Mary Has Chosen The Good Part

This morning, we're going to be finishing up Luke chapter 10. We're going to be studying the account of Martha and Mary. If you know this account, it's easy to think you know the point of this story. You know that you're supposed to emulate Mary and not Martha. If you can remember which one was sitting at Jesus' feet and which one was serving. You go, the one who was at Jesus' feet, that's the one I'm supposed to be like. I'm not supposed to be like Mary, or like Martha, rather. There's much more to this account. In fact, the point of this text is not even to compare Mary and Martha. Jesus doesn't tell Martha, you need to be more like your sister. Instead, he calls Martha to have her priorities in order. This morning, I want us to be convicted about how we don't prioritize the Lord, how he gets the dregs of our time and our energy. If we have leftovers, then we'll serve God, then we'll give attention to him. But we have cares in this world, we have business to attend to, we have things that are important.

They can't go without our attention. And these things, when we bring these things up in our lives and we say, this is what has to be done. And Lord, you'll get the time that I have left if there is some. We have behaved as Martha did. And my goal this morning, my hope is that we will repent of that. That we'll hear Jesus' correction to Martha and that we'll take it to heart for ourselves. This is not meant to simply be knowledge that we have in our heads, but it's meant to be truth that's driven down into our heart and that affects change in our life for the glory of God. Would you please stand for the reading of God's word? Luke chapter 10, verses 38 through 42. This is the word of the Lord, and it is eternally true. 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. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. I want to give you a little bit of context before we jump into the text this morning about who Mary and Martha are. Mary and Martha have a brother, and his name is Lazarus. These are the sisters of the man whom Jesus raised from the dead. It wasn't long before this encounter that we're reading this morning that Jesus actually had come to Bethany, which is where they live, to resurrect Lazarus. When Jesus showed up to resurrect Lazarus, there were a number of Jews that had come out from Jerusalem. Bethany is not far off from Jerusalem, about two miles.

And so there were a number of Jews that had come to Mary and Martha's home to console them concerning their brother's death. And when Jesus raised Lazarus, many of those same Jews believed. And word got back to the Pharisees that these Jews had believed in Jesus Christ. And these Pharisees began to plot against Jesus, seeking a time to seize him and to kill him. They also planned to kill Lazarus as well because he's the one whom Jesus raised from the dead. If he still lives and he goes, that guy they killed? I was dead and he made me alive. They couldn't have that either. And so the Pharisees sought to kill both Jesus and Lazarus. And so after this encounter where the Pharisees decide we're going to get him, Jesus goes, it says in John chapter 11, it says that he no longer walked publicly among the Jews. He retired to a city called Ephraim, which isn't far off from here, near the wilderness. And he taught his disciples because it wasn't time for him to die.

And so he was there, perhaps you'd say in hiding, for a time. And then he comes back. It's six days before the Passover, before he goes up into Jerusalem. He comes out of Ephraim. He goes up into Bethany on his way to Jerusalem. And then he has this interaction with Mary and with Martha. And Lazarus is there. And so now we come to our text. This is what's going on. Jesus has raised their brother from the dead. Many have believed Jesus has gone away for a time. Now he's come back. And so we read that as they were traveling along, he entered a village. This village is Bethany. And Martha comes out and she welcomes Jesus into her home. Not only makes sense that Martha would do this, right? Jesus has raised her brother from the dead. She sees Jesus who's been in hiding, if you will. The Pharisees have sent out the word asking in APB, All Points Bulletin, where is Jesus? If you know where he's at, you come tell us.

And so now Jesus comes out of hiding and he shows up here in Bethany and Martha says, you come into my house. It shows how grateful she was for Jesus' love to her family. It shows that she loved Jesus. She invites him into her house to give him a meal and to care for him. If you were reading John 11, you'd realize that even before Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, he had had some interaction with this family. He loved them. is what we're told in John 11, 5. It says that Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. And if you read earlier in the book of John in John 1, 28, speaking of John the Baptist when he's out in the wilderness preaching and calling people to repent, saying, there's one coming whose sandals I'm not worthy to fill, and he's baptizing people. And eventually where Jesus comes to him at the Jordan to be baptized, it says in John 1, 28, these things took place in Bethany beyond the Jordan where John was baptizing.

