Sermon: Doing and Being

Delivered at Monaghan United Methodist Church in Greenville, South Carolina on July 21, 2019

I share these thoughts hoping they are of help to someone else.

Comments are always welcomed.

If you find these thoughts helpful, please share.

Doing and Being

Audio Version

While Jesus and his disciples were traveling, Jesus entered a village where a woman named Martha welcomed him as a guest.  She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his message.  By contrast, Martha was preoccupied with getting everything ready for their meal.  So Martha came to him and said, “Lord, don't you care that my sister has left me to prepare the table all by myself?  Tell her to help me.”

The Lord answered, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things.  One thing is necessary.  Mary has chosen the better part.  It won't be taken away from her.”

Luke 10:38-42 (CEB)

Teach me to number my days

And count every moment before it slips away

Taking all the colors before they fade to gray

I don't want to miss even just a second more of this

From “Blink” by Revive

The late singer-songwriter Warren Zevon was a favorite musical guest of late-night talk show host David Letterman.  In 2002, Zevon was diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer, and, in October of that year, he appeared one last time on the Late Show, as the only guest, to perform a few of his greatest hits.  During the interview portion of the show, Letterman asked him if his terminal diagnosis had given him any insights about life that the rest of us might not have.  Zevon replied that he had come to realize “how much you're supposed to enjoy every sandwich.”  Basically, he was saying that it is important to savor every gift life has to offer, even if it is something as simple and ordinary as a sandwich.¹

I find it delightfully ironic that Warren Zevon used a sandwich, of all things, as an example of a gift of life we should slow down to enjoy, because it was made popular by someone who didn't want to slow down and enjoy his meal.  The sandwich gets it's name from the eighteenth century English nobleman John Montagu, who happened to be the Fourth Earl of Sandwich.  An avid gambler, Montagu refused to allow hunger to interrupt his games of cribbage, so he would order a slice of salted beef served between two pieces of toast.  The toast covering the meat afforded him the convenience of playing through dinner without getting his cards greasy.  When Montagu ordered his dinner, others would order “the same as Sandwich.”^{2 3}

Personally, I'm a big fan of the sandwich.  A few of my favorites are the turkey sandwich on rye from a deli downtown, the club sandwich served on a croissant with guacamole from another deli in town, and the buffalo chicken sandwich from a hamburger joint at the local shopping mall.  Despite my love of sandwiches, there have been many sandwiches I did not enjoy.  Far too many times, I've taken my laptop or a book to lunch or dinner with me, and I didn't really enjoy my food because I was so engrossed in whatever I was doing besides eating.  Though I did benefit from the nutritional value of these sandwiches, I still feel that they somehow went to waste.

---

In the Gospel of Luke, we read that one day, while Jesus is traveling with the Disciples, a woman named Martha invites them to stay with her and her sister Mary for the evening.  Luke doesn't tell us very much about these two sisters, but John tells us in his Gospel that they live in the town of Bethany with their brother Lazarus, who will at one point become sick, die, and be raised from the dead by Jesus.  John also suggests that Jesus grows very close to this family from Bethany.⁴

That evening at Mary and Martha's house, while Jesus is teaching the Disciples, Martha is busy preparing dinner.  One would expect Mary to help her prepare dinner, but she is instead sitting at the feet of Jesus, listening to His teaching.  Martha, who is trying to be a good host, becomes increasingly angry with her sister for abandoning her when she obviously needs help.  After all, dinner for thirteen hungry men isn't going to magically make itself.  When Martha cannot take the stress any longer, she loses her temper, stomps over to where Jesus is teaching the Disciples, and interrupts Him, saying, “Lord, don't you care that my sister has left me to prepare the table all by myself?  Tell her to help me.”

Jesus replies, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things.  One thing is necessary.  Mary has chosen the better part.  It won't be taken away from her.”

