Ninth Sunday after Pentecost

21:56 Will you please join me in prayer? Holy Spirit where your spirit is there is freedom may your spirits sing to our hearts our minds and our souls in Jesus name we pray amen This summer we have been doing a series called At Christ's Table, looking at passages where Jesus is at a meal, talking about a meal, and in today's passage about to have a meal. Now I'm not sure about you, but this series has definitely made me a little more hungry and ready for coffee hour. Yet we have consistently seen in these passages that Christ makes the table wider and invites the outsiders in. Today's passage talks more about the preparation for a table and what posture we should bring when it comes to hospitality and service.

22:55 So let's listen to the word of God as it comes to us from the gospel of Luke, chapter 10, starting at verse 38.

23:49 This is the word of God for you, the people of God. Thanks be to God. If there was a passage where many Fifth Avenue members would have some beef with Jesus, I think this might be one of them. The story of Martha and Mary is one that many of you know well. You have two sisters on opposite sides. Mary is sitting at Jesus' feet, listening to his stories and wisdom. And Martha is doing all the service, getting ready for either more work to do or a meal ready to be hospitable to Jesus and his disciples. We'll get more into the passage in a little bit, but Martha is the one who gets this rebuke from Jesus. Here she is doing some of her best service, and Jesus rebukes her?

24:40 This is why I think many of you would have some issue with Jesus here. Imagine our lead usher getting ready every Sunday morning, making sure there are enough people to collect the offering, to greet people, to count how many people are in attendance. I see you, Lynn Wishart, back there. And then on a communion Sunday, I think our lead ushers might be Team Martha here. Or imagine our Meals on Heels leaders choosing a meal, making a witty menu, setting up shop bright and early on a Saturday morning to make an assembly line of people cutting vegetables, baking pies, cooking pasta, I think they might be Team Martha. Or imagine being the chair of our Deacon Christmas Angel Tree Project, being a host for the online sermon springboard, being on the investment committee, being pledge chair, file leadership, any of our amazing volunteers who work here at Fifth Avenue, you might be Team Martha. So is Jesus really dissing good service?

25:43 Let's take a look at the passage a little more closely. Often this passage gets interpreted as if Mary is better because she's simply more spiritual than Martha's service. And it quickly becomes a spirituality versus service debate. But I'm not sure that's what's happening in these few verses. So let's start with Mary, because there are some revolutionary things happening here. Mary sat at Jesus' feet while she listened to him. At first glance, this just feels like a nonchalant descriptor of where she is in the room. You can almost imagine the setting. You picture a living room. Mary's gently sitting at Jesus' feet as he's telling stories. But that small sentence actually turns cultural expectations upside down. Sitting at the feet of a rabbi was the posture of a disciple. In the first century, that place was almost always reserved for men preparing to become rabbis themselves.

26:47 Yet Luke's gospel repeatedly shows Jesus welcoming women into places society has closed them off to. Women travel with Jesus and financially support him. Women are the first to witness the resurrection. and again and again Jesus refuses to let culture determine who belongs among his disciples. So when Mary sits at Jesus's feet, she isn't simply finding a comfortable place in the room. Jesus is publicly affirming that she belongs there.

27:22 So let's turn our attention to Martha now. We learn a lot about her in just a short sentence. it says Jesus is welcomed by a woman named Martha. That means this is Martha's house. Most likely she is a widow and she would have been looked down upon because she did not have a male head of household. But here Martha is and welcomes her welcomes Jesus into her home. And her story doesn't end there. When we see her again in the gospel of John her brother Lazarus dies. So she meets with Jesus, her friend, carrying both grief and remarkable faith. Jesus calls Lazarus out of the tomb, and Martha makes one of the clearest confessions that we see in the New Testament. Martha says, yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world. Clear theology coming from Martha. The early church remembers her as a courageous witness to Christ. Yet in this passage, she is at home. She is practicing hospitality. And this is the expectation of a host in that time. To have somewhere to wash the feet of guests, to offer food, to practice radical hospitality.

