Two weeks ago on an unusually cold and dreary day, I warmed up a bowl of my wife’s homemade chili for a man with rotting teeth.
An earlier batch of Kelly’s chili fed grieving neighbors across our street after a sudden death in their family about two weeks earlier.
Now this warm meal would feed someone who can hardly eat anything solid. Although this life-long bachelor now has a government-subsidized apartment, he’s been chronically homeless for many, many years. Renovation Community gave him plenty of kitchen utensils but he rarely cooks even simple meals.
Instead, he generally sustains himself on processed food from a convenience store, like canned spaghetti and meatballs. He placed my wife’s bowl back in my hands an exclaimed, “that was REALLY GOOD!”
There’s a Biblical story in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 10, when Jesus visits the home of a woman named Martha. Apparently her siblings, Lazarus and Mary, also lived with her.
Jesus taught listeners in Martha’s home while Martha prepared a meal for her honored guest and his disciples. We read about Mary “listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made” (Lk 10:39b-40).
Martha expresses her frustration to Jesus, that Mary “has left me to do the work by myself.” She asks Jesus’ help in commanding Mary to assist her harried sister.
But Jesus famously replies, “you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one.”
Sloppy Bible teachers (who, historically and predominantly are men) imply Martha poorly chose cooking a meal for Jesus instead of listening to Jesus.
This neglects the historical fact that many common ancient Jewish homes were small one or, at most, two room structures. Even if Martha had been cooking outside the home while Jesus remained inside, she likely heard Jesus’ every word while preparing that meal.
Of course, just because sounds hit our ear drums doesn’t mean we’re truly processing those sounds. If we are deep in thought, someone could speak right next to us and we might not hear them. And Martha was deep in thought—“distracted,” “worried,” and “upset” thoughts that her sister wasn’t helping.
When Bible teachers suggest Martha’s poor choice lay in her outward acts of cooking and preparing a home for guests instead of sitting at Jesus’ feet next to Mary, they:
1) Convey sexist attitudes that historically female-dominated roles are spiritually inferior to the historically male-dominated tasks of ‘discussing important things’ with other men (but still expecting a hot meal when you’re done with all that hard “man work” 🙄).
2) Ignore the times Jesus explicitly told his male disciples to make the same type of meal preparations Martha had been making.
3) Fail to notice Jesus NEVER critiqued any other person for preparing him food instead of sitting listening to him.
In the Gospel of Luke chapter 4, Jesus went to Simon Peter’s house, where the disciple’s mother-in-law lay sick with a fever. Verse 39 reads, “Then [Jesus] stood over her and rebuked the fever, and it left her. Immediately she got up and began to serve them.”
The context implies this woman did the same tasks as Martha—prepared a meal for her honored guest. Yet Jesus doesn’t chide her with “you should sit and listen to me instead of cooking for me.”
Undoubtedly, this ancient Jewish mama would have been taught to cook and keep house from an early age. She probably was a simple woman from a simple fishing village. Jesus didn’t expect her to be something she wasn’t.
He knows she wants to express gratitude to her healer. Naturally, she expressed it in a manner familiar to her: cooking. And it seems Jesus gratefully received her culinary hospitality without suggesting she should have offered a different Thank You gift.
In Luke 22:8, Jesus “sent Peter and John, saying, “Go and make preparations for us to eat the Passover.” Did these two disciples also coordinate with some of Jesus’ female followers in their preparations? Possibly. Ancient Passover meals did include food typically made by women. Slaughtering the Passover Lamb for the meal, however, was a “man’s task” at that time.
But consider what Peter and John may have missed while out preparing the Passover meal…more of Jesus’ teachings! These men were two of Jesus’ “Inner Three” closest disciples. If, as the sloppy Bible teachers suggest, preparing a meal is far spiritually infeferior to just listening to Jesus teach, why would Jesus have sent two of his top leaders to perform such unimportant tasks?!
And the last Biblical argument against those sloppy Bible teachers comes from all the other times Jesus EVER ate a meal in his life. There’s only two recorded miracles regarding Jesus and food: Feeding the 4,000 and Feeding the 5,000. But he still miraculously multiplied baked bread and cooked fish. Someone (probably a woman) prepared that small meal Jesus later multiplied.
