As the human race, the pinnacle of all creation, (or so we have convinced ourselves), we have become really good at multi-tasking these days. Long ago, we far surpassed the ability to walk and chew gum at the same time.
Nowadays, we can hold our phone in one hand and the steering wheel of our car in the other. Some of us have even mastered texting and driving at the same time. We can seamlessly follow a recipe and cook dinner even as we simultaneously help with chemistry homework or geometry proofs. We are adept at concurrently listening to a friend in trouble while creating a grocery shopping list in our mind. Our body can be in one place, and our brain somewhere totally different.
Once when I was doing a training walk for the Komen breast cancer walk when we lived in Cumberland , I witnessed a man driving way too fast down Greely Road (He must have been late for work). Not only that, he was looking into his rear view mirror and shaving. Seriously! He had a razor in one hand, and was holding his face in the other. He was keeping the car on the road, I guess, by using his knee to manipulate the steering wheel.
One hopes that he had at least taken the time to say a tiny prayer begore he backed his car out of the driveway, a prayer that nothing would cross the road in front of him.
There was a study presented to Congress in the 1960’s that outlined all the new labor-saving devices that would be coming along in the future. The study estimated that, when they were operational, we would only work an average of 15 hours a week. The conclusion of the study was that our primary problem would be what to do with all this time on our hands.
Yet, here we are – with at least three quarters of us working more than 40 hours a week, and only 57% of us taking our allotted vacation time each year. Whereas time away like that used to be similar to an on-off switch, now it is little more than a dimmer switch – so concerned are we about what might happen if we were truly away from work for a week - or even just a couple of days. And yes - here we are – getting an average of two hours less sleep a night than our ancestors did a hundred years ago.
No doubt about it: we have become really good at going, going, going and continuously doing several things at once. I suspect that most of us feel that we could not keep up with life if we did not. In a nutshell, we would make Martha proud!
We are so like her in the brief Gospel story we just heard. I mean, Martha could throw together a shepherd’s pie, double a recipe for hummus, brew some coffee, heat the water for tea, and pick the very best olives from the ancient twisted tree in the back yard in no time flat – all the while polishing the silver and doing a quick wash of the best china dishes that had been sitting idle on the shelf since the last guest had left a few weeks back.
Martha was a veritable whirlwind in the kitchen. She is our unofficial patron saint of multitasking , and Jesus called her on it one evening when he and a few friends dropped by for dinner. Of course, I cannot blame Martha for pulling out all the stops and throwing a darn good party. Such was the expectation for women in her day. The cultural norm was one of radical welcome and unbounded hospitality for whomever might drop by.
Martha clearly knew her Holy Scripture/the Torah well . She could never quite forget the story in Genesis about Sarah putting on that sumptuous meal for the three strangers who turned out to be angels in disguise. They had showed up at hers and Abraham’s tent unannounced and out of the blue right there at dinner time. Martha always remembered the moral of that story: too Who knows when you might be entertaining angels unawares?
And on this night, it was Jesus who had come to call! He was not only a family friend, but he also had become an increasingly popular (though unorthodox) rabbi, a man who was gathering quite a following.
So – there was Martha, our unofficial patron saint of multitasking , clearly in her element. She was able to take cold food from the ice chest at one time, put hot food on the stove at another time, and make it all come out at once —and with everybody having a walloping good time to boot! We should not be at all surprised to find her rattling around in the kitchen amidst her pots and pans, up to her elbows in lamb and mint and chickpeas and olive oil and garlic.
However, Martha was self-reflective enough to realize that at least a part of her wanted to be listening to what Jesus had to say. She could hear his lilting voice and the occasional laughter coming from the dining room. No wonder she was irked by her sister, Mary, who had managed to not lift a finger to extend the expected hospitality to their guests!
Mary was the dreamer in the family, and Martha sometimes wondered resentfully just how firm her grasp of reality might be at times. Like now, for example: There she sat at Jesus’ feet, her arms hugging her knees close, listening, making time to soak in the words of this mesmerizing teacher and friend, not even realizing that her sister was in the kitchen, doing the women’s work, all alone. Mary - the patron saint of dreamers – or shirkers - perhaps?
Maybe it was her sister’s look of placid but rapt attention that was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Clearly something threw Martha over the edge. That much we know. Can we blame her though? I mean, Martha was working like crazy – trying to pull off a miracle - multitasking at its very best, and Mary was sitting at the feet of Jesus doing absolutely nothing.
No wonder Martha stormed out of the kitchen, soot from the fire smudged on her forehead and left cheek, her hair pulled back in a hastily formed bun, sweat from the heat of the stove staining her robe and plastering a few loose hairs to the side of her face.
“Hey, Jesus, yo, don’t you care that my sister has abandoned the kitchen and left everything up to me to do? Tell her to lend me a hand.” Martha could barely keep her resentment in check, and surely she knew that she had committed a big cultural faux pas.
I mean, she could just as easily have taken Mary aside and reamed her out in the privacy of the kitchen – or out back by the ancient olive tree with its twisted branches. Of course, being so public in her displeasure allowed Jesus to respond and put some much needed perspective on the situation. However, his response did not really help a whole lot , and it has been the subject of controversy and misinterpretation ever since.
“Martha, dear Martha, you’re fussing far too much and getting yourself worked up over nothing. One thing only is essential, and Mary has chosen it—it’s the main course, and won’t be taken from her.”