And we know that when John was baptizing, when he's out there in the wilderness doing his work, people are coming from Jerusalem out there and saying, what in the world is going on? And it only makes sense that people from the local community would also be out there saying, what is going on? What's this man saying? And at that time, they would have met Jesus, Mary and Martha and Lazarus. We know that they knew Jesus prior to the resurrection of Mary and Martha, of Lazarus, because when Lazarus fell sick, Martha and Mary sent for Jesus. And they said, come. The one whom you love is sick. And so they knew Jesus loved him. They sent word to him. And so when Jesus shows back up in Bethany, Martha says, you come into my home. So when we read this account of Mary and Martha and our understanding is, we don't want to be like Martha. I say, you're going to miss stuff that's good. Because Martha loved Jesus. And Martha wanted to serve him.

And she welcomed him into her home. And he's a fugitive, as it were at this time. And she says, you come into my home. Because she loved him. Because she believed. When Jesus was coming in to resurrect Lazarus, Martha leaves the mourning party at her house. She hears Jesus is coming and she runs out to him and says, if you'd been here, Lord, he wouldn't have died. And Jesus says, I'll raise him from the dead. And she goes, I know that you'll raise him on the last day. I believe in all that stuff. And Jesus says, I mean more than that. I'm going to raise him now, is the implication. And when Martha finds that out, she goes back and she tells Mary, and she goes, Mary, the teacher's here. And then Mary gets up and Mary leaves. And this is the context in which all these people are around seeing Jesus save, raise Lazarus. And so there's love that flows both directions, from Jesus to this family and from this family to Jesus. And the fruit of that,

is hospitality. The fruit of that is openness, welcomeness, welcoming. Oh, you're that guy they're trying to kill. If we have you come into our house, what's going to become of us? No, no, you come into our house. We love you. Our faith and our love for God ought to work itself out in us welcoming Jesus and his disciples into our homes. These sorts of opportunities arise, and it's our joy to be able to host them. A couple of months ago, and I will say, what this means is that you're going to host Christians you don't know. And you know what? You'll be encouraged by it. You'll be encouraged by it. A couple of months ago, I got contacted through the grapevine. I got a Facebook message from some guy I've never met before. And says, hey, I'm going to be an indie for this conference. And me and my wife and three of our friends, we need a place to stay. I've never even met this guy. And he's like, oh, well, our mutual friend said I should get in touch with you. And I kind of chuckled like you're chuckling because you're kind of sitting here like, that's awfully presumptuous.

And so I messaged him, you know, I said, oh, let me work on it. And so I called, you know, I call around, I got in contact with the Georges, and I say, hey, can some strangers stay at your house? And Dan says, yeah, sure. Now it turns out that they actually, you know, circumstances were such that they didn't end up staying at Dan and Wendy's house. But that ought to be our disposition towards Jesus and his disciples. Yes, you can come into our house. Yes, we will feed you a meal. Yes, we will help you out. And I can tell you that... This is something that's right on the, that we're going to be dealing with this again in our congregation, Lord willing. It's our hope that toward the end of July, we're going to host a rally, if you will, a worship service. On a Wednesday evening, is that right, David? Thursday evening, July 26th or 27th, I don't remember the date, 27th, I think.

And the goal of this is we're going to host a rally. We're going to have men from, some of the men that we were with in this conference in Phoenix are going to be holding a national conference down in Louisville. And they're going to come up here and we're going to have a worship service. And then the next morning, as many of us as are able are going to go to the abortion mill in the morning. Well, we're going to be looking at having, I don't know, two to four dozen people come up from Louisville who said, if you've got a place we could stay, that'd be great. If not, we'll work it out.

But if you do, that'd be awesome. Now, do we have the means as a church to say, yeah, we can house 50 people? Eh, maybe not. And we're going to work to find other housing and other accommodations. But that right there is an opportunity for you to do what Martha did. If you've got room and you go, you know what? We can feed them macaroni and cheese or we can get Little Caesar's pizza or whatever it is. If you've got room, I want you to pray and consider it because the request is going to end up coming. at some point. And if you can't, I don't want you to feel bad about it. I don't want you to be like, oh, I'm not a good Christian because I can't. If you sincerely can't and you honestly don't have the room, that's okay. But if you do have the means in the room to host other Christians, then do it. That's what Martha did here. It's commendable what she did at her own cost. She welcomes Jesus and his disciples, right? A big party of people into her house to house them and to feed them.

