Today I was thinking about Mary and Martha. Martha is so typical of most of us. We get so busy serving that we forget why we are serving and often times, our own relationships with God suffer. We can't seem to stop serving others long enough to slow down and spend time in God's Word or in prayer, but that wasn't Martha's only mistake. She let anger build up inside of her until she was not only angry with her sister, but also with Jesus. She yelled at Jesus! Can you imagine! But we do. Maybe not out right, but when things aren't going our way, do we ever just say, don't you care God? Just do this, so that it will go better? Martha is so much like us. We like to look at her as the ugly step sister, but in reality she is more like us than we will ever care to admit. She is the keeper of the home, the responsible one. We all know that it is hard to separate ourselves from our duties and relax when we know there are dishes in the sink. Mary was younger, she hadn't got to that point in her life yet. She still had that "child like" faith that Jesus wants us all to have, that He speaks of in Mark 10. Mary is not the one responsible for hosting Jesus, that ultimately fell on her sister, who was also presumably left to raise her. We don't have all of the back ground to their lives, but I think sometimes when we read the Bible we like to put ourselves in the shoes of the one we see in the favor of Jesus, when often times, the shoe is really on the other foot, we just don't want to see it. I would love to be a Mary, but I know that deep down I am a Martha.
Suggested reading: 12 Extraordinary Women by John MacArthur
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." Luke 10:38-42
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My devotion this morning took me back to the passage about Martha and Mary. It didn’t suggest that the author was one or the other, but instead that there are times when we should be busy like Martha, and times we should be still like Mary. What wonderful words of wisdom, and I could not agree with them more!
ReplyDeleteSo my prayer today is a prayer for discernment. A prayer for wisdom to know what is need most. A prayer for God to show me what is most important at any given moment, because each moment is different.