One Thing: Prescription for Those Who Hurt
“Religion dry as dust will never do.”
Dry as Dust
That’s the opening line of a sermon from a famous preacher of the mid-twentieth century by the name of Harry Emerson Fosdick. Fosdick was, during World War II, the pastor of what we would now call a mega-church, a Protestant, non-denominational congregation known as Riverside Church in New York City.
During that time, the church had many families who had lost relatives to the war. People could feel the uncertainty and the fear and the grief that surrounds those kinds of untimely deaths. That’s when he got up in the pulpit one Sunday, and his opening line was “Religion dry as dust will never do.”
It hit me hard. Because it seems to me that at these times when we go through times of fear and uncertainty and things are difficult, the last thing that we need is dry-as-dust religion, pious platitudes, weary liturgy and hymns, and a kind of pro forma that gives us the capacity to do what needs to be done in public but doesn’t actually answer the cries of the heart. And so I began to wrestle with that, and then when I looked at the scriptures, I saw, in essence, a prescription. A prescription for a religion that is anything but dry as dust, but instead one that is rich, full, and vibrant, and has real meaning.
That’s actually what’s going on in this Mary-Martha story, much more than the common “Work less and pray more” lesson many preachers take from it. I think that’s superficial in the extreme and doesn’t actually get at the heart of either what’s going on in Martha or what Jesus is trying to address.
If you’ve had any church experience at all, you know the story. Mary’s breaking all the rules. Typically, what would happen when the rabbi came is that all the men would all sit in the front room. Mary and any other women present would prepare the meal while the men discussed the teaching the rabbi brought.
But Mary, you see, isn’t doing anything like that. She wants to hear Jesus, and so she comes in, takes a place among the men, and begins to listen to him.
Martha is outraged. But not just because Mary has broken social convention. Her anger is much more personal. And what she says clearly, and I’m sure, in a decidedly angry tone, is “Jesus, why don’t you tell Mary to come in and help me out? I’m in here all by myself” (cf. Luke 10:40).
Driven to Distraction
Notice what Jesus says. In the scriptures, he rarely chooses one side over the other, because all of us are tainted. No one gets it completely right. But Jesus has the perceptiveness to speak to what’s going on in Martha’s heart, which is far more than her immediate circumstances: alone in the kitchen, mad at Mary for putting her there.
Jesus says, “Martha, you are distracted by many things.” He’s not just talking about this particular instance; he’s actually describing her life. In fact, he’s talking about a certain kind of person who, deep in his or her heart, is overworked, anxious, and more often than not, in the midst of a series of demanding circumstances, is feeling alone. Their thoughts run like this: “Nobody feels what I feel. Nobody sees all the sacrifices that I make. Nobody really appreciates everything that I’m doing. And besides, it’s their fault, because if people did their responsibilities, I wouldn’t have to pick up the slack.”
You see, that’s what Martha’s really saying to Jesus. “If she were doing her part, I wouldn’t be here by myself.” She’s a rule-follower. This is the same Martha who showed up after Lazarus had died and was almost in Jesus’ face: “If you had been here. . . it’s really your fault that Lazarus is dead” (cf. John 11:21).
Do you know people like that? I do. Actually, I think there’s a little bit of both Mary and Martha inside us all.
Out of Control
The point that Jesus is trying to make, though, lies in the term distraction. You see, the kind of person we’ve been describing is also a person has known deep disappointments. Things have not worked out the way they planned. They’ve been hurt, perhaps profoundly.
And when things don’t work out the way you want, when you’ve been hurt and especially if you’ve been struck by tragedy, there’s a kind of heaviness deep within. But you don’t like that part of yourself at all. And the way you try to deal with it is to distract yourself from whatever’s going on inside.
Usually somebody who keeps the rules and expects other people to do the same feels only more burdens when those people don’t do what they’re supposed to. The attitude of “I have to do it for them, thank you very much again” comes because of the deep pain inside that they’re trying to escape through all of their work.
When you have that kind of feeling inside, you’re trying to manage chaos. Chaos within as well as chaos out there. Chaos meaning, “These circumstances are bigger than me, and I cannot and don’t know how to control them.” And for that kind of person, not being able to control the situation feels like chaos. “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things” (Luke 10:41b).
Which is why Jesus says, “There is need of only one thing” (Luke 10:42). What’s he talking about? What is the one thing someone who’s wrestling with that kind of profound inner grief and conflict needs?
One Thing
It’s being with the one in whom “all things hold together” (Colossians 1:17b). You see, if there’s chaos, and it’s more than you can handle, and things are not working out and you clearly don’t feel in control of your circumstances, but you’re trying to do the best you can with what you have, you resent your situation like crazy. Nobody’s holding it together, and therefore you have to step in and somehow take control of things in a way that often feels coercive.
But being with Jesus, in whom all things hold together, produces in us a different kind of inner life. You see, it’s not that you figure it out. That’s again a part of the control stuff: if I get the best facts possible, then maybe that’ll help me manage all of the stuff that’s going on in my life. And while ignorance does produce a certain kind of fear, it still doesn’t get at the heart of the matter, which is this effort to somehow manage the chaos of my life.
But if I can go and be with Jesus, and pour out before him everything that is in my heart: all of the anger, all of the resentments, all of the fears, all of the grief, all of the sense of loss, and if in the midst of that I can affirm, “OK God, I don’t understand. Sometimes, I don’t even know how to get through the day. But if you are the one in whom all things hold together, and if you really are there, and here inside me, even though I don’t often feel your presence at all, then Lord, I’m willing to take a step into this day as nothing less than a sheer act of trust.
“I can’t predict what’s going to happen. And I don’t like it when I snip at people because I’m so frustrated. I know it’s not right, God. I’m sorry. I need to learn how to trust in you who holds all things together. I need to see the fact that you really are in my heart and that I’m not alone after all. And that you would be the one to somehow take me and guide me and save me from the worst parts of myself. And help me to make sense out of these days ahead, and give me the comfort that I need, especially when I don’t understand. Give me, God, the things that I cannot ask because of my blindness but that I need so desperately.
“Martha, Martha, there is need of only one thing” (Luke 10:42). And what is that one thing? It’s not a thing, it’s actually a who. It’s him, the one who is telling her that. The one who holds heaven and earth is in her living room. You see? Being with him somehow helps provide that kind of inner order that I can’t get any other way.
There is no Plan B.
Notice what Jesus doesn’t do to Martha. He doesn’t say, “Martha, if you’d just get it together, this’d be a lot easier for all of us.” You see, that’s another coercive, demanding person talking. But Jesus is not like that. He speaks in the gentlest of tones to a woman who’s full of all kinds of frustration and anger and sorrow.
And the same is true for us. You see, if you think that Jesus is wagging his finger at you and saying, “Come on, get it together,” you’re not looking at Jesus at all. He doesn’t treat people that way. He invites us into something that’s far more tender, far more human as well as divine.
So today, in the midst of all of the things you and I are going through, let us say, “God, here’s who I am. All I can do is be me and offer myself to you. Help me know more and more of you, the one in whom all things hold together and, even when I don’t feel it, is alive, and alive in me, because I’m your child. And you love me. And you will never let me go. Amen.”
One thing. No matter how we’re hurting, Jesus says that’s all we need. So how are you giving yourself to that “one thing”? Share this blog and your response on Twitter. Please include my username, @revgregbrewer.
(This post is an adaption of Bishop Brewer’s sermon on July 17, 2016, at St. Barnabas Episcopal Church, Deland, Florida.)
Unless otherwise noted, scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.