Martha did well here, and we should emulate her. So Martha welcomes Jesus into her house. And then she gets to work. Because this wasn't planned. Hey, I'm coming in, and we're going to be here, and there's going to be this many people. They show up. And she goes, you come into my house. Now we've got to feed them. How are we going to feed them? So Martha gets to work preparing this meal. Now I want to ask you, what kind of meal would you prepare for Jesus? You want to despise Martha, but just consider, what would you feed him? Steak? You'd say, what? Yeah, more than Little Caesars. You'd say, I want to do the best. Kids, go get cleaned up. Wipe your hands. Set the table. We're going to do this. Kill the fattened calf. Go get this. You'd want to prepare the exact same kind of meal that Martha would. You know what? You'd be busy doing it. Are you so different than Martha? You'd want to say, we've got to give them a great meal. And what if your husband said to you, you know what? Jesus is here.

Now, Martha wasn't married. But what if, in your home, the husband says, Honey, get some Papa John's. Tell them to deliver it. Come sit down with Jesus. Do you understand how that would go over? No, we can't do that. And so we're like Martha. We understand what she was thinking. And is what she was thinking wrong? Was it wrong for her to want to serve her Lord the best she had? No, the desire is good. So she gets about that work. And Mary goes and sits at Jesus' feet. And Martha's about the work and she's slaving away. And the whole house is abuzz, you can imagine. Jesus, all of his disciples, Lazarus, these women, who knows who else is at this house. It's a big group. And Martha's scrambling, getting the work done. And she comes to Jesus and she says, tell that lazy bum of a sister of mine to get up and help. That's essentially what she said, right?

Martha was distracted with all of her preparations and she came up and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me alone to do all the serving alone? She accuses her sister of being lazy. Don't you think she should get up and help? But Mary's sitting at Jesus' feet. She's listening to him preach. One of the things that we realize, one of the other things we can learn from this text is that when you spend time in other people's homes, you ought to redeem the time. You ought to make it profitable. Jesus didn't just sit down and chill out and wait for dinner. He was teaching. What was Mary doing? She was listening to his word.

Paul tells the Ephesian elders, he says, for a period of three and a half years, I didn't cease to admonish you, each one of you, day and night with tears publicly and from house to house. This is what Jesus is doing. He's in their house and he's teaching. And so when you're in other people's homes, it's not time to talk about the weather or the Colts or the NBA finals or the economy or the president or whatever it is. Redeem the time. Make it profitable. I'll tell you, if you make it profitable, if you do this sort of thing, people will want to be around. They'll want to be there. They'll enjoy it. At our small group, I don't lead the group. Poor John Hensel has to try to lead the group, but I'm there. And so since I can't lead the discussion time or whatever, we read a book because we've got a lot of little kids in our group. And we want them to be engaged for the whole time.

And so one of the things that I do is when we eat our meal, I just have something I want to talk about. I just pick something. And it can just be, do you remember when you read in this scripture and you remember it said this or it could be something like that or it could be, did you see what happened over here in culture? Here's how I think Christians ought to respond to that or just some sort of conversation. And this is what we do at my small group every week. I come and just talk because that's what I do. And then other people talk. And then Daniel talks and John talks and Emily talks and Vanessa and Mallory. And everyone's talking. You know what? Our small group attendance is awesome. Everyone comes every week. And everyone's disappointed when we cancel. Now, don't you wish you had that small group? Redeem the time. Make it profitable. Talk about something. You won't get young men. They want to go watch the game. They want to play frisbee golf. They want to go do something fun. They don't want to come sit and...

