Luke 10:38-42
“Needed Things”
Preached Sunday, July 20, 2025
I think we’ve been looking at the whole Mary and Martha story all wrong.
Some preface:
My sister and I are complete opposites. We grew up sharing a room and always bickering - sometimes, full out fighting. I was …not the neatest person. At some points, it might have even been fair to call me a slob. She was a much neater, and cleaner, person.. That, actually, was the basis for most of our arguments. We played out the old sibling sitcom tropes - everything from yelling at each other about borrowing clothes and literally putting duct tape down the center of the room to dictate “your” space and “my” space. Today, my sister and I are still very different people.
Now, she lives 9 hours away - something my sister and I would both claim is good for our relationship but we still talk at least weekly if not more. We still care about what is happening in the other’s life. We still want happiness for the other and love one another.
But, as a child who was used to fighting with her sister, when I was younger, I heard this Mary and Martha story as a fight between two siblings and Jesus claiming a winner. I, who identified more with Mary at the time and who labeled my sister “a Martha,” well, I was obviously the winner and my sister was the loser. Sibling dynamics play out in our lives - and all through the Bible. Cain and Abel. Isaac and Esau. Leah and Rebekah. Joseph and his brothers.
I know I am not the only one who has thought of the whole Mary and Martha thing as a Mary versus Martha thing. Fighting siblings are pretty much par for the course in the Bible and in life. AND, I also think this story plays into our culture’s unhealthy obsession to pair women off against each other. Ya’ll know what I’m talking about? Instead of celebrating female excellence we want to make it into a feud - create the false narrative that there’s not enough room at the top.
So we make it Taylor Swift versus Olivia Rodrigo
Rihanna versus Cardi B
Brittney Spears versus Christina Aguilera
And, I know some of you don’t understand those references so I did some googling to find some that you might know:
Vivien Leigh versus Marilyn Monroe
Cyndi Lauper versus Madonna
Bette Davis versus Joan Crawford
Those last three are complete unknowns to me but maybe they make sense to others out here…but basically…in every generation, the media has pitted females against each other. In some instances there may be real beef, in others, it’s played up for the drama, more clicks, more sales…
And, of course, from our Scripture this morning: Martha Versus Mary.
We take this Bible story of two women and decide that there can only be room for one of them to be living out her discipleship right and so we hear Jesus’s words that Mary has taken the better part and we become anti-Martha. And so many sermons on this topic talk about the danger of busying oneself too much and not spending enough time at Jesus’s feet - and while, I think that is a moral of this story, they so often do so in a way that is decidedly anti-Martha and her actions. They take the commendation of Mary as a condemnation of Martha.
So I want to say first that both Mary & Martha were demonstrating discipleship. Both of them were serving Jesus. Both of them are worth emulating in our discipleship.
Martha often gets written off as putting housework above God. Some of these commentaries or interpretations of this passage paint her as a silly woman, busying herself with the kitchen rather than sitting at the feet of Jesus. Not only is the interpretation sexist - it misses an important point. Martha was practicing and extending hospitality to Jesus.
The Bible emphasizes hospitality above most other things. Being inhospitable is the Biblical sin of Sodom and Gomorrah. The commandment to be hospitable and to welcome the stranger among you is repeated over and over in the Bible and Jewish & Christians faiths. In many Ancient cultures, including Greek, Jewish, and Christian - hosts were expected to welcome guests, even strangers, and house them, clothe them, feed them, protect them - and then, in many stories, including Biblical ones, those strangers turned out to be gods or angels among them. The most famous from the Bible is Abraham welcoming the travelers who would tell him that he was going to have a son. Or the two disciples walking along the path to Emmaus, not knowing it was Jesus they invited in to eat with them. Jesus himself stresses hospitality. When he sends out his disciples two by two, he tells them to look for and expect people to take them in and be hospitable. The spreading of the Good News depends on those willing to take in strangers and care for them as if they were Jesus themselves. The whole Gospel of Luke stresses the point of hospitality as a central tenet of the Christian faith.
Martha was being the hospitable host. She was doing everything her religion and society taught her. She was doing what Jesus taught. She was serving Jesus, feeding him, giving him shelter, offering protection - she literally had a God in her home and she was treating him as such.
Martha’s error was not in being hospitable. It was not in working. It was not in doing. It might have been calling out her sister to Jesus - but also, what a sisterly thing to do, right? She was like, “Um, hey, Jesus - help a girl out and remind my sister what we’re supposed to be doing right now?” She was expecting him to notice her hospitality, praise it, and remind her sister and all there to do the same. How much can we relate here, right? Maybe in relationships with our own siblings, our spouses, even fellow Church members. We can feel like we’re doing all the work and just want to remind others that this is their house too, their church too. But Jesus says that her sister, Mary, has chosen the better choice. Now, I highly doubt all those there took this as a condemnation of Martha’s acts. After all, Jesus had urged hospitality frequently and will go on to stress it again and again.
Martha’s actions are also commendable. The early church and even the church today - needs people like Martha to survive. We too are called to live out our discipleship in hospitality to each other and to the stranger.
I see Jesus’s words to Martha not as a condemnation or shaming or belittling her. Jesus’s words helped Martha put things into perspective. Helped her really focus on what the most important thing was in that moment. Martha was not really realizing what it means when Jesus is right in front of you. Not realizing the “why” of doing what she was doing.
