
to literally draw from around. If you take it apart, literally.
Martha’s attention, instead of being centered on Christ, the
King of the Universe, the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords,
instead of being centered on Christ, it was here and here
and here and here. She was drawn about in all different
directions. Martha was distracted. She was
distracted with her preparations. And people, that’s us. We’re
so busy being busy. I had a guy that I worked with
at Home Depot. I’d never met anybody like him.
He had a position. He had a title. And everybody
that watched him knew not what he did. He was the most busy
looking individual I’ve ever seen. He walked at brisk pace,
faster than anybody I saw. Always had a clipboard. Always
looked like he was doing something. And never seemed to get a single
thing done. That’s exactly what’s presented
before us here. She was distracted with all her
preparations. So much stuff going on that she
couldn’t do anything. Preparations for a meal, as we’ve
already seen. In a meal that was supposed to
honor Christ. A good thing. Right? She set out to do a good thing.
To provide for the Lord. She felt like it was her duty.
It was going to be a practical showing of her love and faith
and devotion to Him. It was going to be a good thing.
She had it all planned out. And to be fair, Martha had a
lot to do. I believe that not only was Jesus
a guest, I believe the other twelve apostles were there too.
Because if you look at the context, it says, verse 38, they were
traveling. And in verse 11 or chapter 11,
verse one, immediately following this passage, it shows that the
disciples were with Jesus. There’s nothing here to indicate
that they weren’t. Martha has a house full, not
the least of which is the Lord himself. And she wants it to
be good. She wants it to be perfect. But
in her anxiousness to provide this perfect meal for the Lord, her preparation gets the best
of her. It gets the best of her and eventually
she vents, only she forgot who she was venting to. She forgot
who she was criticizing. She forgot her priorities. We too are too prone to become
easily preoccupied with earthly concerns. In fact, if you look
at this passage, you know what immediately follows this particular
passage? It’s Jesus in chapter 11 instructing
on prayer. We’re so prone to get all caught
up in our practical service, in our daily lives, in our activities,
That we lose sight. We get preoccupied with those.
We lose sight of the rest of life. And our tendency to become
agitated and fidgety, even during prayer. It’s an interesting thing. People don’t look at prayer as
being something substantial. They don’t look at it as real
hard work. They don’t look at it as being
a substantial part of ministry. In fact, you know, even early
on as a pastor, I’d have people ask me about my week and they’d
want to know how many hours I studied and who I visited and where I
went, what I taught. Nobody ever asked me. How long
did you spend in prayer? Because they didn’t consider
that to be even part of a pastor’s week, much less their own. It’s
not legitimate work, most people think. It’s not what Jesus says. It’s not what he seems to intimate
here. The tumultuous life of a saint is marked by another
symptom. Not only a preoccupation with earthly concerns, but secondly,
critical of people and God. Critical of people and God. Look at what happens. And I think
this is exactly how it happened. She’s in there. Perhaps she had
an apron on. I don’t know if they had aprons
back in first century. But she’s busy in there in the
kitchen. This is how it happens in our
home. And all of a sudden with me, that towel goes down and
she’s off to go talk to the Lord. I think she reached a point and
she snapped. She came up to him. And that
little word there indicates an outburst, a sudden outburst of
anger. She had had it. sitting there
having a little devotional meeting while I’m in here working? The word indicates sudden, as
one called it, a sudden suspension of her feverish activity. When
Martha looked out at her sister Mary who was listening to Jesus
and seemed to be enjoying herself and worshipping the Lord, Martha
just snapped. She stopped short and she took
up this attitude She was bound and determined to go to the Lord
and to get it off her chest. She approaches the Lord in this
sudden, hasty attitude and she comes to the Lord and says, Lord.
She doesn’t doubt His nature. She doesn’t question whether
or not he is the Lord of the universe. And that’s what makes
this whole sentence so astounding. Lord, do you not care? She doesn’t doubt that the Lord
had seen this activity, that he sees Mary sitting at his feet,
that he sees Martha hard at work in the kitchen. It wasn’t. She didn’t doubt whether the
Lord had seen it. She doubts whether He cares. This is an astounding rebuke.
This is an astounding challenge, but really, it’s no different
than us. When we see, look at, remember Psalm 73, the rich man
is doing well. The Lord seems to be blessing
him. Psalmist writes, don’t you care? We say it all the time. We say
it in our hearts when we’re struggling and everybody else seems to be
blessed. Lord, don’t you care? We shouldn’t look down our nose
at Martha because we say it all the time. We say it all the time. We know that he’s the Lord. We
know that he sees all. Our question is, does he care?
Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do all
the serving alone? Not only do we make these grandiose
statements and bold assertions at the Lord, but look at her.