There are many lessons to be gleaned from this relatively simple story.  For some, Mary and Martha represent different kinds of people.  William Barclay, for example, describes this story as a “clash of temperaments.”  He writes that “some people are naturally dynamos of activity” while “others are naturally quiet,” concluding that “God needs his Marys and his Marthas, too.”⁵  St. Bernard of Clairvaux suggested that the three vocations of the monastic life – the life set apart for God – are embodied by the family from Bethany.  In Lazarus, who dies and is raised to new life, we see penitence; in Martha, who always strives to be a gracious host, we see action; and, in Mary, who sits quietly with Jesus, we see contemplation.⁶  According to the great contemplative Thomas Merton, “True monastic perfection consists above all in the union of all three vocations: that of the penitent, the active worker... and the contemplative.”⁷

Some commentators, like N.T. Wright, point out that Mary, who is sitting at Jesus' feet, would be sitting with the Disciples.  In an era when women are not chosen by rabbis to be disciples, Mary is basically declaring herself to be one of Jesus' disciples, and Jesus commends her.⁸  In the past, I've paired the story of Mary and Martha with the Parable of the Prodigal Son, suggesting that Mary shows us the right way to be prodigal.  Mary flouts the expectations of her family and her culture; she follows her heart; and she loves wastefully.  She does not end up in a proverbial pig sty but is repeatedly commended by Jesus for what she does.

As I've returned to the story of Mary and Martha recently, two words have come to mind: doing and being.  While Martha is busy trying to do many things for Jesus, Mary takes the time to sit His feet and simply be with Him.  I suspect that, like Martha, some Christians get so wrapped up in what they're doing for Christ that they neglect to spend time simply being with Christ.  I also suspect that, like Martha, some Christians criticize others – either out loud or in their minds – for not doing as much for Christ as they think they ought to do.  Though there is much doing to be done, in the Church and in the world, it is important that we take time for simply being.

Martha is angry that Mary is sitting with Jesus and not helping her to prepare dinner, but Jesus tells her that “Mary has chosen the better part.”  Alice Connor suggests that Jesus is not, by any means, belittling Martha's work of hospitality but is instead inviting Martha to step away from her “resentment and frustration and distraction” and to step into greater presence.  Maybe Jesus is saying to her, “We'll work that part out together in a bit.  You, Martha, don't need to be relegated to the kitchen.  You are a disciple, too.  Come out here and be with us.”  Connor defines presence as “the practice of paying attention,” and she describes it as “really being where your body is – feeling the heat or cold, but also feeling your feelings, seeing your thoughts as they happen.”⁹  Perhaps presence could also be described as “enjoy[ing] every sandwich.”  What Connor calls presence others might call mindfulness.

Mindfulness is not practiced enough in our society, and I don't think it is stressed nearly enough in Christianity.  So often we are mentally miles away from wherever we happen to be physically.  We are drawn out of the present moment by either our regrets from the past or our anxieties for the future.  We are not fully present in what we're doing, because we're multitasking or because we're distracted by thoughts of what we have to do next or what we would rather be doing.  We overcommit ourselves, so we end up rushing through one activity so that we can hurry off to the next and rush through it as well.  The emergence of the smart phone has, for many of us, made being present to those around us all the more difficult.

Though we are constantly bombarded by anxieties and distractions, God calls us to mindfulness.  The forty-sixth Psalm reminds us that, as the mountains shake and the oceans roar and the world falls apart, God says to us, “Be still, and know that I am God!”¹⁰

There is a scriptural basis for taking time away from doing for simply being.  One of the Ten Commandments instructs us to “remember the Sabbath day and treat it as holy.”¹¹  In other words, we are told to set one day apart from the rest of the week solely for rest.  The commandment continues,
Six days you may work and do all your tasks, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God.  Do not do any work on it...  Because the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and everything that is in them in six days, but rested on the seventh day.  That is why the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.¹²
This commandment prescribes a necessary balance between doing and being.  It reminds us to diligently get all of our doing done in six days so that we can spend one day simply being.

