Sermons

Do you remember the 1991 movie City Slickers with Billy Crystal and Jack Palance? As the story goes, every year, three friends would take a vacation away from their wives and their city lives, mostly, I think, to avoid their midlife crises. On their current guy’s trip to the Southwest to participate in a cattle drive, unhappy city slicker, Mitch, tries to overcome his sense of uneasiness with his life and to have an adventure. Mitch was in search of something, something that was missing. Problem was, he knew he was unhappy but he had no idea why. On the cattle drive he encountered a gruff cowboy named Curly, who was weathered and wise, if not somewhat impatient. Curly was just the person to break through the disenchanted and discouraged personality of Mitch. Here’s the advice he gave to Mitch as they were sitting around a campfire. Curly said, “Do you know what the secret of life is?” And Curly held up one finger. “This,” he said. And Mitch responded, “Your finger?” Exasperated, Curly said, “One thing. Just one thing. You stick to that and the rest don’t mean crap.” Mitch responded, “But, what is the ‘one thing?’” Curly then wryly smiled, “That’s what YOU have to find out.”

Curly believed that the “one thing” was different for everyone, but that finding that one thing seemed to be a struggle, no matter who you were. You see, Mitch appeared to have it all, a good job, loving wife, happy family, loyal friends. And yet he was unhappy. So, for him, what was that one thing? What could possibly have been missing from his life that he needed to go out into the middle of nowhere, to risk it all? The movie was a hilarious journey in which Mitch discovered that he was far braver and daring than he knew, and that his one thing (which is actually never revealed to the audience) gave him the courage and the happiness to continue with his own life, even if his life wasn’t as exciting as a cattle drive.

Just like Mitch and his friends were on a journey to find that one thing, to find out who they were and what was ahead of them, we see that Jesus is in the middle of his journey too. Several weeks ago, we heard that Jesus had set his face towards Jerusalem. He was of single-minded focus to do the work of turning the world upside down. And we get the sense in the gospel lesson for today that we are still on a journey with Jesus as the very first words in the text are, “While they were traveling…”

And this journey we are on with Jesus is one of trust and hospitality. Do you remember two weeks ago when Reann talked about the seventy disciples, sent out two by two into the villages, receiving the hospitality of those who welcomed them? Well that’s what’s going on here, in the text today. Jesus and his followers have entered the town of Bethany and they are given hospitality by Mary and Martha.

And we know very little about Mary and Martha as this story in Luke is the only place in the Synoptics where these two women are mentioned. So, not knowing much about these sisters means we can’t simply pass judgment on their sibling fighting or who was right and who was wrong. I mean, I have a twin brother and I’m often unsure by the end of the argument what we were fighting about or who actually won. No, I think focusing on the actions of Mary and Martha distract us from the “one thing,” the main thing I found in this story… Jesus. Both Mary and Martha committed themselves to following Jesus, Martha with diakonos, food service, and Mary with that of being a pupil. Both tasks were imperative to the work and life of Jesus. So, maybe the question isn’t who was doing the better thing, the serving or the sitting, but where was their energy directed? Who received their devotion?

I think it is important, as we seek to understand the intentions of the two main characters in this narrative, Martha and Mary, that we should hear what a leading professor and preacher has to say from a female perspective. Dr. Karoline Lewis sees the competition between these two female friends of Jesus and knows we, too, can get lost in the daily comparisons of life. But we must look beyond the serving and sitting, and see the devotion of both Mary and Martha to Jesus. Dr. Lewis says, “The danger of this story is its invitation to what is better. To pit one expression of belief, of discipleship, of service, of vocation, against the other. We are exceedingly skilled in such comparison. Yet, when we make these kinds of moves and assumptions, we rarely stop to think about what we then assume about Jesus. To favor Mary is to say Jesus discounts service. Which, if you read the Gospel of Luke, makes no sense at all. And makes Jesus make no sense at all. To favor Martha would be to say service is all that matters. Clearly, both matter, if you read the Gospel of Luke carefully.”

Dr. Lewis continues, “So, this story cannot be about who is better or what is better, but rather about acknowledging that even a woman can be a disciple – can sit at the feet of Jesus and learn. This story is not about which is better. Because service and learning are both hallmarks of following Jesus. It’s a story about pointing out what is possible – what God wants to be possible.”

