Mary and martha
A lot of us have heard the story…
“As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Marthaopened her home to him. She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”
“Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.” John 10:38-42
I have been like Martha.
Striving for service in the name of the Lord and forgetting to just sit down and listen to him.
Action is necessary at some times but others, we just have to learn how to sit at Jesus’ feet and be taught by Him.
Martha was in action-mode, wanting to do a lot. She was worried, anxious and stressed about all her tasks and looked down with resentment upon Mary.
She complained to Jesus, demanded He took her side to get Mary to stand up, leave Jesus’ presemceand help her.
ways to embrace mary
Quiet time with Jesus
Running to Him first
Resting
Reading the Bible
Slow down and be an active listener
How many situations do we have where we behaved like Martha. We are so busy, we forget to set our eyes and complete attention towards the Lord.
Recently I did it, and have done so many times. I was busy proving myself, doing, acting out ways to be seen, approved of, and validated and this distracted me from seeing God in all His glory right in front of me…
In this chaos of doing, I expected others to come along with me and help, understand and ‘be on my side’ when truly, I needed to find solace only in Jesus.
This action-mode led me to see people as bigger than God, put them on a pedestal and essentially sin by glorifying their judgement of me more than God’s. I made them bigger than God, higher than God, I gave them power and as a result, didn’t trust God, His will and His say in my life.
Me doing was a way to keep control on how those people would see me, which then gave me the validation necessary to continue being a ‘good Christian’… how far was I from the Truth, literally, from the God breathed Word through Scripture.
People will have their opinions of us and the more you work to try to prove someone wrong, if they are not bringing forth the fruit of the Holy Spirit, they will not see Your fruits, they can’t, it is not something they will be able to recognise and the Holy Spirit isn’t in them.