Alabama had a song years ago that reminds me of a story from Jesus life. The song says, “I’m in a hurry to get things done, oh I rush and rush until life’s no fun. All I really gotta do is live and die, but I’m in a hurry and don’t know why.” I hear it all the time, “I’m so tired.”
Jesus was coming to Mary and Martha’s. Martha was running around angry about doing all the serving. Mary sat at Jesus feet listening to Him. When Martha blew up, Jesus said that Mary had chosen the needed part, it would not be taken from her.
The way of life in this world is Martha, not Mary. Doing over listening and the receiving. So many think Jesus and His church want something and avoid it. Time. Work. Money. What might you put on the list? But Jesus wants you to sit and listen. Jesus wants to give to you. Jesus wants to spend time with you. There’s plenty of opportunity to serve, but what good is service if it simply burns us out on the Lord and on each other?
If you think coming to church is about doing I get why it is hard to come. As a matter of fact after a week of work I get why it’s hard to come to church some Sundays for all of us. It is hard enough for me to get up and get to church some days and I’m the pastor.
If I lived on a lake and after a hard week had a cup of coffee in hand on the porch looking out at the water — it would be hard to get going. It would be easy to sleep in, have a leisurely breakfast, read the paper, watch TV, hang with friends. Who needs a lake. It’s terribly easy to let most anything get between you and Jesus, whether our work or play.
We live most of our lives with duties to execute, obligations to fulfill, expectations to meet, quotas, goals, you name it. We are busy people, running from one thing to the next, rarely taking the time to sit still. The story of Mary and Martha reminds us that all work and play and no worship will burn us out in our own busyness, chasing after the wind, as Ecclesiastes says.
To come to the worship service is to sit with Mary, to rest in Jesus, to have His Word have its way with you, to participate in His rest. To rest in Jesus and His Word of grace.
It’s a busy world out there. But there is rest and refreshment in Jesus, and in Him strength to do what your calling demands, not in bitterness but in joy, not to please God but in thanksgiving that you are pleasing to God.
— The Rev. Kevin Oster is pastor at Our Savior’s Lutheran Church in Hutchinson.
