The One Thing Necessary – Br. Keith Nelson
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In the world of spiritual care, there is an oft-quoted adage. It seems especially common in the world of hospital chaplaincy:
“Don’t just do something. Stand there.”
I first heard it from the novelist John Green, whose experience as a hospital chaplain shaped his authorial approach to empathy. During my own months as a chaplain intern last Fall, this deceptively simple reminder kept me centered in the demands of my role. While I in fact did, and said, and asked many things, it was ultimately just standing or sitting there in loving availability that God would use to open a healing space in a patient’s experience.
Allowing ourselves to be loved by God, as Jesus did, also requires some degree of just sitting there, as Mary of Bethany did in Jesus’ presence. But consenting to this transformation at the core of our being is anything but passive: it is our single greatest challenge. To the world, that process looks like nothing. But to Jesus, it is the one thing necessary.
In Luke, we encounter two women who respond in love to the presence of Jesus in their home. The fact that they are women is crucial to Luke’s exploration of genuine presence.
Martha is engaged in the work of hospitality as she hosts Jesus and his band of disciples. In this she is fulfilling the gender role expectations of ancient Mediterranean Jewish culture. We are meant to imagine Martha performing tasks in a space nearby but separate from that in which the men of the house would gather, where Jesus is engaged in teaching.
Into this predominantly male space, Mary has entered and has made a bold choice: “she sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to what he was saying.” To sit at the feet of a rabbi meant to initiate a serious commitment of discipleship. We are meant to notice that in this, Mary has crossed a boundary, and that this boundary-crossing is sanctioned by Jesus. In this, Mary is vulnerable to criticism by people of either gender who might wish to police that boundary.
Martha is distracted. The word in Greek suggests being dragged or driven around. On the surface, she is distracted by the very service she is providing to this important gathering. But the core of her distraction becomes interpersonal. Martha is distracted by the choice Mary has made. Perhaps part of her wishes she could emulate her sister and sit at the Lord’s feet as well. Perhaps part of her identity is so deeply tied to the ways she has always served others that the thought of doing differently in this new situation creates an unbearable tension. Part of her certainly feels abandoned, resentful that she must do the work that others take for granted.
Mary becomes the all-too-reasonable target of Martha’s inner conflict. “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.”
But beneath her ultimatum, I hear a poignant subtext in Martha’s words. I hear her saying one thing, but feeling something deeper that touches the core of her human need. She says to Jesus, “Tell her then to help me,” but she means:
“Do you not see all that I am doing for you?
Do you not see that this is how I love you?”
Martha’s way of living out her faithful commitment to God is primarily defined by what she has the capacity to dofor Jesus. The gospel is filled with passages that summon us to go, to do, to serve, and to act: to be laborers sent out into God’s harvest. But in Martha, this going, doing, and serving isn’t producing the fruit of the kingdom. It is producing anxiety, comparison with others, and the inability to spend any real time with her guest of honor.
Mary’s way of living out her commitment is defined not by any capacity of her own, but by her choice to sit there and listen to the Word of God. Mary does not say, “Lord, tell my sister to stop fussing over everyday chores and to sit down and learn about the kingdom.” Mary is attending, receiving, and absorbing. She is not concerned with the behavior of others. She’s concerned with Jesus.
There is need of only one thing, Jesus says. It is the single-hearted, undivided commitment of discipleship. For Mary, this requires the silent, courageous risk of taking her place before Jesus, in opposition to the expectations of her society and the accusations of her own sister. But the response of Jesus is unequivocal: “Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”
We live in a society that actively discourages true presence. Like Martha, we are driven to expend our energies across many domains of life, many of them good. But if our expenditure lacks presence, we become bound in cycles that fragment our attention, leaving less of us available to the people and things that matter most to us, and the God who craves the simple return of our love.
Jesus invites us to relinquish those pressures at the edge of the circle and to draw renewed presence from His. To the world, this looks like doing nothing of value. But to Jesus, it is the one thing necessary.
But what if Mary was always leaving Martha to do the chores? I’ve never thought of this before now, but on re-reading and thinking about it, I can’t tell if Mary’s neglect of the kitchen was habitual or this one-time only!
Your sermon, Br Keith, opens a door for me… there are daily choices to make, and, too often, I choose based on duty/’should’.
Martha’s “going, doing, and serving isn’t producing the fruit of the kingdom. It is producing anxiety, comparison with others, and the inability to spend any real time with her guest of honor.” Whereas Mary’s primary concern is about getting to know Jesus.
