“Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.” Romans 10:17

Prayer of the Day: O Lord Jesus Christ, You came not to be served, but to serve, and to give Your life as a ransom for many. Teach us to stop our anxious striving, to drop every burden at Your feet, and to listen to Your life-giving Word. Forgive our resentment, quiet our troubled hearts, and give us the one thing needful: faith that rests in You; for You live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

Now it happened as they went that He entered a certain village; and a certain woman named Martha welcomed Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who also sat at Jesus’ feet and heard His word. But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she approached Him and said, “Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore tell her to help me.” And Jesus answered and said to her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things. “But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.”

What are you supposed to do if you catch on fire? You are supposed to stop, drop, and roll. What should you do if you are worried and troubled about many things? Stop, drop, and listen to Jesus. What should you do if you are filled with resentment? Stop, drop, and listen to Jesus.

What would you do if you found out that Jesus was coming to stay at your house? This is the almighty God, Maker of heaven and earth, and the One you love above all else. What wouldn’t you do to try to show Him your love and thanks? Yet if we did that, we might be falling into the same mistake as Martha. Instead, we should be like Mary. We should stop, remembering that Jesus came to serve, not to be served; drop before Jesus’ feet, remembering what is the better part; and listen to find peace.

Stop, drop, and roll is good advice if you are on fire. Stop, drop, and listen to Jesus is necessary for the distressed Christian. There are so many different ways that we can be distressed. Like Martha, we can be distressed about many things we are trying to do for our Savior. We can be distressed about trying to be a good spouse, parent, or neighbor. We can be distressed over our sin. We can be stressed, wondering whether we are worthy of God’s love. We can be stressed over the meaning of our life and the question of whether we are saved.

But in this account, God is reminding us of a lesson that we need to relearn every day, a lesson that Martha needed to be taught and retaught. In the midst of all your worries and troubles, God calls out to you to stop. Stop fretting. Stop worrying. Stop stressing out spiritually or mentally. Stop and remember this truth: Jesus would rather serve us than have us serve Him. Let me say that again, and really think about it, because it goes against everything that we by nature would think of God. Jesus would rather serve us than have us serve Him. Or as Jesus said it in Matthew, “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”

That is absolutely foreign to our way of thinking. But a great example of it in action is in our text. Both Mary and Martha loved Jesus. They knew He was their Savior, and they believed in Him. They both tried to show their love for Him. Martha did so by doing things like making a room ready for Him to rest in and by preparing the best meal she could. Mary did so by sitting at Jesus’ feet and being spiritually fed by His words. So who was Jesus more pleased with? Mary. That is right, Mary. It wasn’t that He wasn’t pleased with the things Martha had done in faith and love. It was that Mary had chosen the better thing, because Jesus did not come to be served but to serve. The greatest joy you can give to your God and Savior is to let Him serve you. Let Him serve you, bless you, forgive you, and save you through His Word.

What a great and loving God we have! Parents, do your children serve you, or do you serve them? Notice the difference between obey and serve. I didn’t ask if they obey you or you obey them. I asked if you serve them or they serve you. While it is true that some godless parents do use their kids like slaves to serve the parents’ interests, you look out for your children’s interests. You work to provide for them. You feed them and bathe them. You teach them and comfort them. You chauffeur them to events. You serve them, not as their slaves but as their parents who love them. So God serves us. And He is the perfect and loving Father.

This is a lesson we need to keep being taught and remembering. In your distress over sin, over living a life worthy of God, over whether you have done enough to be saved—stop! You can’t. You haven’t. Stop and remember with relief that we aren’t saved by our service to God. We are saved by God’s service to us. Christ didn’t come to this earth so we could carry Him around on a palanquin and feed Him grapes. He came for your sake to give up His life for you, to die so that you might live. As a parent would do anything possible to save his child, God would do anything to save you. And He did. He gave up His life to be the cure for sin and death. And to our eternal joy and the eternal praise of God, He succeeded. The veil between heaven and earth has been torn in two. You have been saved. When you are in any kind of spiritual distress, stop and remember that.

But spiritual distress isn’t the only type of stress we have. We have all kinds of earthly and mental stress. We can be distressed over all the chores and work we have to do, or about money or war. Which of you has a life free from mental and physical stress? Now, what is the first thing a doctor will tell you to do to deal with stress? Take a little time to yourself just to relax, to breathe, to drop all those worries and troubles for a moment and read a book, or float in a pool. That is good advice, but I am going to give you better advice, advice which comes from God’s Holy Word.

What was one reason that Martha was so troubled and worried? Because she had forgotten that one thing is needed. Think about all the things you have to do this next week. Now tell me, which one of those things will affect you in a year, or ten years, or one hundred years? Which one of those things will affect you forever? Martha needed some perspective, and often so do we. There are only a few things that you might do this coming week, which will affect you for eternity. This perspective helps you understand what is absolutely necessary.

Jesus isn’t encouraging laziness in our work and duties here on earth. He is teaching us priorities. Jesus had something to say, something to teach. He had the words of eternal life, and so Mary dropped everything else to sit at His feet. She stopped what she was doing, dropped before His feet, and listened. She had the right attitude, the attitude of a Christian: when God speaks, we listen.

Now, it is a little harder for us to imitate that, since God speaks to us through the Bible. So how do we know when we should drop everything else to listen? For one thing, when you are worried and troubled about many things, that is a time when you need to stop, drop, and listen to Jesus. When we look at and believe in the power and love of God and what Christ has earned for us in heaven, worries melt away like ice under the summer sun. Yes, they will keep coming back because of the weakness of the flesh, but you have unlimited access to God’s throne. You can keep coming back to stop, drop, and listen to God’s Word and find perspective and comfort in the Gospel, as Mary did. “Mary sat and listened like a lily turning its chalice to the sun.” And she received the one thing needful. When her faith was in need of God’s Word, she turned to the words of her Savior and found peace.

When else should we stop, drop, and listen to Jesus? When else is choosing to spend time in God’s Word over our earthly duties choosing the good part? When sin seeks to be our master.

Can’t you see Martha in the kitchen, her resentment growing all the time? At first, when Mary sits down at Jesus’ feet instead of helping her, Martha probably thinks to herself, “Fine. I will do it all myself.” But then, as she hurries around trying to get a hundred things done all by herself, her resentment starts growing, and she starts giving Mary dirty looks. Then she starts getting passive-aggressive, scrubbing the potatoes for supper really hard. Finally, when supper boils over, her resentment does too, and she storms over and tells Jesus to make Mary help her.

Now I don’t know that it played out exactly like that and I don’t think they had potatoes, however this is a scene that plays out in every house and every heart, because we have sinful hearts.

This is a time when we need to stop, drop, and listen to God’s Word. When those sinful desires start rising up in our hearts—resentment, lust, hate, jealousy, self-pity, despair, greed, selfishness—we need to stop, drop, and listen to God’s Word. God’s Word points them out for what they are: sin. God’s Word teaches us to say no. And the Gospel gives us the desire to say no.

Tell me, is letting your resentment grow needful? No. Is letting your resentment spill out needful? No. Is letting our sinful desires rule us needful? No. What is needful is repentance over these sins. What is needful is finding forgiveness in the only place there is forgiveness: in Christ who loved you and gave Himself for you. He forgave your sin. What is needful is to find peace. And peace is found in only one place: in Him who came not to be served but to serve, and who gave His life as a ransom for many—Jesus, your Savior, your peace. Now and always. Amen.

—Pastor Aaron Ude

Good Shepherd Lutheran Church Rapid City, SD

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