In your house and do nothing? Redeem the time. Make it profitable for them. Do what Jesus did. He showed up and he talked. He taught. And Mary was wise to engage, to listen. So Mary's sitting at Jesus' feet. He's teaching. She's listening. This is where the temptation to compare the two women comes in because Martha comes in and she goes, I'm doing what's right and Mary's doing what's wrong. And we say, that's right. Mary's doing what's right and Martha's doing what's wrong. But then if that's really what we think, then what Jesus' response to Martha is, Essentially, what he's saying to Martha is, it's okay for her to be lazy. I'm glad for her to be lazy. She's chosen the good part, the lazy part. She's sitting at my feet, being lazy. Because that's what Martha's accusing her of. Jesus says, it's good for her to be lazy and sit here and do nothing. Now, is that what Jesus is saying? It's good for Mary to be lazy. In fact, all my people are lazy.

That's the mark of my people. They just come and listen and listen and learn and learn and study and do all this stuff, and they're lazy. They don't weigh tables. They don't clean their house. They don't do their laundry. They don't go to work. You think I'm crazy, but I've met Christians who think they're too godly to work. They can't work with unbelieving bosses. They can't work with people who talk like that, because they've got to be clean. They're Christians, you know, and they're all about their devotions, and they're all about their godliness, and they're all about that stuff. Now, are those things good? Should you be about the Lord Jesus Christ and about his word and about prayer and devoting yourself to him? Absolutely. Is that in any way in conflict with you working hard, being hospitable, or loving other people? No, it's not. You can love Jesus Christ with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and then you can love your neighbor as yourself, and you can serve them food. Martha did well to prepare a meal.

It was appropriate for her to do it. Martha wanted to honor Jesus Christ. And she comes to him and she says, My sister's being lazy. And by his response, he doesn't respond directly and say, No, she's not being lazy. Actually, what she's doing is the right thing. He responds to her and he says, Martha, Martha. So what's wrong with Martha? What's wrong with Martha is that her priorities are all screwed up. They're really all screwed up. And if you think back to what you would do if Jesus showed up at your house, The president of your company. Or the chair of your department. Or some elected official. Who is it that you respect? When they show up at your house, what do you do? What's it like before company comes over? You run around, you scramble, and everything's getting all cleaned up, and you behave, and you do this, and where's that food, and don't burn that, and it's just crazy. And the more prominent the guest, the more crazy it is in preparation. That's what it's like.

And so Martha was distracted with all of her preparations. And that was the impetus for her coming to Jesus and saying, my sister's being lazy. Tell her not to be. Tell her to be like me. But really what's going on is Martha's priorities are out of whack. It was good for her to serve a meal. It needed to happen. These men had been traveling. They were tired. They were dirty. They were hungry. They needed to be fed. Someone had to prepare a meal and it was good for Martha to do it. But it did not have to be as wonderful as she intended it to be. It really didn't. And that's what Jesus said to her. You've got your priorities all out of whack. All out of whack. Here's an example. Today is the first Sunday of the month. And we have a picnic after church, right? Do you know that there's a correlation between Sunday school attendance and picnics in our church? Do you know that you guys don't come to Sunday school on time when you have picnics? Why?

I'm bringing food, says the woman. That's right, you're bringing food. And so here's my solution. Prepare your food last night or bring something that takes less work. How's that? How's that sit with you? Well, what will they think if I bring a potato salad from Kroger? And I say, you think that homemade potato salad is more important than Sunday school? Do you think that coffee is more important out there than Sunday school or donuts or whatever it is? Gotta have it. Gotta do it. No, you don't. You've got your priorities out of whack. You're being like Martha. If that stuff's really that important to you, here's the difference. Martha didn't know Jesus was coming. You know when the first Sunday of the month is coming. Okay? You know. Make your preparations and get to Sunday school on time or to worship on time. Okay? If you don't, you're broadcasting.