I find it difficult to stop doing whatever it is that I imagine is ‘good for someone else’…and it might ultimately benefit my reputation. This is hard to admit, because I know it’s true.
Thank you for helping me consider (again and again) “the one thing necessary”.
An ‘Aha’ moment: it isn’t so much what Martha was doing but how she was doing it. Yes, she felt resentful, but if she had known what Brother Laurence shared in Practicing the Presence of God she could have “offered a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving” while doing her work. We need people who act our their faith as well as contemplate.
I had an opportunity to not do something, but sit there; about 10 years ago as a chaplain in a small Texas hospital. Outside of a large ER suite, a female family member, demonstrative in her grief, “fell down” to sit on the floor. Observing her, I first stood at her side, then moved by the Spirit, I too “fell down”, sliding down the wall to sit on the floor next to her. It took a few minutes for the Spirit in her to connect to the Spirit in me, and she initiated conversation about what was going on inside the ER suite. I believe our Spirits connected due to my proximity to her, sitting on the floor.
What a key message we need to hear in this hi tech
Chaotic world at the moment.
Thank you
Sometimes, a chaplain is called to be both Mary and Martha. One night, I was called to a nursing home where our EMTs had lifted an elderly man from his bed and placed him on the floor to perform CPR. After he was pronounced, they left him there to answer another call. A compassionate nurse already had called the family, who were on their way. Then she and I had to lift his body from the floor and put it back in the bed, where she cleaned him up for his loved ones to see. I then met the family in the lobby and accompanied them to the room, where I performed Last Rites in their presence.
Later, I was called to the same nursing home to do a “blessing of the hands” service for the nurses and their aides. I recall it as one of the most moving moments of my ministry. Sometimes, you must both stand there and do something.
How I wondered if Martha might, just might, have wished she was not so bound to cultural norms. Perhaps that was the root of her resentment. Perhaps had she not been so intent on what was expected of her by the people in “the other house” that she could have thrown down the dish towel and thought, “I’m going in, too. All in!” Jesus fed the 5,000. He definitely could have done the same for those at this time of worship and discipleship. Did she forget that? Do I forget that?
A corollary question worth considering: who is to prepare the supper?
I too have often wondered that. Jesus has finished teaching, the men all rise expectant of a the hospitality of a meal. There is nothing prepared. Does Jesus himself urge the breaking of further expectations by going to the kitchen area and make flat bread, cutting up cheese, cleaning fruit and laying out a table.? A truly feminist gesture! ! ?
Those are my thoughts as well. If Martha had left the meal preparations to join those in the room with Jesus, who would have prepared the expected meal? Would Mary have gotten up with Martha after Jesus finished speaking to finish meal preparations and then serve the meal? Or would Mary go in alone to finish what Martha had started? Or would both women just wait for someone else to do it?
Jesus said ‘Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.’
The food is a lesser concern. That is the entire point. Over and over Jesus calls us to a higher calling. Mother Teresa spent all of her energies serving the hopeless; not fund raising even though she did not know from day to day where the days meals would come from. Mother Teresa chose “the better part.”
Is that not the lesson for each of us?
Brother Keith,
This is one of the BEST interpretations of the Mary and Martha story that I have heard. Maybe the BEST! It is so easy to busy yourself with life – there is always more work. Working on one’s relationship with God and each other is something different altogether – and more difficult. Thank you!
Wow, Brother Keith. In all my long life, including my years in seminary, I don’t think I’ve heard this passage so profoundly explicated. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
This is the first time I listened to a sermon as I read it. The potent words were made all the more penetrating as I heard them being spoken.
Attending, absorbing, receiving. Yes. And I hadn’t ever thought of Mary’s gentle resistance to the strict gender-roles of her day: that she would be student to the teacher!
Thank you, Brother Keith, for your words.
Dear Brother Keith,
What a joy to hear your words! My mother taught me this very same way of being simply by the way she lived. She worked hard at making sure all our needs were met while centering her life in God at the same time! Presence was important to her!
She knelt down at bedside every night with my brother and me and taught us to pray!
Fooling around was frowned upon and we knew it! That same model carried over into our lives in a way that has encouraged my formation as a disciple of Christ to this day! God’s loving presence in our lives is her most precious gift to us and in turn a gift we will want to give back to God through our loving presence in our relationship in Christ and in all creation!
“If you love one another as I have loved you, then you will truly be my disciples!” ( John)
Mom was also present in the lives of those around her