28:44 This isn't a bad thing at all. In fact, Martha reminds me of my dad in what I call carne asada hospitality. My father will welcome you into his home. He's already bought a wide variety of beverages to make sure there's something you want to drink. And while most guests are in the living room sharing stories, my dad is in the back patio grilling up some of the best carne asada in the world. I leave for California on Tuesday. Can you tell that I'm excited? Martha practicing hospitality is not a bad thing at all. In fact, it is good. So what goes wrong? She complains to Jesus that Mary is not helping her out. And Jesus gently rebukes her by telling her that she is distracted by many things. And that Mary has chosen the better part.

29:38 This is devastating to Martha. She thinks she's doing everything right. She sets up the usher team well. She preps for meals on heels. She has icebreakers for sermon springboard. And Jesus rebukes her? Again, this story can easily turn into a service versus spirituality debate of which is better, to be in God's word or to be out in the world doing God's work. Martha is known for her service and Mary is known for her devotion. this reputation continues to this day in fact there is this medieval legend about Martha that I had never heard about until this week and I couldn't resist sharing it with you if you're wondering about the rather unusual dragon on the bulletin cover this morning here is why the legend says that after the resurrection Martha and her sister Mary and their brother Lazarus were forced out of Jerusalem, they crossed the Mediterranean and eventually arrived in the south of France. Once they arrived, their paths diverged. According to the tradition, Mary journeyed into the wilderness near Saint-Bohm, where she devoted herself to a life of prayer and contemplation.

31:00 Over time, Christians remembered that place of one of deep spiritual significance, and it becomes the destination for pilgrims seeking a quieter life with God. Martha, on the other hand, well, she stayed Martha. She walked into a town where people were living in fear of a creature known as Taurusk. According to the legend, this was a dragon on steroids. It was a terrifying beast with the body of an ox, the shell of a turtle, the tail of a serpent, and a mouth full of razor-sharp teeth. It ravaged livestock, it overturned the boats in the river, and it kept the entire region in fear. Soldiers tried to defeat it, hunters tried to kill it, and nothing worked. When people heard that Martha followed the Christ that conquered death, they begged her for help. So Martha did what Martha always seems to do. She shows up. Part of me can actually imagine Martha coming in with a sword and a shield, but in this legend, she came carrying a wooden cross and a vessel of holy water. She walks into the marshes where the beast lived, makes the sign of the cross, called upon the name of Jesus Christ, and sprinkled their dragon with holy water. The legend says the dragon immediately lost its fury. Martha slipped off her belts, tidied around the creature's neck, and led the once-feared beast back into the town as gently as if it were a family pet.

32:37 Seeing the power of Christ over fear and evil, the people embraced Christian faith, and the town eventually became known as Tarscone. Now, is this story historically true? Almost certainly not. but legend often tells us something about how the early church remembers people mary remains devoted to prayer and contemplation and martha remains devoted to showing up where she is needed one serves through quiet attentiveness to god and the other serves by walking straight into the places where everyone else is afraid to go i'm fascinated by it because it continues to highlight Martha's faithful service, but it's also clear that she is now in tune with the message of Jesus Christ, which is what she may be missing in our passage. This passage is clearly not a spirituality is better than acts of service. In fact, it is in this same chapter right before this that Jesus tells the parable of the Good Samaritan, highlighting how important service is.

33:46 Because if you have just heard praise for the Samaritan for stopping to help someone in need, wouldn't Martha seem like the hero here? She's the one serving. She's the one making sure everyone is cared for. In fact, if Martha had been standing there when Jesus told the Good Samaritan story, she probably would have thought she was doing exactly what he commanded. That's what makes these two stories so interesting side by side. Jesus isn't changing his mind about service. The good Samaritan still matters. Hospitality is still there. Loving your neighbor is still required. What changes is that both stories invite us to the same radical obedience. The Samaritan crosses boundaries by loving a stranger. Mary crosses cultural expectations by becoming a disciple. And even Jesus crosses a boundary by correcting his own host, something no polite guest would have ever done.

34:44 The kingdom keeps overturning expectations because the kingdom asks us to orient every part of our lives around Christ. doing service is really good it replicates the kingdom of god here on earth i think about some of our youth group students who came two wednesdays ago to help serve at a place at the table our meal ministry here at fifth avenue they came and served meals on a hot 95 degree wednesday with the smoke from the canadian fires visible to our eyes this was good for them to do not just to serve but in our reflection they noticed injustice that make poverty happen. I think about another youth group student, Adrian, who helps at Meals on Heels. I had lunch with his mother this week and apparently Adrian recently noticed that there were a lot of scraps like potato peels and he asked him why don't we compost these? So he brought compost bags from home and he personally took huge bags of compost on his city bike, balancing it, and took it home to compost himself.

