Sermon 7-18-10

“Roles and Rituals”
Luke 10:38-42

How do we serve the Lord here in Lima?  That is one way to look at the questions we will be asking ourselves after the service when we discuss uses of our endowment money.

“How do we serve the Lord” is the same question Luke asks as he recounts Jesus’ visit to the home of Martha and Mary.  We know that Jesus was close friends with Martha and Mary and their brother Lazarus and often stayed and ate at their home.  As usual, Martha’s response to Jesus’ visit is to get busy preparing a nice meal for her visitor. This is her socially mandated role and Mary’s too.  But Mary’s response is to sit at Jesus’ feet and listen to what he has to say.  This challenges the cultural expectations of the time, and certainly that of her sister.  In fact, Mary at Jesus’ feet is acting more like a disciple, putting her attention on learning rather than on serving.  Since all the disciples were male, we might catch an early whiff of gender equality here with Mary acting as a liberated woman.

Here in this church, this household of faith, some are more like Martha living out their discipleship preparing communion, printing bulletins, visiting the homebound or feeding the multitudes. Others live out their discipleship more like Mary in study, prayer, teaching and worship.  Both are necessary roles and responsibilities, yet Jesus seems to favor Mary’s over Martha’s.  “Mary has chosen the better part,” he says. Why does Jesus say this?

One approach explains Jesus’ words by suggesting that in a household of God, either Martha and Mary’s home or our church, the primary hospitality that needs to be offered is hospitality to the Word.  A church that is “worried and distracted by many things” as Martha was, will be focused on activities – on doing things.  Such a church will be concerned it is not doing enough, it will be anxious about its future.  The place will look good and operate smoothly, but the gospel may not be heard.  Inevitably concerns for the perpetuation of the institution will come to the fore.  What happens is that motion morphs into meaning.  Good people do good work, but without continual spiritual replenishment, they become fatigued.  Another result:  Nominating Committees find they have a tough time finding non-exhausted people to serve on church committees.

On the other hand, a household of God which positions itself at Christ’s feet, puts its energy into listening to the gospel in study and in worship.  As faith is nurtured, a shift in being occurs.  Life no longer requires ongoing management but resounds with the good news on its own.  From that faith, actions flow as a natural and easy consequence of attention to the God within.

I think that when Jesus says, “there is need of only one thing,” that’s what he means.  Faith is sufficient he is saying.  For example: One can make a meatloaf as an act of love towards one’s family.  Flowing from love, the ‘doing’ of the meatloaf becomes an opportunity, a joy.  One can also sigh and make meatloaf again, because it is Saturday and the family expects it.  In this case there is only burden and duty in the ‘doing’ of the meatloaf.

And that may be the situation Martha was in – she was making dinner out of duty rather than out of love.  From duty she felt put upon, especially when her sister wasn’t helping, so she complained to Jesus, looking for justification.  Notice that in her two-sentence statement, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself?  Tell her then to help me,” Martha refers to ‘me, my’ or ‘myself,’ four times.  Notice, too, that Martha complained to Jesus, rather than Mary directly.  Martha is seeking vindication for her position, for doing the ‘right’ thing.

Jesus seemed to scold Martha when he repeated her name, “Martha, Martha,” as he began his answer to her.  Jesus continued saying, “Mary has chosen the better part,” but maybe this has less to do with what Mary and Martha were doing respectively, than with their motives for doing it.  Jesus is addressing Martha’s frustration more than her activity.  Just as in Martha’s case, when anxiety in right-doing becomes the measure of our hospitality, then the church has forgotten the One it has been called to serve.

When we act out of love, when we are truly in our Lord’s service, we forget ourselves in the doing.  According to theologian Karl Barth, such services are:

“usually done in concealment, so that by their very nature no great glory can attach to them, and they can be undertaken and executed only as pure, selfless and unassuming service which might well be hampered or even totally spoiled by even occasional attempts at domination.”

Mary was apparently acting out of love, Martha out of duty.  There are many ‘duty’ Christians out there, people who attend and participate in church because they know they are supposed to.  That makes it hard for them, an energy drain.  I wouldn’t invite them to do more, as this would only add the guilt of declining to their existing discomfort.  I would invite them to keep their life questions in mind as they engage with the scriptures, with worship or with one another.  This too is faith.  Faith is as much asking yourself, “What does God require of me in this moment,” as having ready answers to heavy theological questions.

Now lets flip this story around.  A superficial interpretation would conclude that Mary at Jesus’ feet was the ‘good’ sister and Martha in the kitchen, the ‘bad’ sister.  But shouldn’t we celebrate service?  Jesus himself, later in Luke, asks his disciples at the Last Supper,

For who is greater, the one who is at the table, or the one who serves?  Is it not the one at the table?  But I am among you as one who serves.

Yesterday our team at Third church prepared and served a hot lunch to 63 homeless folk.  Pausing in our work we gave thanks for the opportunity to serve. 

A.T Pierson wrote a book called The Truth.  In it he says:

Whatever is done for God, without respect of its comparative character as related to other acts, is service, and only that is service.  Service is, comprehensively speaking, doing the will of God.  He is the object. All is for Him, for His sake, as unto the Lord, not as unto man.  Hence, even the humblest act of humblest disciple acquires a certain divine quality by its being done with reference to Him.

So Martha might have been on the right track after all.

Then there is the question of Mary’s motivation.  She was evidently looking for something in what Jesus was saying.  Martha wanted help in the kitchen, but Mary probably wanted something too – a lesson, reassurance, forgiveness, recognition – something.  Both sisters were wanting something.  The issue with wanting is two fold.

First, wanting assumes that one is not already all that one could ever want.  Something additional seems to be needed to make us complete, happy, lovable, etc.  Sure we come before the Lord asking for forgiveness for our sins, but that is an issue of thought and behavior, not of essence, not of who we really are.  The true issue is not so much one of becoming what we are not, but rather of letting go of what we are not.  Jesus’ chiding of Martha was not about who she was, not about her faith, but about what she was wanting – help in the kitchen.

Second, wanting distracts one from the gifts of the moment – the present, if you will.  This is what Jesus points out to Martha, “you are worried and distracted.”  In distraction less than full attention is given to what one is doing.  Productivity, quality and satisfaction all suffer as a consequence.  Thus, Martha’s task was actually made harder by her concern for what Mary was doing or not doing.  Today, someone has labeled the disease of the Internet age as continuous partial attention.  When we act with partial attention, when we attempt to multitask, we are making things harder for ourselves.

I’d like to suggest that Martha and Mary’s actions are not in opposition, one correct and the other incorrect.  There is only one object of devotion, but there are multiple forms of devotion, multiple roles and rituals. 

A church is different from a service club because it recognizes that it is the word of God that gives life.  So a church turns toward its object of devotion and listens to the word.  It pauses and sits at the feet of the eternal much as Mary sat at the feet of Jesus.

But like Martha, a church also has a calling to serve as the hands and heart of God addressing the needs of our brothers and sisters.  The word of God leads us and strengthens us to do good when we give it our full attention.

And the question we will be asking after church today, what is this church’s form of devotion?  In what ways do we want to be like Martha, and in what ways like Mary?  Let us give it our full attention.

Amen