All the serving? People, we have too high a view
of ourselves. We just do. That’s just our nature. We think that we’re the only
ones doing anything, any time. eagerly want to be recognized
for it. And we’re so characterized by
these kinds of statements. We’re doing all the serving alone. Nobody’s helping me. All the while, Mary is making
use of this opportunity. Martha was in there getting angrier
and angrier by the moment. Supposedly working unto the Lord. Supposedly preparing this meal
for Christ. The best meal that she could
prepare. And she meant well. But in her zeal,
she forgot who she was dealing with. She began to be embittered
towards her sister Mary, and it finally came out. And she said, my sister has left
me. And that seems to imply that at least Mary helped Martha for
a while. But then when she saw the Lord,
when her guest had arrived, for her, preparations were over.
We’ll eat what we have. We’ll live with the house as
it is. The guest has arrived. And she put her priorities in
order. I remember my friend, a mentor
in a sense, Lance Quinn said one time, if you have too many
priorities, you don’t have any priorities. Here is a woman who
saw priorities. They came into collision and
she acquiesced to the greatest priority of all. And that was
devotion to Christ. She knew that she could fulfill
her purposes better in this very privileged visit by Christ. He
didn’t stop and eat at everybody’s house in town. It was their house. Theirs alone. She knew the best
way to spend her time was at the feet of the Savior. There’s
an attitude that comes out as you look at those words. My sister
has left me to do all the serving.” You almost get this attitude
that Martha felt like it wasn’t even of any use to talk to Mary
herself. Otherwise, she might have called
her aside. Mary, I need some help in the
kitchen. And we know from having little
ones that this is certainly a possibility. that maybe Martha in the background
was motioning. You know, come help. I need help. And Mary sat there all pious,
sitting at Jesus’ feet. Wouldn’t go. Not going to go. You know what? Jesus knew. Jesus knew Martha’s heart. He
knew what was irritating her. And Jesus knew Mary’s heart.
He knew what her motives were. He knew that they were pure motives.
And that’s why the rebuke was wrong. Martha was just wrong. We, too, were just like Martha. In the midst of our difficult
and tumultuous Christian life, we are too prone to excise other
people. We are too prone to get inside their heads and know what
their motives are, to know their heart, to know what their entire
day and week and life is like. And we see a snapshot, much like
what Martha saw, and we are too prone to criticize. We criticize them. We dwell on
them. We wonder about them. We nitpick
at them. We judge them. And when it seems
that God doesn’t hear us, then we turn our attention to Him.
When God’s standards don’t seem to be measured up to our own,
we embitter ourselves even towards Him. There was another one that
did this, the Apostle Peter. The Apostle Peter did this same
thing in John 21. Remember, after his threefold denial, he decides
that’s it. I’m done with the ministry. I’m
going fishing. And he goes out on the boat, catches nothing.
And the Lord comes to the shore, tells him to cast out the nets
a different place. They catch this great catch.
Suddenly they know it’s the Lord. They come and they worship. He
restores him to ministry. It’s a great day, right? Wrong. It’s a great day, almost. Except
Peter has this hang up, the hang up that we have. It’s the hang up called, what
about him? John chapter 21, Peter turning, saw the disciple whom
Jesus loved following them, the one who had also leaned back
on his bosom during supper and said, Lord, who is the one who
betrays you? So Peter, seeing him, said to
Jesus, Lord, what about this man? How come he gets to go with
you? How come I got to go through
all this difficulty and heartache? What about this guy? And Jesus’
answer is so often the answer we need to hear, people. If I
want Him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow
Me. God has a different program for
each one of us. God has a different purpose for
each one of us. Can there be such a thing as
exhortation in a brother’s life? Absolutely. But let’s leave off
the criticism and the judgmentalness and the harshness and the attempts
to elevate ourselves in all that we do, because that’s really
what’s behind it, isn’t it? It’s exactly what’s in Martha’s
heart. In exposing Mary’s weakness,
she was exalting herself. But there’s a third sin. of a Christian in turmoil. A
troubled Christian is not only preoccupied by earthly concerns
and critical of people and God, but their life is marked by an
imbalance of devotion and service. Verse 41, Jesus begins to speak. The Lord answered and said to
her, Martha, Martha, you are worried and bothered about so
many things That repeated name, it was almost
characteristic of Christ. Luke 22, he calls to Simon, Simon,
Simon. Peter’s previous name. Behold,
Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat. Do you
note the mercy in that voice? The affection there? The concern
for Peter? And here, in this passage, the
concern and affection for Martha. Martha! Martha, don’t behave
like this. He says you’re worried and you’re
bothered. And that worried is our typical standard word in
Scripture for that type of sinful behavior. It’s a moral preoccupation. It’s a distrustfulness. It implies division, implies
distraction of mind. We see it in full in Matthew
6. Matthew 6, verse 25, For this
reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life. Don’t
carry on this life of distraction and distrust. about what you
will eat or what you will drink for your body, what you will
put on. Matthew 6.28. Why are you worried about clothing?
