Mary and Martha

Sermon--Pentecost, Proper 11, Year C

Amos 8:1-12
Psalm 52
Colossians 1:15-28
Luke 10:38-42

Mary and Martha, Mary and Martha.

The story seems so familiar.

Mary: the quiet dutiful disciple at the foot of Jesus soaking everything in.

Sometimes Mary comes to stand as the example of the contemplative life, where all one needs to do is lead a quiet life of prayer in order to have chosen the better part.

Then you have Martha: the distracted busybody who invites Jesus over only to become annoyed when she is the only one doing anything.

Sometimes Martha comes to stand as the example of what happens when Christians or churches try to do too much, try to be too active, and so miss out on what is really important. In some very extreme forms, the perceived danger of being a “Martha” leads to people finding hospitality and social outreach —which are concrete ways of showing concern for one’s neighbor— to be secondary, and concerns more-easily dismissed.

Too often, when one hears this story from the Gospel, one hears more of “Mary or Martha” as though one must choose to follow the example of only one of these women, or as though these two women represent ideas that are always opposed. Some care needs to be taken before this brief exchange between Martha, Mary, and Jesus leads us into forcing ourselves and others into a false choice between what seems to be two opposed patterns of life.

To do this, we’ll need to look at what went right —and wrong —with Martha, what Mary understood from the beginning, and what we might learn from both about the nature of hospitality.

Let’s start with Martha. What was going right here? First of all, she was showing hospitality to Jesus. Hospitality is incredibly important in the whole of the Bible. If we were to just stay in the book of Luke, recall that Jesus sent first the twelve disciples, and then the seventy, to the surrounding towns to preach.[1] He sent his disciples with nothing —not even an extra shirt or sandals— making them totally dependent on those whom they would meet. In short, the disciples were given the responsibility to proclaim the news of the Kingdom of God, and they were expected to live on the hospitality others provided. Jesus says they were being sent out like lambs among wolves because they had nothing about themselves on which to rely. The hospitality they were shown—or not shown— was in effect a test of the town. To turn away a stranger in need —particularly one who was proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God—reflected poorly on the town.

Jesus, being the wandering preacher that he was, also had to rely on the hospitality of strangers and friends. Martha did right by inviting Jesus in, and taking on all of the responsibilities that doing so entails. This includes food, comfort, protection.

And if you have invited someone to your home, for a night or for an extended stay, you know how busy you can be. You have to buy extra food, wash more towels, maybe give up the exclusive claim to your own bathroom...

This busy-ness was not the problem, since we see that Jesus relied on hospitality for himself and his disciples [further, in Acts 6, we see the disciples assign folks to serve in hospitality so that neither preaching or service  to others are neglected].

So what was the problem for Martha?  Well, the problem was not that she set herself to complete many tasks, the problem was that she was eventually consumed by them.  The problem was not that she was trying to be hospitable, and so wasn’t also sitting at Jesus’ feet; for Martha’s hospitality and Mary’s attention are both ways of showing devotion. Instead Jesus names the problems as worry and distractibility.

Does that sound familiar to anyone?
Prone to worry? Easy to distract? Anybody?

The problem was that in the midst of her tasks, Martha’s “practices of hospitality were eclipsing their purpose. Hospitality that is anxious and troubled loses its focus, which is Jesus, who is Lord and guest.”[2]

Understanding the focus of our hospitality as having something to do with the Christ we proclaim goes to the heart of what hospitality is, and why Christians are called to practice hospitality with such care. We learn in the Gospel of Matthew that what we do for even the least of those whom we meet is also done for Christ.[3] We learn in the Book of Genesis that all are made in the very image of God, and so are worthy of respect and dignity by virtue of sharing something so central to our own humanity. An act of hospitality on our part is an act of love for another who bears the image of God in Christ. It is an enactment of the ethic of the Kingdom of God in which all people have a worth intrinsic to themselves.  Our practices should call into serious question worldly ways of determining the worth of individuals, ways which all too often will not look past the surface layers of wealth, race, or gender...to name a few examples.

Martha, in her effort to call her sister and her guest to task for not cooperating in her own vision of what the visit should have looked like, lost sight of why she invited Jesus in the first place.

As for Mary, it was this single-minded focus on Jesus as the guest, and not simply her presence at his feet, which made Mary the clearer example of discipleship in that very moment. In this exchange between Mary, Martha, and Jesus, it is that matter of focus on God in Christ to which Christians need to attend, not a false choice between more prayerful or more active manners of devotion.

So. Okay. Mary and Martha were lucky enough to have Jesus in the flesh in their very home. How do we, today, find that focus? There are ways, both prayerful and active, which have been passed down through the generations. Reading and praying with scripture is a direct encounter with others’ experiences of God. Through the scriptures, encounters with God are still possible As we immerse ourselves in a story we continue to tell and take part in. Prayer in which we leave room for God to speak into our silences remind us that we are in conversation with God, not possessors of a one-way wish-granting hotline. Serving others with hospitality, here at church and elsewhere throughout the week, attune our eyes to finding God in unexpected places. Even starting a conversation with someone you do not know can become an avenue to give or receive God’s grace —and coffee hour is a good place to practice doing this.

These practices: encounter with scripture, prayer, and practicing hospitality, can help us keep a focus on God as we seek to serve our neighbors.

In the Christian tradition, we also have examples of holy people trying to maintain a balance between contemplation and hospitality. In Benedictine monasteries from the 12th century to today, the arrival of guests was seen as an opportunity to serve Christ in the visitor, rich and poor alike. And monks [well, at least the priors] would suspend their own fasts—their own self-imposed spiritual disciplines— in order to eat with their guests.[4] This is an example worthy of the attention of all Christians.

Now focus is one thing. I want to end by talking briefly about distraction, and leave you with a few questions. It is easy to lose sight of God in the bustle of our lives. After all, Martha managed to get distracted while Jesus was sitting right there.

What are the things in our own lives that lead to distraction? What keeps us from being attuned to the murmurings and messages of God?

For Martha, it was the demands of the household that blinded her to the memory of why she was showing hospitality in the first place.

What about us, as individuals or as a community?
What holds our attention?
Where might God be calling us to make a change, so that we may hear more clearly that which God is calling us to do?

May your listening be fruitful.

Amen.



__________
[1] Lk 9:1-7, 10:1-16.
[2] Matthew L.Skinner, Feasting on the Word, Year C, Volume 3, p. 267.
[3] Mt 25:31-46.
[4] The Rule of Benedict, Chapter 53.