The 14th Sunday after Trinity Sunday | September 13th, 2009
Luke 10:38-42 Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me." But the Lord answered her, "Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her."
Dear Saints,
We have for our admonition and comfort today these words of the visit of our Lord Jesus to Mary and Martha. We see in this text how crafty the devil is, and how desperately he wants to stop up our ears and block our hearts from hearing God's Word.
For there is, dear friends, only one thing needful in this life and in the life to come: the gracious words and gifts of our dear Lord Jesus. The devil knows that if he can keep us away from the Lord's Word he can keep us away from Jesus and from heaven, the resurrection and everlasting life.
What is incredible about the text before is that the devil uses the occasion of the visit of Jesus to Mary and Maratha's house to tempt Martha away from the Lord's words and gifts. Can you imagine it? Jesus is coming for a visit. If there was ever a time when the devil might say, “This is a waste of my time, I'll come back and trouble them tomorrow” it would be the day when Jesus comes to visit. But this is not the case. The devil never rests.
He uses even the good things of God, coming to church, serving your neighbor, he even uses these things to prevent you from hearing and believing and rejoicing in God's word.
And how does he do it? We see in the Scriptures that the devil seems to have three plans to keep us from receiving the Lord's word. Plan A is disbelief. The devil would tempt us to doubt God's word, for whatever reason. This can be an intellectual doubt, historical doubt, cultural doubt. It could be a manufactured doubt because you know that believing the Scriptures means thinking and speaking and acting and believing differently that you do now. This is the devil's plan A: disbelief.
Plan B is similar: despair. The devil would have you doubt the Lord's mercy and love, or doubt that it is for you. Despair sounds like this, “Sure Jesus died for sinners, but look at what I've done. How can that be forgiven? I've sinned against God and my neighbor, I've done it over and over, and I've done it on purpose. How could God love me?” That's despair, that's plan B.
But if he can get us with plans A or B, then there's plan C: Distraction. The devil would get us so busy serving God and our neighbor that we can no longer be served by Jesus. This is what happens to Martha.
Make no mistake, there are many things that distract us from God and His gifts, from the life-saving words of Jesus. The Rockies are making a pretty good run at the plan-offs. It's just about time to get the yard ready for winter. Do you wonder if the devil is the one who makes sure that 100 catalogs come in the mail in order to distract you? Whenever I go to open the Scriptures there is always something else there to read. There are plenty of things on each of our to-do list, at home, at work, at church. But the devil does best at distracting us when he gets us fixated on a certain good and godly work, even at church.
And there is a pattern that this distraction follows. A downward spiral that gets worse and worse.
First, you see a good work that needs to be done, you know it's important, so you get after it. Martha saw Jesus coming, she knew He would need something to eat and drink, that the house needed a bit of cleaning up, so she got after it. The Lord wants us to serve one another, so we serve. So far, so good.
But then something else happens, there is a move for the importance of the work to the importance of ourselves. We begin to think “I'm important because this work is important.”
And this self-importance leads to isolation. “Look, I'm the only one doing this work.” This is now getting dangerous, but it's difficult to see it. We are becoming self-absorbed, and there's even a bit of self-pity. We start to think that if we didn't do it, no one would, and even though there is no joy is our work, we trudge on.
As this continues we lose perspective, we forget what's important, the work has taken over, we begin to become bitter. What began as service to our neighbor is now distancing us from our neighbor. “And yet, this is a good work,” we say to ourselves, but is producing the fruit of bitterness and pride.
This is the slide that Martha went down. We can hear it in her words, “But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, 'Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.'”
Do you see the isolation? “She left me to serve alone.” Do you see the self-importance? The loss of perspective? “Do you not care?” she asks Jesus. Do you see the bitterness, “My sister has left me?” And then this marvelous pride, “Tell her then to help me.” Do you see how Martha began by serving Jesus, but now she is bossing Him around, telling Him what to do, and imposing her will on her sister Mary. The devil's work is done.
How long does this take? It seems like it took Martha only a few hours, and this could happen to you. But perhaps we see it happening on a much slower pace, but what began as a joyful service to God and the neighbor, after weeks or months or years has begun to be a source of distraction, or worry, or trouble.
Now we have a serious question: does this sound familiar to you? Do you know something of this pattern? Are you distracted, troubled with all the good works you've signed up to do? Worried about the work you have at home or especially here at church? The devil loves to play this trick today, to distract us with our good works, with our serving, even our service in the church, our committees, boards, guilds, whatever. And this is a dangerous thing.
I would like each of you to consider this and your own life. If you are somewhere on this slippery slope of distraction, if you see yourself getting an inflated sense of your importance, or you are becoming isolated in the work you are doing, or you are losing perspective, or you have no joy in your service, or you are complaining or proud about the work you do, if the devil is using your goods works and service to distract you from hearing God's word, if any of these describes you, then I want you to hear the tender words of Jesus to Martha; they are for you. "Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her."
Leave the dishes dirty in the sink. They'll get done, and even if they don't, you'll have the one thing needful. Set aside the work that you think is so important. If it's that important the Lord will see it through. What is important for us is not that we are busy serving, but that we are being served by Jesus.
Jesus Himself said, “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many,” (Mark 10:45), and “But I am among you as the one who serves.” (Luke 22).
So we sit at the feet of Jesus, we listen to His Word of life and forgiveness, we eat His body and blood, and we are filled with His Holy Spirit, and so Jesus serves us with gifts that will never be taken away, but will endure even to life eternal. Amen.
And the peace of God which passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