To me and to anyone else who has eyes to see, I'm like, Martha, my priorities are all screwed up. And you know how you come into Sunday school? You come in all miserable and with a scowl. And then you've got to get up and you've got to go check on this thing. And you and your husband got in a fight or you and your wife got in a fight on the way here. And everything's all miserable. You're distracted with your many preparations. And you come and say, Lord, this isn't fair. I wish we never had picnics. I hope it rains. So Martha's priorities are all out of whack. Her preoccupation with the meal.

which was necessary, led her to sin. She acted as though the meal was the most important thing going on. But do you understand? Jesus was in her house, and he was teaching, and she's worried about food. When you put it that way, the priority seems obvious. It's like, what in the world were you thinking, Martha? It's so clear. Mary didn't even have to think to do the right thing. And I say, no, she did. You should serve a meal, but you should receive what's being given. The scripture tells us that it's better to give than to receive, right? And so you can understand Martha saying it's better to give than to receive. Sacrifice instead of sit. And I say when Jesus is speaking, it's better for you to receive than to serve a meal. You follow? It's better for you to listen to Jesus Christ than to fret about food and napkins and tablecloths and this sort of stuff. I was at a wedding one time and it was discouraging to me because someone that I love very dearly was worried about the lines in the tablecloths for the reception.

And they were missing their child's preparation for their wedding. And I was talking to the pastor who was doing the wedding, and he just said, that's just so sad. It's very clear that this woman loves her daughter. Because look at the attention and the care that she's giving to the tablecloths. But you couldn't tell this woman to stop. Just leave the wrinkles. Your daughter's getting married. It's very easy to get our priorities all out of whack. So Martha, convinced that she's right, Because why would you talk to Jesus the way she did unless you were convinced you were right? She comes to the Lord and she says, my sister's being unfaithful and lazy. Now Mary wasn't being either of those things, actually. Mary had her priorities straight. She wasn't above serving. In fact, when Martha went out to meet Jesus when he was on his way to resurrect Lazarus, Mary stayed and hosted the morning party. This is what she did. In this situation, when Jesus has come into their house, Mary understood what was most important and she attended to it.

She also wasn't being lazy. You know what goes hand in glove with laziness? If you want to know what else a lazy person is, they're greedy. Laziness and greediness always go together. Lazy people always complain that they don't have enough and they don't have what's theirs and it's not fair and why do they get that and I don't get that? And part of the answer is because you don't work for it. But laziness and greediness always go together. And so what do you envision? Think for a minute. Jesus is sitting there and he's teaching and Mary's at his feet. and she's listening to his word. What do you think Mary's doing? Do any of you know what Mary's doing? This is where she takes a pound of pure nard, of perfume, and she anoints Jesus' feet with it, and then she washes his feet with her hair. That's what she's doing at Jesus' feet. This is what we find in John chapter 12. It says, so they made him a supper there. This is Jesus. So they made him a supper there, and Martha was serving, but Lazarus was one of those reclining at the table with him, with Jesus.

Mary then took a pound of very costly perfume of pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. Is she being lazy? Is she being greedy? She's serving Jesus Christ. And he says to her what she doesn't know. And he says, when Judas gets all upset, the thief, Judas Iscariot, who's like, we could have sold that and we could have given money to the poor. And Jesus says, you don't know what she's doing. She's anointing my feet for death. She's got her priorities straight. She's taking care of me. You're going to have the poor with you forever.

She's doing the right thing. Mary wasn't idle. She wasn't lazy. She was serving Jesus Christ. She was loving him. She was worshiping him and praising him. This is humble work. Mary did humble work. Lazy people don't ever do humble work. If lazy people are ever brought to work, it has to be work that people will notice. People will go, oh, look at what they did. They'll never do the humble work. Mary does humble work. She anoints Jesus' feet. She sits and listens to his teaching. And so you can understand Martha's, you know, this adding to Martha's frustration in the heat of the moment. Very costly perfume. Whole house smells like it. Money, gone. Not helping me serve. Martha's mad. She's distracted. And the Lord answered her to Martha, and he said to her, Martha, Martha, you're worried and bothered about so many things. You're worried and bothered about so many things. It's simple. It's just a simple correction. And it's offensive, isn't it?

It's actually offensive. You're worried about so many things and they're not important. They're not as important as you're making them out to be. Jesus simply corrects her, Martha, Martha, you're worried about so many things. Not a few things, but so many things. You've multiplied your worries and your concerns and your fears and your anxieties and all these things. You can't help but worry about them. You're worried about so many things. Jesus doesn't go on to say to her, why are you worried about preparing us a meal? We don't need to eat. Why don't you come sit down like your sister and be lazy? No, the meal needs to be served. Jesus doesn't condemn her for serving. He corrects her for having her priorities all messed up. Here I am. I'm your Lord. I love you. I love you. He raised her brother from the dead. When Jesus saw Mary and Martha and all of the Jews weeping, Jesus wept. He loved them.