Matthew 6.31. Don’t worry then what we will
eat, what we will drink. It isn’t just in the Gospels
that we find it. 1 Peter. calls us to cast all our anxiety
on Christ. Trust Him. Trust Him. Not only were we worried, she
was bothered. And this is the external manifestation
of that. This is where her stress becomes
visible. It refers to this external agitation
and irritation that she had. This Lord who stood before her,
He had perfect knowledge of the human heart. He knew Martha’s
heart. He knew Mary’s heart. He knew
that Mary was there worshiping in purity. And He knew that Martha
likely started out with a good heart. Wanted to make dinner
for the Lord. But she stumbled along the way.
The plans became too grandiose. Too many courses, perhaps, in
the meal. Too fancy of a napkin fold together with the tablecloth,
together with the fancy dishes and the fancy spoons that needed
shining. Who knows? But the plans became
too much and she just maxed out. She forgot the most important
task of all wasn’t to serve the Lord Jesus through some kind
of deed and action, But through the spiritual exercise, first
and foremost, that issues forth more pure deeds, more pure forms
of practical worship. You see, Jesus disapproved of
what Martha was doing. He didn’t say that dinners, banquets
are bad, evil. No more banquets. Never said
that. He knew that this banquet, this
dinner that she was preparing was an outworking of love for
him. That it started off good, but
that her wrong attitude had made it sour. Her condemnation of
Mary, her dissatisfaction with the way Jesus treated it, essentially
ruined the dinner. One Puritan said it this way,
To be the best housekeeper in town adorns the Christian piety
of the woman. If it in no way encroaches upon
and destroys her devotional life, it’s not a bad goal. It’s not
a bad goal to have a clean house, to have a well-set table, to
have a nicely prepared meal. It’s not a sin. But it’s sad, he goes on, when
the ambition of a secular duty crowds out the important spiritual
thoughts and activities. And that’s what happened here.
Her inward attitude showed itself. I remember we had some friends
in Illinois, a couple of gals, one of them was they were sisters,
one of them was married to an unsaved man. And they said, you
know what? If you’re going to come by, just
stop by. Don’t call. Don’t call because if you call,
then I’m going to feel obligated to clean and I just want to enjoy
your visit. What a great attitude. In the house, we’d stop by just
as they directed and it was never a disaster area. In fact, it
looked very much like our own home before the guests. One thing is necessary, Jesus
goes on to say. There’s only one thing really
necessary and that is the devotional life. That’s what’s really necessary
because everything that issues forth from that is going to be
purified. It’s going to be right and good.
Done well. Some have characterized this
one thing as one dish. It’s an interesting take. They
said, in other words, Martha, put away all the other pans and
pots and dishes. All we need is one thing. And
I think the guy that pastored in this small town before we
got there, I think he must have taken that view because that’s
where they invented the casserole. One thing, and it finishes with
tater tots on top of it, but almost anything else goes into
it. You know, potatoes and all kinds of ham and whatever kind
of meat you can put in there. But you finish it off with tater
tots. Is that what Jesus was saying?
All we need is one dish. Casserole will be fine. He goes on to say, Mary has chosen
the good part. Does that mean that Mary took
the best portion? Mary got first dibs on the casserole. What it meant was that Mary Mary
chose the better thing, and that is the difficulty in the Christian
life. It’s not between good and bad so much as it is between
good and best. And what Mary did was choose
the very best. She saw the priority. She saw the clash of these priorities. And in that moment, she knew
there was only one place that she could be. And that was at
Jesus’ feet. Jesus goes on to say that that
life of devotion, rich fellowship that she had would not be taken
from her. There was no way Jesus was going
to order her to rise and depart into the kitchen. What she was
doing was a good and a wholesome and a pure thing. One Puritan, in closing, summarized
it this way. Mary was seeking more grace.
She was striving after nearer and closer communion with God
and Christ. The portion which she preferred
to everything else and to which she was willing for a time to
postpone all earthly care. Those who seek such a portion
shall never be disappointed. The treasure shall never be taken
from them. There’s a balance. There’s a
balance in life. We are supposed to fall on our
knees in devotion. We’re supposed to rise from our
knees in continued devotion and service. It’s not one against
the other. Let’s examine our hearts before
the Lord. Our gracious God, We came to this somewhat familiar
and difficult passage. We saw glimpses of ourselves
initially, and now we see in full that Martha, this precious
saint of yours who had such a clear testimony, is very much like
us. Very prone to take her eyes off
of Christ, to put them full on earthly things, And in time with
the wrong attitude to criticize everyone around her, including
you. Father, we confess it. We know that it’s true of us.
We ask for a right heart by your grace. To serve you. Both in active devotion and active
service in Jesus name that we pray. Amen. If you would, our closing hymn
is hymn number 165. The servants of God, your master,
proclaim for the sake of time, just the first and the