The Israelites received the Ten Commandments while they were camped in the wilderness, at the foot of Mount Sinai.  Just a few months earlier, they were slaves in Egypt, subjected to constant backbreaking labor by Pharaoh.  If they even dared to ask for a break, their already excruciating workload would be increased.¹³  The Israelites were treated as machines in Egypt, so, after God delivered them from slavery, they essentially had to learn how to be human again.  In Egypt, Pharaoh demanded that they be more and more productive, but, at Sinai, they encountered a God who demanded that they spend one day per week not being productive.¹⁴

Constant doing without any time set aside for simply being is unsustainable, and it leads to a host of mental, emotional, and physical problems.  The Sabbath day is a gift from God, intended to uphold people's humanity.  By Jesus' day, keeping the Sabbath day had become less of a gift and more of an obligation.  Jesus had to remind people that “the sabbath was made for humankind, and not humankind for the sabbath.”¹⁵  Nowadays, when we think about keeping the Sabbath day, we ask ourselves if we really have to spend a day not doing anything, forgetting that we get to spend a day not doing anything.  Not only does God command us to take a day off, God gives us permission to do so.

Rob Bell learned the hard way the importance of observing the Sabbath day, after suffering a burnout while he was a pastor.  Sabbath is, in his words, “taking a day a week to remind myself that I did not make the world and that it will continue to exist without my efforts,” “a day when my work is done, even if it isn't,” “a day when my job is to enjoy,” “a day when I am fully available to myself and those I love the most,” “a day when I remember that when God made the world, he saw that it was good,” “a day when I produce nothing,” “a day when I remind myself that I am not a machine,” “a day when at the end I say, 'I didn't do anything today,' and I don't add, 'And I feel so guilty,'” and “a day when my phone is turned off, I don't check my email, and you can't get ahold of me.”¹⁶

Hopefully, people are starting to realize that effective doing requires time set aside for simply being.  In a recent op-ed piece in The New York Times, Bonnie Tsui stresses the importance of “fallow time,” which she describes as “an active refueling that can seem at odds with our fetishization of productivity.”  “To do the work,” she writes, “we need to rest, to read, to reconnect.  It is the invisible labor that makes creative life possible.”  She continues, “There's something to be said for the state of quiet dormancy, where little apparently happens.  We might have periods of furious output; to get there, we require periods of faithful input.  With input, there's a restoration of fertile, vibrant thinking.”¹⁷

In Jesus, we find rest.  In the Gospel of Matthew, He says to a crowd, “Come to me, all you who are struggling hard and carrying heavy loads, and I will give you rest.”¹⁸  To Martha, Jesus says, “You are worried and distracted by many things.  One thing is necessary.”  It could be said that Mary has been enjoying a sabbatical at Jesus' feet.  Maybe Jesus is implying that Martha needs the same.  Scholar William Barclay suggests that maybe Martha is working so hard because she is trying to throw some extravagant dinner party for Jesus, when Jesus, who undoubtedly has had a long day and has a lot on His mind, just wants to enjoy some quiet time with His friends.  If this is the case, then Mary is the one who is showing Him the kind of hospitality He needs.¹⁹

John, in his Gospel, tells us another story in which Jesus and the Disciples spend an evening at the home of Mary and Martha.  Jesus has just raised their brother Lazarus from the grave, so they hold a dinner in His honor.  Martha serves dinner, as she loves to do, and Lazarus sits at the table with Jesus and the Disciples.  At one point, Mary breaks open an expensive jar of perfume, pours it all on Jesus' feet, and dries them off with her hair.  As the fragrance of the perfume spreads throughout the house, Judas, one of the Disciples, becomes incensed by how the perfume was used.  Feigning a concern for the less fortunate, he says, “This perfume was worth a year's wages!  Why wasn't it sold and the money given to the poor?”²⁰

Jesus says to Judas, “Leave her alone.  This perfume was to be used in preparation for my burial, and this is how she has used it.  You will always have the poor among you, but you won't always have me.”²¹  When Jesus says that they will always have the poor among them, he is not endorsing the economic disparity between the haves and the have nots.  What He is saying that Mary will continue to have opportunities to help the poor in the days to come but that she only had one opportunity to express her love for Him in this way.  Jesus knows that His time in this world is coming to an end, and He goes so far as to say that Mary has prepared Him for His burial.