And he says to the one he loves, you're worried about so many things. And it's loving for him to say that to her, to correct her. Mary's expectations for her sister and the meal were inappropriate. All of the details surrounding the hospitality had displaced what was actually important. Jesus says to her, only one thing is necessary. Only one thing is necessary, for Mary has chosen the good part, the better part. In different translations, that word is translated better. Jesus commends Mary to Martha and calls Martha to get her priorities in order. You're working on things that will be gone tomorrow, honey. You really are. You're working on stuff that's going to be gone tomorrow. But what I'm saying to you can never be taken away from you, and it has eternal benefit. Sister, listen to me. Listen to me. This is what Jesus is saying to Martha. It's very tender. It's not nasty. It's not mean. It is direct, but he's correcting her.

So here we have Mary and Martha. And both of these women, in their own regard, have been given to us to emulate. It's not an either-or. It's not like, well, I'm supposed to be like Mary and I'm not supposed to be like Martha. Both of these women loved Jesus, absolutely adored him, and they sought to serve him in the best way they could, the best way they knew how. Mary chose the better part, the better way. Martha was a hospitable, hardworking woman. who loved Jesus and served him well. Mary was a humble, faithful woman who loved Jesus and listened to his teaching. So what's the application to you and to me? Well, first, you have to figure out whether you're a Mary or you're a Martha. And I've already said that most of us are like Martha. Because if Jesus was coming to your house, you'd do what Martha did, or you'd be inclined to, and now you'd be all bollocked up about it because I said you shouldn't do that. But all of you are inclined to be like Martha. I can honor by doing this stuff. I can serve, and it's helpful.

Well, you've got to figure out who are you. Are you Martha? If you're a Martha, I want you to know that your service and your hospitality are not beneath God. Mary doesn't teach you that being hospitable is inappropriate. Because Jesus doesn't have anything to say about her saying, you shouldn't have prepared a meal. It was unnecessary. He doesn't correct her desire to serve him in any way. He only corrects her priority. And so if you're a Martha and God's given you gifts of service and gifts of hospitality, then I say the way you serve God is by exercising them, not by killing them. Some of you aren't hospitable. Some of you aren't. But some of you are. And those of you who are hospitable aren't supposed to live in a constant, I'm like Mary. I need to stop being like Mary. Well, yes, if you understand that being like Mary is that your gifts are going to tempt you to sin.

And that's true of every one of us. That's true of every single one of us. The gifts that God has given you, those will be your greatest temptations to sin. You will sin in ways that correlate with your gifts. You have gifts of helps and hospitality. What's your temptation to sin going to be? Bitterness? Frustration with other people? Constantly? This is what people who are hospitable are always dealing with. They're mad at you because you're not hospitable. or you're not good house guests. Do you know that? That's what hospitable people think. They think, I've made all these preparations, I've done all this stuff, I've made all this thing, and then you walk through my house with your muddy feet, child? If your wife acts like that, she's hospitable. And her hospitality is leading her to temptation. So if you're a Martha, I don't want you to go, I'm not supposed to be about service and hospitality. No, you are. Jesus Christ was honored by her care and by her service.

But what you may not do if you're a Martha is you may not subvert the word of the Lord for hospitality. If you can't make a meal pleasantly and cheerfully without biting the heads off of everyone in your house, order pizza. That's it. Order pizza. Serve it on paper plates. Sit in folding chairs with no table. That would be better. And I really mean better. If you're a Martha, you're to serve God with your gifts, but you're not to let your gifts Subvert what's actually important. The food is not the most important thing going on in Martha's house. Jesus' teaching is. Secondly, to you men. Now, I haven't said it explicitly, but I have been talking to women quite a bit. And the reason is because these temptations are women's temptations. You women identify much more readily with Mary and Martha than you men do. Women tend to be more hospitable than men. They tend to care more about details. Presentation, generally speaking, is more important to them.