How many meals did Jesus eat in his lifetime? Thousands? Yet we don’t read about him criticizing anyone else for preparing food rather than doing more “spiritual” tasks, like listening to him or any other rabbi.
Even after Jesus’ resurrection, he miraculously enters locked rooms but still personally cooks a fish breakfast over a fire on the beach instead of conjuring the meal out of thin air (John 21:9)
Clearly, Jesus doesn’t have a problem with his followers spending time on ordinary tasks like cooking. So what’s his deal with Martha?!
I think the clues lie with the three words describing Martha’s inner thoughts. [This shouldn’t surprise us since God does “not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart” (1 Samuel 16:7b)].
Martha is “distracted,” “worried and upset about many things.” In other words, while it seems “worshipful” to prepare a meal for Jesus, she lacks the singular focus on Jesus that would turn such preparation into genuine worship.
For contrast, consider Peter’s mother-in-law after Jesus healed her…
In a pre-modern age when “fevers” could kill, how might this woman have gazed in wonder at Jesus while she cooked? As she kneads dough for their meal, I envision her hands working in one place while her eyes stay fixed somewhere else— on the great rabbi who’d just healed her.
But it’s hard to picture Martha that way isn’t it? Instead, I envision her gritting her teeth and huffing as she makes death-stares at her oblivious sister. Martha is cooking a meal for Jesus. But she isn’t focused on Jesus. She’s focused on herself, all the work she’s doing alone, and on her sister who isn’t helping.
Many thoughts, but none of them “Jesus.”
Martha welcomed the great Teacher into her home, but she’s not listening to the Teacher. She’s listening to her own thoughts, on repeat, about her worthless sister. At a pause in Jesus’ teachings, she doesn’t ask for clarification on his parables’ meaning. She asks for a favor, that he would use his clout to get her some help in the kitchen.
Martha’s Cooking Ministry may have begun as genuine worship. But it’s now morphed into something else…something lonely, resentful, and bitter…where she.. where we privately, angrily brood about all who aren’t helping us, instead of gazing only at our Great Healer.
[Lord, save us.]
Jesus, only Jesus, is the one thing needful. Mary’s eyes, gazing into her Master’s, proves she understands that (at least in that moment). Martha’s eyes, burning holes into her sister, proves she’s forgotten that truth (or she hasn’t yet learned it).
This Gospel story isn’t about a “good” sister choosing a Bible study while the “bad” or “self-righteous” sister chooses the “unspiritual” kitchen.
It’s about a Christ-follower temporarily losing her way because she’s “distracted, worried, and upset” that other believers aren’t serving Jesus the same way she is.
[Lord, save us.]
But Martha only needs one thing—to unswervingly keep her eyes on Jesus as she follows him, serves him, welcomes him, cooks for him.
How her sister Mary serves Jesus?? That’s between Jesus and Mary.
And NOW, this long-winded preacher returns to where I started… a man with rotting teeth, eating a Stay-At-Home Mama’s “really good” chili.
As Renovation Community’s “Chief Storyteller,” I get the most credit for the work we do. But anyone familiar with ministries like ours knows such work CANNOT happen without many, many people serving behind the scenes.
I’ve written before about my wonderful wife, who quietly serves the Lord by serving her family at home. At this season of her life, she wouldn’t have it any other way.
She generally avoids any ‘spotlight’ ministry roles to focus on everything her scatterbrained husband overlooks (which is EVERYTHING). Other pastors’ spouses may work alongside them in the job, just like they were another church staff member. But I admire my wife’s confidence in who she is and what she feels called to do. Right now, she feels called to be a Stay-At-Home Mama. She’s qualified for high-paying jobs but is content to work at home without such income and accolades. And no one will successfully pressure her to follow a different Calling.
Associate pastor and awesome Stay-At-Home Dad Jordan Buchner is an ordained Elder in our denomination. He’s fully qualified to serve in a lead pastor role like mine. But his current roles generally revolve around: DIY church construction projects that literally save us THOUSANDS, computer admin work, making toddler lunches, and multi-tasking during his daughter’s nap time.