Perhaps this second story of the family from Bethany can shed some additional light on the first.  Remember that, in the Gospels, the Cross is always in the background.  Luke has already told us that “the days [have drawn] near for [Jesus] to be taken up” and that Jesus has “set his face to go to Jerusalem,” where He will be betrayed, arrested, put on trial, and crucified.²²  Mary and Martha will have plenty of opportunities to prepare dinner for the people they invite into their home, but they will have very few opportunities to simply sit at the feet of Jesus and listen to His wisdom firsthand.  They can spend many evenings in the future doing for others, but this evening is meant for simply being with Jesus.

Jesus says that “Mary has chosen the better part” and that “it won't be taken away from her.”  Sometimes in life it is better for us to stop what we're doing and to simply be present in the moment.  In this life, there will always be more doing that needs to be done, but there are moments in this life that are meant for simply being.  Do not let these moments pass you by.

The song “Cat's in the Cradle” by the late folk singer Harry Chapin tells the story of a man who was so busy doing for his family that he missed out on being with them, particularly his son.  When his son was born, there were still “planes to catch and bills to pay.”  His son learned to walk while he was out of town, and, when he gave him a baseball for his birthday, he had no time to teach him how to throw it.  When the man finally had some time to spend with his son, his son had already grown up and was busy building a life of his own.

Don't be so wrapped up in what you're doing with your life that you neglect to stop and savor your life.  No doubt you've heard at least once that “nobody on their deathbed has ever said, 'I wish I had spent more time at the office.'”  Cartoonist Levni Yilmaz has expressed this sentiment in another way: “I don't know if this sounds dumb or not, but, if I was dying, I doubt I would be concerned that I didn't earn enough money, status, or power, but I do think I'd be annoyed that I didn't spend enough time lying down in the park, looking at trees.”²³  Dumb or not, I suspect that something about this statement rings true to you.

There will always be much doing to be done, but some moments are meant for simply being.  It is my hope that we will choose “the better part,” so that it does not slip away from us.  May we set aside some time to simply be, for there is more to our lives than what we do.  May we savor every gift God gives us in this life, even if it is something as simple as a sandwich.

Amen.


Notes:

1. Robert Deis.  “Enjoy Every Sandwich.”  This Day in Quotes, 10/30/2014.
2. “Sandwich History.”  What's Cooking America.
3. Wikipedia: “Sandwich”
4. See John 11:1-44.
5. William Barclay.  The New Daily Study Bible: The Gospel of Luke.  2001, Westminster John Knox Press.  p. 168
6. Thomas Merton.  Contemplative Prayer.  ch 8
7. ibid
8. N.T. Wright.  Luke for Everyone.  2004, Westminster John Knox Press.  pp. 130-1
9. Alice Connor.  Fierce: Women of the Bible and Their Stories of Violence, Mercy, Bravery, Wisdom, Sex, and Salvation.  2017, Fortress Press.  pp. 143-4
10. Psalm 46:2-3, 10 (NRSV)
11. Exodus 20:8 (CEB)
12. Exodus 20:9-11 (CEB)
13. See Exodus 5.
14. Rob Bell and Don Golden.  Jesus Wants to Save Christians: A Manifesto for the Church in Exile.  2008, Zondervan.  pp. 33, 191
15. Mark 2:27 (NRSV)
16. Rob Bell.  Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith.  2005, Zondervan.  pp. 117-8
17. Bonnie Tsui.  “You Are Doing Something Important When You Aren't Doing Anything.”  The New York Times, 06/21/2019.
18. Matthew 11:28 (CEB)
19. Barclay, pp. 168-9
20. John 12:1-6 (CEB)
21. John 12:7-8 (CEB)
22. Luke 9:51 (NRSV)
23. Levni Yilmaz.  “Death.”  Tales of Mere Existence, 10/13/2011.

Christ in the House of Martha and Mary was painted by Johannes Vermeer in 1654.