So is there any application for you men? Oh, absolutely there is. Because your work gets in the way of you serving Jesus Christ and sitting under his word just like Martha. Oh, I got to work. Oh, I got to study. Oh, I got to play this video game. I got to beat it. I got to do it. No, you don't. No, you don't. You have to attend upon the word of God. That's your calling, men. You do the same thing Martha does. You just do it in your sphere. And you ought not to do it. Pastor's telling me I shouldn't work hard. No, I didn't say that. That's not what I said. Men should work hard. You should be diligent. You should be efficient. Do you know that I've said to men before, they say, I'm so busy and I don't have time and I can't do this. And my response to them is, you're not efficient enough. Your problem is that you're not efficient enough. You need to get more work done in the same amount of time and not sacrifice your family and not sacrifice the word of God. Work.

Better, more faster, okay? And you can tell your kids that with homework, okay? You can actually tell them that. If they, I can't, I got homework, I can't eat dinner. Look at them and say, sweetie, I love you just like Jesus loves me. Get it done by nine o'clock because you're going to bed at nine and that's that. You're not gonna miss dinner. You're not gonna miss family devotions. You're not gonna miss bedtime. You're not gonna miss the things that are more important. Because you're inefficient. Straighten up. Get it done. And when you say that to a man, when I say that to a man, it's like I stuck a hot branding iron on his backside. He's, and he's going to do his work because, you know, I got to work faster. And you know what he does? He makes a complete mess of it. For a time, that's what happens. Just like if I told a woman, stop the preparations and sit down because Jesus is here.

well, what's going to happen? Well, the food's going to be cold and the potatoes aren't going to be cooked and the lemonade's not going to have sugar in it and whatever else is wrong. And you know what? That's okay. Mama, you'll figure it out. You'll learn how to get that work done in the time you've got. You really will. So get your priorities straight. If you're a Martha, if you're a Mary, what's a Mary? Is Mary lazy? No. What's Mary? Mary says, well, my inclination would be to attend upon the word of God. Some of us, have more of a taste for it, more of an inclination to it, would that all of us did, and cared more about the things of God and attended to his word and to his service better than we do now. But for those of you who are more sensitive at this point and have a conscience that's more in tune with that sort of thing, I want to say to you, Mary was not sitting there doing nothing. And Mary was not above service. Mary was not idle.

And you may never conceive of serving Jesus Christ as being a covering for idleness. How are the widows in 1 Timothy 5 that we read this morning, how are they described? Were they idle women? No. If they were going to get on the list, it said explicitly, they may not be idle or busybodies, which leads to gossip. They may not. But I'm going from house to house, and I'm serving all the women of the church, and I'm doing all this stuff. Paul tells Timothy, you watch out for those women because they're gossips. You tell them to get to work, take care of their kids, keep their own house, get married if they're young. You tell them not to be idle. Mary was not idle. And so godliness is not an excuse to be able to put life in neutral. Oh, well, I can't do that because I need to be about Jesus. Well, I can't do that work right now. I can't come do that. I can't make that sacrifice because that would affect me in Jesus' time.

I say you can't live in a world where service to God directly and devotion to him is set in conflict with the responsibility that he's given you. You can't live and put those things in conflict. You can serve Jesus with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength and love your neighbor. You can listen to his teaching. You can attend to everything that he provides and you can fulfill your duties. You can be hospitable. What's that look like practically? Okay, ladies, what that looks like practically is it looks like your house can't be a mess because you had to have devotions. You had to pray all day. You can't. That's unfaithfulness. That's not appropriate. That's not what Mary's doing here. You can attend to the Word of God. You can attend to prayer. You can attend to worship and Sunday school and small groups and prayer meetings and everything else that we do with Christians, and you can keep your house clean too.