Who here, has been hosting a party - a holiday, a birthday party, a family reunion - and they have been so busy DOING, cooking, cleaning, making sure everyone has what they need, make sure everything is running smoothly, etc - that it gets to be the time when people are leaving and you realize…I never actually sat down and talked with the people I care about. I never actually took a moment to savor being surrounded by people I love. I never got to just…enjoy? Raise your hand? I am expecting it to be mostly women raising their hands because this is how our society works…Yupp.
Can you imagine how Martha might have felt when Jesus stood up to go and left and Martha realized…the Messiah, the Christ was in my house…and I never stopped and talked to him! I never stopped to listen to him! I never appreciated the blessing he was bringing me. I never just took a moment to bask in his presence… I am sure she would have regretted it. And perhaps even had resentment against her sister who did take the time to appreciate being in the presence of Jesus.
Martha needed to shift from serving, to worshipping.
Living out our discipleship, as Martha was doing, is only one side of the coin. Because in this world we can live as good people, we can welcome the stranger, we can feed them, clothe them, protect them, we can love the neighbor with no exceptions as ourselves - and we can, and people do this, entirely from a secular position. What sets our lived discipleship apart, what sets our hospitality and service to the stranger, the neighbor, the world, apart is that we first sit at the feet of Jesus. We return to the feet of Jesus, over and over.
We come to the feet of Jesus to learn, to listen, to drink deeply from the well, to unburden, to realign our priorities, to renew and strengthen ourselves for the work of discipleship. Mary was doing, serving, living out the important commandment of hospitality - but also forgetting to first sit at the feet of Jesus and and fill up her well before serving. No wonder she was exasperated with her sister. When we fail to care for ourselves and our souls first, when we fail to rest in Jesus, the work, even the good work, drains us and burns us out - leaving us frustrated and tired. I know many of us have felt this way - burned out by church work.
This story is very much about the double-sided coin that is love of God and love of neighbor. It come to us in the Gospel of Luke right after the parable of the Good Samaritan which emphasizes love of neighbor - even love of enemy. This story, of Mary and Martha, emphasizes love of God. Many commentaries believe Luke was intentional in framing these two stories this way. We cannot have one without the other. We need to balance our attention to both, lest we forget why we serve. One could even imagine Jesus, who is praising Mary for sitting at his feet, for resting in him, for learning and growing in her faith and adoration of God - we could imagine if she sat there too long - If she started to neglect hospitality, if she neglected love of her neighbor - We could imagine Jesus saying to her, “Mary, you have chosen the better thing - but don’t just sit there! Share it! Live it! And then return.”
I have preached many times about love of God and love of neighbor. Love of God pushes you to love your neighbor. Love of neighbor reveals more of who God is, causing us to love God more. The story of Martha and Mary reminds us of this: two sisters living out love of God and neighbor. The caution in the story is to not forget to keep on coming back to God. Don’t pass up a single opportunity to sit at the feet of Jesus. Don’t forget to tend your own soul, to find rest in Jesus.
We need “Marthas” - I am one most of the time. It would be too easy for me to make my life motto “Busy people get stuff done.” And yet, how unhappy, uncenetered, and unfulfilled would I be if I let that busy-ness, even busy-ness for Good causes, overtake my life? We all need balance, need to have our wellspring be Jesus, need to not miss the Kingdom in front of us. We need to START with Jesus. It is the only way our work will be sustainable. We need to start with God and never lose sight of the invitation to rest in Jesus. Mary and Martha are not at odds, they are two sides of the same coin. Two women living out their discipleship. Two women who Jesus uses as a teachable moment about the necessity of resting in Jesus.
Summer is the perfect time to revisit this - it’s supposed to be a time of rest and renewal and yet we get so busy...even if we’re busy with good things. We might get to the end of our summers, supposedly a season of rest and renwal and realize… we are burned out. We are tired, we are exhausted. We never want to get to the end of a season and I realize our wells are empty.
But we might. And we will. During one season or another of our lives. We are only human. And it is at this point that we need to ask ourselves: How long has it been since I last sat at the feet of Jesus? How have I been filling my own well, tending my own soul? It is then that we need to turn to Jesus and hear him say, “you have been doing good work. And it’s time to chose the better thing. Sit at my feet. Rest.”
Even with the best intentions, we can forget why we’re doing what we’re doing. We can forgot to turn to Jesus first. We can forget to rest at his feet. Because when we encounter Jesus, the tables are turned. We are no longer the host, we are the guest. Jesus is our ultimate host - taking care of us, offering us protection, offering us renewal, a safe place to rest our heads - inviting us to feast on the Word, to drink deeply from the water that gives life.
So how have we been getting the story of Mary and Martha wrong? The conclusion is not a “don’t be a Martha, be a Mary.” The conclusion is more - be your whole self for God. Live out love of God and neighbor, extend hospitality, serve God - AND never forget why. Never forget to drink deeply from the well. Never lose sight of God inviting you to rest in Jesus, that invitation that is always right in front of you.
For now, right now, choose the better thing, stay here at the feet of Jesus, and rest awhile. May we all find renewal and strength for the journey here, with Martha and Mary, at the feet of Jesus.
Amen.
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