35:53 Adrian has been at sleepaway camp the last few weeks, so if you see this when you get back, Adrian, wear your helmet. but I'm so proud of Adrian I asked his mom why do you think he did this and he said he saw a need and did something about it Adrian has also visited the farm and area with the youth group many times so I have to wonder if if he's thinking about lessons we learned at the compost pile a reminder that death does not have the final word and that compost brings forth resurrection adrian's service is good martha's service is good her rebuke comes at the worries of her tasks she is so focused on the tasks that perhaps she forgot the reason behind it friends sometimes in our service we do such a good job of doing the work that we forget why we do it and when we get into a rhythm of simply doing the work, we begin to rely on our own capabilities that we forget to invite Jesus and the Holy Spirit into the conversation. I'm pretty sure I've told this story here before, but when I was in college, I was working at my home church, and I can't thank them enough for the risks they took on me, giving me multiple opportunities to preach and to lead worship. That experience was so life-giving, especially at 20 years old. And I did pretty well in my first sermon, but going into my second sermon, I felt really confident, and the stakes were a little bit higher. The pastors were on vacation, so I was doing the welcome, I was leading the worship band, and I was preaching the sermon. I was ready for it to be the Warner Show.

37:46 on the first song i put my capo on on the wrong fret so i played the first song in the completely wrong key from the rest of the band my sermon was a dud i saw so many glazed eyes when i looked up to the congregation and it was my first time but not the last time that i saw someone literally fall asleep in one of my sermons. And it gets worse. It was a communion Sunday and the elder who was supposed to help preside forgot to show up. So I decided I was going to preside over communion. I poured the cup into the pitcher. The service was an absolute mess. The following Tuesday, I had a conversation with my supervisor telling him how it all went wrong and he apologized saying, I'm sorry, Warner, we should have had more backup for you. But then I confessed something to him. I said, I actually think this is my fault. I was ready for the Warner show and to prove that I could do this, so much so that I forgot to pray. I forgot to ask God to lead the service and to simply use me as a vessel.

39:07 In a way, like Martha, I was worried about the tasks and service that I forgot to let Christ's message into it. Jesus gently rebukes Martha. It's not a put-down. It's an invitation to collide her service with Christ's message. As people of faith, we trust and lean on the Holy Spirit to guide our service. My story of messing up on a Sunday morning is funny now, but what if the stakes are higher? What if in our pursuit of justice, we relied only on our own wisdom? What if in our efforts to build peace, it only depended on our own strategies? What if in our care for God's creation, it rested only on what we could accomplish? We might do a decent job. We might even do an excellent job. But what happens when we let some of Mary's posture shape Martha's work?

40:07 What happens when we sit at the feet of Jesus before we rush into service in his name? I wonder if listening to Christ changes not only what we do, but how we do it. Maybe we begin by asking better questions before assuming we have all the answers. Maybe we become more curious about someone's story before deciding that they are our enemy. Maybe we discover that justice is not about defeating people, but about restoring relationships. Even when we must speak hard truths and confront injustice, we do so remembering that every person involved is someone created and loved by God. and maybe that's how the table gets bigger when our service is shaped by christ there is room for conviction and compassion for courage and humility the work is still hard the injustice is still real but we are no longer carrying it by ourselves we discover that christ has been at work long before we arrived, and the Holy Spirit is still moving long after we leave it.

41:26 Martha reminds us that the kingdom needs people willing to roll up their sleeve, and Mary reminds us where the work begins, with Christ. And when service grows out of prayer, it stops feeling like a burden we carry alone, and it begins to feel like participating in the feast that Christ is already preparing. Friends, if you're willing, will you please rise in body and in spirit as we affirm our faith together from the Barman Declaration. As Jesus Christ is God's assurance of the forgiveness of all our sins, so in the same way and with the same seriousness is he also God's mighty claim upon our whole life. Through him befalls us a joyful deliverance from the godless fetters of this world for our free, grateful servants to his creatures.

42:28 We reject the false doctrine as though there were areas of our life in which we would not belong to Jesus Christ, but to other lords. Areas in which we would not need justification and sanctification.