A faithful woman in our congregation has stood by me amid 8+ years of tumultous church changes since I’ve been her pastor. As we begin to turn a corner on the Pandemic, we’re slowly resuming our all-church meals. Plenty of churches do church potlucks. But in a church like ours, with many food-insecure people and Chronically Homeless who may wander in from the streets, such meals play a vital role in helping struggling people. Not only might we serve them the only home-cooked meal they’ve eaten all week, we bless them with ‘to go’ plates to sustain them later. Any time we do anything involving food, our Fixer Upper Family knows who’s in charge–Donna Mann.
Not only does she consider every detail, her pastoral heart brings people from our church “fringe” closer to the “center” as she asks for their help in cooking, preparing, and cleaning for meals.
I stay in contact with numerous people who call Renovation Community their church home but may only attend a few times each year. When I try to invite them back, it’s amazing how many ask, “Does Donna still attend?” Then they recount fond memories of how this church Matriarch made them feel loved, welcomed, and needed. Donna Mann has Martha’s gifts, without Martha’s hangups.
Why, PLEASE WHY have I gone on and on about all this?
Because as I started writing (what was supposed to be a short post), I suddenly remembered numerous faces from my ministry Undergrad and Seminary years. I know dozens of young men and women who spent thousands, listening to professors lecture on Bible and theology classes in preparation for vocational ministry. But they soon quit, were fired, or never started those ministry assignments after graduation. Many also dropped out of their formal theological studies before they’d completed.
Of course, the reasons for Vocational Ministry Attrition are varied. But even as a naive and inexperienced college student and seminarian, I remember my utter confusion as to why some of my classmates were there. Sure, they loved Jesus. That much was clear. But it often wasn’t clear that they exhibited the so-called “gifts and graces” for vocational ministry in the Church.
And this is where that sloppy Bible teaching matters…
Sadly, it seems some of the older Christians and church leaders in these classmates’ lives pushed my peers into formal theological training when they saw their passionate faith.
“After all, isn’t this what Jesus meant by the ‘one thing needful?’ The obvious next step in this teenager’s spiritual journey is to follow Mary’s path…sitting in Bible lectures for many years.”
Not surprisingly, I watched these classmates become disenchanted with an educational path they weren’t wired for and didn’t enjoy. I watched others persevere through the classes, only to drop out once they finally took a church assignment they probably shouldn’t have taken.
How many Christians have become frustrated in their spiritual journey because other well-meaning but misinformed Christians pressured them towards Mary’s path of ‘lecture listening’ when God really intended them to follow a path that looked more like Martha’s, something like housekeeping, cooking, or event planning?
*Martha’s problem was NOT the work she did, but her attitude while she worked.*
Yes, I think Christians should study their Bibles more. But no, they should not all go to seminary.
Yes, I think Christians should spend more time serving their local churches and the world. But no, they should not all strive to be pastors.
May you grow in your faith and follow God’s path for YOU, whether it’s to theology classes or trade school, as Stay-At-Home parent or CEO, Missionary or Machinist.
May the Church not make you feel inferior for not having someone else’s Calling.
God does not need “Marthas” to act like “Marys” or “Marys” to act like “Marthas.”
He needs us [or more accurately, WE need] to recognize the path God has uniquely called us to follow.
EVERY Christian’s faithful path will include difficulties.
After all, his call to “follow” includes a call “carry a cross.” When our faithful “burdens” feel heavy (even a burden like cooking a meal for a large group all by yourself), it’s understandable to want help carrying that burden. And we are commanded to carry one another’s burdens (Galatians 6:2).
But in that desire to lighten our own load, may we not pressure others down a path to which Jesus has not called them.
He will sustain you for the journey and ALWAYS give you fellow Burden Carriers at the proper time (though perhaps not the preferred time).
Let Mary be Mary. Because God has created a special task just for YOU today. And it may not require listening to another Bible class or seminary lecture.
Who knows?
With the right attitude and your eyes directed at Jesus while you work, that “unspiritual-looking” task may nourish someone’s soul, like a man with rotting teeth eating homemade warm chili on a cold day.
