Luke 10:38-42 – Martha and Mary

Luke 10:38

1. Jesus was good friends with the sisters Martha and Mary and their brother Lazarus, whom Jesus also raised from the dead on another occasion (John 11). They lived just outside Jerusalem in the village of Bethany.
2. The passage just before this text, “The Good Samaritan”, begins with a lawyer asking Jesus what one should do to have eternal life, to which Jesus replies, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbour as yourself.” (Luke 10:27). Then Jesus tells us first about the Good Samaritan to show us how to treat our neighbour as ourselves, and then we read about Martha and Mary to show us how to love the Lord God with all our heart, namely by “sitting at the Lord’s feet”.
3. This text shows two representatives of two different ways of practising their faith. Martha represents the practical active Christian and Mary the more pious praying and reading Christian. Neither of these two ways of practicing their faith is wrong, but Jesus wants to emphasize that Mary has chosen the better of the two.
   1. What Mary learned at Jesus’ feet she will carry with her forever and ever, while all of Martha’s practical tasks will eventually come to an end.
   1. However, it should be remembered never to despise one or the other way of practicing one’s faith because both are needed. A Marior-only congregation would be just as strange as a Martor-only congregation.

Luke 10:39

1. Sitting at the “feet of the Lord” was the place of Jesus’ disciples. This was how Jewish students sat when they listened to their rabbi’s teaching (Acts 22:3). Now Mary, a woman, sits there.
   1. You can imagine that many people turned up their noses when Mary sat down to listen to Jesus as if she were one of his closest disciples. Perhaps even some thought that the kitchen, where Martha was, is the place for women.
2. When you sit down at Jesus’ feet, that is, start reading your Bible as if it were God’s word to me today, then discipleship begins in earnest. You show Jesus that you believe in him, bow to him and are ready to do what he says. But perhaps most of all, you show that you love Jesus and his word.
3. This is how Jesus wants us to approach him, by listening to his word, the word of God, the Bible.
   1. Constantly going to church to meet friends and have some social fellowship is not wrong, but if that is your only focus, then you have missed the most necessary thing.
   1. In Jesus’ time, you could get to know Jesus by meeting him in person, but today we meet Jesus through his word, the Bible. For those who discover this, it is like finding treasure in a field (Matthew 13:44).
   1. When we take time for God’s word, the Bible becomes for us like a light on our path: ‘Your word is the lamp of my feet and a light on my path. ” (Ps 119:105)
      1. Many times I have had problems in my life and not really known how to solve them, but when I have prayed to God, he has shown me some kind of solution from the Bible. God’s word is living and active and it does not return to the Lord until it has worked out what God wants (Isa 55:10-11, 1Thess 2:13, Heb 4:12).

Luke 10:40

1. Not only was Jesus a celebrity, he was also the promised Messiah, something the siblings had probably begun to realise.
   1. So it was not surprising that Martha wanted to prepare her home for Jesus’ coming. Martha is not wrong to make practical preparations for Jesus’ visit. When you have such a nice visit, you naturally want to make the house nice and offer something good.
   1. The mistake that Marta makes is that she is so busy fixing everything practical that she forgets the most important, the only necessary.
2. Sometimes we humans are so busy fixing our homes, shoveling snow, cleaning the church, raising the kids, etc, etc, that we forget the most important thing, sitting at Jesus’ feet and listening to his word.
   1. There is absolutely nothing wrong with shovelling snow or taking care of your children, on the contrary, this is what we should do. But it must not be at the expense of our relationship with Jesus.
3. Martha was even so distracted with all the practical things that she actually interrupted Jesus when he was teaching to complain about her sister.
   1. When one wrongly criticizes other Christians, there is a risk that one prevents Jesus from doing what he intended to do.
4. When I once visited the mountain where Jesus preached his Sermon on the Mount, there was a nun sitting guard at the entrance to the church. She would snap and scold anyone she thought was dressed unchristianly and would not let them in. She was so busy with her task that she had forgotten that Jesus was the friend of sinners (Luke 7:34).

Luke 10:41-42

1. It’s not often that a name in the Bible is repeated in this way, but you can almost hear the love in Jesus’ words to Martha.
   1. When we humans make mistakes or even sin, Jesus lovingly calls us to turn around and come back to him.
2. No matter how much you serve Jesus, it is in vain if you lack that “one thing necessary”.
   1. In a similar way, Jesus responded to the rich man who asked Jesus what he would do to have eternal life. He had done everything right, but one thing was missing: to sell everything he owned and come follow Jesus (Luke 18:22).
   1. If we fill our lives with good works, perhaps even in church, but have not given our lives to Jesus, then we have done all in vain.
3. No matter how many troubles you have in your life, you can hand them all over to Jesus and receive “the peace of God” in return (Phil 4:4-7).
4. As I said, in this biblical text Martha and Mary show two different ways of exercising their faith, one practical and one contemplative. Neither is wrong, but one is better. The challenge for those who want to grow in their discipleship is to start from the perspective of “the feet of Jesus”, while allowing both sides to develop. If you feel more like Martha, you may need to make more time for the Bible. If you feel more like Mary, you may need to try to put into practice what you have learned from reading the Bible.
   1. What Mary learned at Jesus’ feet she will carry with her forever and ever, while all of Martha’s practical tasks will eventually come to an end.
   1. However, it should be remembered never to despise one or the other way of practicing one’s faith because both are needed. A Marior-only congregation would be just as strange as a Martor-only congregation.
   1. Whoever begins like Mary, at the feet of Jesus, will hopefully eventually also begin to do like Martha, to serve God practically.