and keep the laundry folded and picked up. And you can teach the kids to put the toys away, and you can get them to school, or you can teach them, or whatever it is you do. You can do all of it, actually. You can be busy. Not busybodies who don't produce anything, but you can actually be hardworking and faithful and productive. Mary was productive. She was not idle. You ought to teach your daughters this as well. Your daughters are going to be tempted to be like Mary or to be like Martha. and it'll be more apparent to you than it will be with sons. Sons will face the same temptations, but when you start trying to tell your sons about Mary and Martha, there's kind of a disconnect. You need to talk to them from other places in Scripture about what it means to be a son. But your daughters are going to be tempted to be like Mary and Martha. You need to teach your daughters not to be idle. Little girls like to be idle. I was just having a conversation this last week about nursery, and I was told, I didn't know,

Because I've got one young, young daughter. And I was told, you know that 12-year-old girls like to go in the nursery so that they don't have to be in here? They'd rather serve in the nursery and play with babies. Now, is that every girl? No. But is that a common temptation? I'm told it is. And I'm inclined to believe the person. So bear that in mind and think about your own daughters and say, are you lazy? Do I have a lazy daughter? If I do... How am I going to help her? I don't want her looking at Mary and going, I'm doing like Mary. I'm just going to read my Bible all day and I'm not going to clean my room and I'm not going to wash my hair and I'm not going to serve my family. No, this is not. That's not Mary. So if you're a Mary, which is not to say you're lazy, do not neglect your duties of the teaching you receive. Take what Jesus teaches you and put it into practice. That's what Marys ought to do. Jesus doesn't teach that our brains can get bigger. Jesus teaches so that our

Hands and feet can get tired doing the work. Finally, men, husbands, brothers, fathers, it's your place to know the women that God's placed in your life and help them towards greater godliness in this area from wherever they are. If your wife's not hospitable, you need to help her learn what it means to be hospitable. And that doesn't mean badgering her because Jesus didn't badger Martha or Mary. You need to be kind and you need to be tender. You need to help her. learn what it means to serve Jesus from where she's at. Jesus was kind and tender to Martha and Mary, and you ought to be also. You ought to love and care for the women in your life. Realize that the temptations that Martha faced are common, and you ought to deal with them the way Jesus dealt with them. He didn't despise either one of them. He cared for them. He was tender with them. He loved them. And you men ought to love the women that God's placed in your life. If you do those things,

Jesus Christ will be honored. He'll be honored by your service. He'll be honored by your devotion. And he will receive glory. The last thing I'll say is that ought to be public. People ought to be able to look and see these things. They ought to be able to observe that these things are true of your life. This is not some hidden thing. It should be public. People should be able to observe it and say, you know about those people? They love Jesus. And I can tell because this is the sort of stuff they do in their life. It should be obvious to people. If you do these things, it will be obvious to people. I'm not telling you, okay, how do I make my godliness obvious to people? The answer to that question is, be godly. If you will be godly, it will be obvious. If you will serve Jesus, people will see. And when they give you that look like, then you speak and you say, I know, you think I'm nuts. Because they do this thing. But let me tell you why we do it. Because there's a God in heaven.

who's going to send everyone who doesn't love him to hell. That's what he's going to do because he made us. Made me, made you. And I serve him because he sent his son to save me from the pit of hell and to help me to live a life that honors him. That's why I do what I do. And that's why I do it with joy. And you ought to as well. They'll know. I'm scared. I say, trust God. Trust God and speak. What I just said to you, every one of you can say. From the little one. up to the gray hair, you can say it. And so say it and do it. Let's pray. Father, you are good and loving and pleased to call us your children. We thank you for your mercy, for your long suffering and your patience toward us. We pray, Father, that you would equip us to walk in a manner worthy of our calling. Help us to devote ourselves first and foremost to loving you and serving you, learning about you, living.

lives in obedience to you. Father, would you give us eyes to see, help us to understand who we are, what our particular temptations are, and then give us grace to fight them. Give us your Holy Spirit to lead us, to protect us, to comfort us. Father, you've given us your word. You've equipped us with everything that we need for life and godliness through the true knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We ask that you would fix our eyes on his cross and commit our feet and our hands and our mouths to his service without ever looking back like Lot's wife. And we pray that through all these things you would receive the glory that you deserve. Forgive us when we fail, when we sin, and equip us to grow more and more into the image of your son, our Lord Jesus Christ. It's in his name that we pray. Amen.