Now what is that supposed to mean? That it is better to sit around discussing and analyzing the politics of the day rather than actually participating in the political process? That it is better to read the Bible than it is to live day-to-day what the Bible says?
Oh, Jesus, you make things so difficult at times. The least you could have done was tell Martha that you appreciated her efforts in the kitchen, that the hummus was out-of- this-world, and that the shepherd’s pie was the very best you had ever tasted. And maybe Jesus did say those things, but the Gospel writer just did not see fit to include them in the narrative.
Whether Jesus complimented Martha on her cooking skills or not, I do not think in responding to Martha’s tirade that he was making a judgment about the relationship between being the unofficial patron saint of multitasking and that of dreamers and shirkers or about the relationship between working and learning. I do not think that Jesus was creating an either/or situation. However, I do think that this incident allowed him to point out the way to a richer and fuller life centered on God, something we all ought to be seeking.
Jesus tells Martha that she is anxious and distracted about many things, as many Bible translations phrase it. Mary, in turn, has chosen the one thing. And that one thing is, what? That is a tantalizing detail missing from the story.
Do you remember the film "City Slickers”? It is about three old friends, men in the midst of impending midlife crises trying to reconcile their urban (and urbane) yuppie lifestyle with something else. And so they decide to spend a vacation together going on a cattle drive - helping some seasoned cowboys herd their cattle across the great plains of the American West. In doing so, they hope to get in touch with their deeper selves and figure out the meaning of life.
The boss of this cattle drive is a leathery old cowboy. He is mean and tough, and he can do anything with a lasso or a whip or a knife. He is also very wise.
In one of the more serious scenes of this comedy, he is riding alongside one of the city slickers, and their conversation turns philosophical.
The city boy comments to the old cowboy: “Your life makes sense to you."
To which the cowboy replies: "You city folk. You worry a lot. How old are you? 38?"
"39," the man says.
"You all come up here about the same age. You spend fifty weeks getting knots in your rope and you think two weeks up here will untie them for you. None of you get it."
He pauses a minute and then he goes on, "You know what the secret to life is?"
"No, what?" says the city slicker.
And the old wizened cowboy says, "One thing. Just one thing. You stick to that, and everything else don't mean nothing."
"That's great," says his companion, "but what's the one thing?"
The old cowboy looks at him and smiles: "That's what you've got to figure out."
I think Jesus understood that Martha’s constantly expanding “to do” list never left her time to figure out what was important, never allowed her to simply be fully in the present moment I think Jesus understood that when your life is in a whirlwind, you just cannot take note of things around you that may be beckoning to live within you. I think that Jesus understood that we all make choices, and we all have priorities. I think that is what Jesus meant by his cryptic remarks to Martha.
It is as theologian Paul Tillich once remarked,. "There are innumerable concerns in our lives and in human life generally," he says, "which demand attention, devotion, passion. But they do not demand infinite attention, unconditional devotion, ultimate passion. They are important, often very important, for you and me and for the whole of humankind. But they are not ultimately important....”
I would submit that this Bible story really is not about Martha and Mary at all. It is about us – and about the choices we make – and on what basis we make those choices. As Episcopal priest Michael Marsh noted, “ Our choices can shape who we are. They can establish in us patterns and habits of how we see and at, the words we speak, and the way we relate to each other. Our choices can set a trajectory for our life. Our choices make a difference.”
There was once a couple going on a European vacation they had been planning for a long time. Now, finally, they were standing in line at the airport waiting to check their numerous bags.
The husband said to his wife, "I wish we had brought the piano."
She replied, "Why? We've got sixteen bags already!"
Her husband said, "Yes, I know-- but the tickets are on the piano!"
Thank goodness for smart phones and online check in!
Seriously, how frustrating for each one of us when primary things become secondary, and the important things get lost in the push and pull we experience each day! As one blogger I read this past week noted, “We can be taking care of our house, but not building a home.
We can be living with our spouse, but not cultivating a marriage. I can serve faithfully at church, but not truly be serving the Lord. I can sing Christian songs and not really be worshipping. “
This Lenten worship series has been focused on reconnecting to our unhurried God, on slowing down because we move too fast, on not being a victim of our circumstances, but rather taking control of our lives and how we spend our time. To that end, I have encouraged you to be more intentional, to reflect more on your priorities and to look honestly for where God and Jesus and all that he stood for and this church as well fit on your “to do” list.
I have encouraged you to develop at least one Lenten practice that will offer you an opportunity each day - if only briefly - to exist more in the present moment than in the future or in the past Each Sunday, I have suggested and offered experiences here in worship that have the potential to encourage you to take time to be silent, to pray and meditate more regularly, and to give up as best you can some of the multitasking and living life in a constant state of busyness, like Martha did.
That is what made her anxious, you know. Martha was pulled in so many directions that she could no longer see what was truly important – or maybe, even more tragic, she could see what was important but could not see her way clear to embrace it. Her “to do” list was too long. She did not think she could afford the time to just listen to Jesus, this man who emanated the goodness of God in his own person.
We are entering the second half of Lent this week – how time flies! Let’s use these final weeks of this season of preparation for Easter to continue – or maybe to begin – a contemplative practice that will encourage us to be a bit more like Mary, who chose not to be a victim of her culture but rather took control of her life, who was able to focus – at least for that time before dinner – on that which is most important for us who say we are Christians – the voice of Jesus beckoning us to invite him into our lives not just Sunday morning but every day, to listen quietly for the Holy Spirit and what the Spirit might e telling us, and to embrace and live out all that he stood for.
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