Isn’t that true. We follow Jesus in the ways of Mary and Martha all the time. We are good at following Jesus by preparing church lunches, collecting food for North Dallas Shared Ministry, accompanying immigrants during court dates, teaching our kids in Sunday School, playing the organ, singing the songs, praying the prayers, preaching the sermons! We are all Marys and Marthas. But the “one thing” Jesus is referring to is not about Mary and Martha. The “one thing” is about Jesus and who Jesus accepts in his inner circle. In fact, it isn’t about who is in the inner circle, it is that everyone is welcome at the feet of the savior. Jesus was changing the rules of the game and initiating a new work, a new way to follow God. British professor and scholar N.T. Wright says, “Not only was [Jesus] redrawing the boundaries of God’s people, sending out a clear message about how the gospel would reach to those outside the traditional borders. He was redrawing the boundaries between men and women within Israel, blurring lines which had been clearly laid down.”

And so, I believe, the main thing that was upsetting Martha and other women in the kitchen wasn’t the workload. It wasn’t the fact that Mary thought she was too good for the women in service. It wasn’t that they needed a lot more help with the food. The real problem was that Mary was behaving as if she were a man. The real problem was that Mary knew she was made in the image of God and was called to be about the work of Jesus, to be a disciple, to be a student. That was the real problem.

You see, in that time, male and female areas were separated. Men had their space and women had their space. They each had their roles and their responsibilities. It was the custom of the day. It was religious and social law. There were strict boundaries to the world and people just couldn’t cross over them willy-nilly. It was scandalous to do what Mary did. She shouldn’t have behaved in that way. She needed to return to where she belonged. She needed to go back to where she came from.

And it’s not that being in the kitchen and being a servant was necessarily a bad thing. This wasn’t about superiority or inferiority. This was about the separation of humanity and the roles of people to make sure that Jesus was welcomed properly. Jesus and his disciples needed food and they needed care. Martha and all the other women had a crucial role to play to make sure Jesus could continue on his journey. And the men did too. The place for the men was to be at the feet of Jesus and be learners of what he was teaching. This was a decidedly male role as we see with the same use of the phrase, “sat at his feet,” used when Saul of Tarsus “sat at the feet of Gamaliel” in the book of Acts. Saul wasn’t lounging like a dog in a begging posture, he was soaking in the teaching. He was listening and learning. It was what you did if you wanted to become a teacher yourself, if you wanted to become a rabbi.

So, it wasn’t that Martha had too much to do in the kitchen, although I’m sure to take care of all of those people, the job was immense. No, it was that Mary was barging in on the men and interrupting their time. Mary’s devotion to Jesus was so strong that she knew that she was called to be a follower, a student, a disciple who was equal to the men, who could sit at the feet of Jesus, and could live out her gifts and skills in service to God. Mary was quietly saying to the first-century world that she had just as much freedom as a follower of Jesus to be a rabbi, to be a teacher and preacher of the kin-dom of God. Mary was a boundary-breaker!

And that is, I think, the main theme of the Gospel of Luke and our main ideal as Christians today. We need to shout to the world that everyone is loved by God and that everyone has a place at the feet of Jesus. Everyone is made in the image of God and we need everyone to be equipped, no matter who they are, to bring the gospel message of inclusion, love, and boundary-breaking peace to the world. Dr. Lewis says, “That those we deem unworthy for the role of disciple are those that Jesus insists are more than qualified. Our certainty about criteria for discipleship Jesus seems to upend. Is it service or sitting? Hospitality or listening? Attentiveness or learning? Or all of the above? This is a story about the fact that even Mary, even a woman, even those we have determined to be outside of God’s grace can imagine themselves as disciples. In other words, what if this story has nothing to do with who is better and everything to do with who matters? What if this story is not preoccupied with proper acceptance and has everything to do with whom you accept?”

It seems the important part of this scripture for today is that we see the true work of Jesus. And that work is to blur and even break the lines that separate us, not only as men and women, but as learners and servants and rich and poor and confident and lonely. All those borders are crossed and even shattered. What we really see are two sisters. These two sisters didn’t have being a student on their mind or being a host on their mind. No, they had Jesus on their minds, devotion to the one who would bring order and love and hope to the world. These sisters simply did the best they could with who they were to draw near to Christ. Their devotion to Jesus was seen in Mary’s attentiveness to his teaching and in Martha’s hospitality. These are all ways they invested in the “one thing.”

So, the one thing? What is that one thing? Is it serving, getting hot and sweaty in the kitchen, running around to make everyone feel at home, providing hospitality and hope? Or is it sitting, listening to the divine, soaking in the words of faith, preaching, praying, and teaching? Yes… to both. Because the one thing isn’t just serving or sitting. Like Curly believed, the “one thing” is different for everyone. Yet, we as followers of the divine know that whether we are serving or sitting, helping or healing, loving or learning, everything we do is in the name of the boundary-breaking Christ. We know what the one thing is. The one thing… is Jesus.

Amen.