Sit

Somniodelic Workshop

Lections: The Sixth Sunday After Pentecost (Lectionary 16), AD 2025 C

Homily:

Lord, we pray for the preacher, for you know his sins are great.

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

Always pay attention to the Marys. There are quite a number of them in the New Testament, such that to distinguish them, one from another, can prove a bit of a sticky wicket. The reader begins to wonder why every other woman in first-century Judea seems to have the same name. It’s like George Foreman with all 12 kids named either George or Georgina.

The answer to this particular quandary is politics, I’m afraid. Rome had set up Herod as their puppet-king in Jerusalem. To cement his claim to the throne, he first married and then murdered the last princess of the previous dynasty. Her name had been Miriam, after Moses’ sister in the Book of Exodus. And so in protest parents named their children Mary after the lost princess, and to remind Herod of his sins. Norwegians would much later do something similar by naming their children Ole, after St Olav, whilst under Danish rule.

Thus in the Gospels and Epistles of Paul we end up with Mary the Mother of Jesus, Mary the mother of John Mark, Mary the mother of Joseph and James, Mary of Bethany, Mary of Rome, and of course Mary Magdalene. Please take notes, as there will be a quiz. Mary Magdalene—whose sobriquet means Tower—is the Apostle to the Apostles; the first witness to, and first preacher of, Jesus’ Resurrection. Christ likely styled her “Magdalene,” the Tower, in the same way that He called Simon “Petrus,” the Rock.

Mary of Bethany, meanwhile, lives in a wealthy household run by her sister Martha, along with their brother Lazarus. Situated but two miles east of Jerusalem, theirs appears to be the home in which Jesus prefers to stay during his regular visitations to the Holy City. There is some debate, over centuries, between the Christian East and West, as to whether Mary of Bethany, the sister of Martha, is the same person as Mary Magdalene, the Tower. I tend to think she is, in part because of our Gospel reading today.

Jesus once again has come to Bethany. Granted, Luke doesn’t call it that—he just says “a certain village”—but unless we want to theorize a seventh Mary with a second sister Martha, let’s just go with the natural connection. Mary’s sister Martha greets Him. Luke, who always places special emphasis on women, presents her as the head of her own household, rather remarkable at the time. And Martha is a gracious host. She busies herself to serve her honored guest.

Even if Martha has as yet no suspicion that Jesus is the Messiah—let alone God upon this earth—He is still a rabbi, a recognized spiritual authority. And in first-century Judaism, a woman’s primary religious duty consisted in the upholding of her household. Women attended the synagogue, and the Talmud records some brilliantly educated female minds, but on the whole wives and mothers were exempt from formal Torah study. It was for men to wrestle with texts, and for women to deal with practical daily necessities.

So when her sister Mary kneels at Jesus’ feet, as a disciple would before her rabbi, to receive His formal instruction, Martha is conventionally correct in saying that such is not her place. Mary shouldn’t be acting like a man. Martha is doing what she understands to be religiously proper, while Mary acts inappropriately. “Lord,” she says to Jesus, “I apologize for my sister. She ought to be working with me. Please set her straight.”

To which Jesus rather shockingly replies, “Martha, you are worried by many things. Only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken from her.”

Now, this tends to offend modern congregations, due to the ol’ Protestant Work Ethic. Productivity is piety in these United States. After all, isn’t it better actively to do good, rather than just sit there on our haunches? But 2000 years and half a world away, this would have been gender-bending. A woman receiving formal rabbinical instruction from a recognized if divisive rabbi? That’s why I suspect that she’s the Magdalene: because “Tower” is the type of name He gives to His disciples. Someday this woman will preach Jesus’ Resurrection to unbelieving male Apostles.

The idea that we must carve out time to sit and listen to God has a truly ancient pedigree. Such is the purpose of the Sabbath: one day a week, set aside for every man, woman, child, and beast; to cease as best we can from all our ceaseless labors; and, thus freed from interference, to know within our hearts and souls the peace of God’s own presence. Such is why monks retreat to the wilderness, or shamans drum to drown out all distraction.

For Christians, the Sabbath is not a single day, not a set time during which certain specific actions are prohibited. But we observe our Sabbath whenever we turn to the Word of God; to the Christ in whom the fullness of divinity is pleased to dwell; who holds all things together, and makes peace between Heaven and earth by the Blood of His Cross. We fulfill the Commandment, we observe the Sabbath, whenever we sit at the feet of Jesus and listen. That is the better part, which will not be taken away.

We sympathize with Martha, of course. How could we not? For my own part, our daughters and I recently returned from a three-week summer getaway at my mother’s immaculate house. She spent the whole time cleaning, baking, planning, driving, making sure that we had the best vacation she could possibly provide to us. And she succeeded.

Jesus Himself taught us to serve and He set His own example. Whenever He tried to get away, up a mountain or across a lake, and the crowds hounded after Him, He never sent them away. He taught them, fed them, healed them, blessed them. On the night in which He was betrayed, He washed feet, even and especially the feet of Judas.

Humble service is Christlike. It allows us to see Christ in our neighbor by being a Christ unto him. And so Martha is not condemned, far from it. Martha serves the Lord. Yet for as blest as it is to feed a guest, as Christ once said to Satan: “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.” C.S. Lewis called it a matter of setting first things first. “Aim at Heaven and you will get earth thrown in,” he wrote; “aim at earth and you will get neither.”

All of which stands to remind us that good works are the fruit and not the root of faith. First trust in Christ. Trust that He is beautiful, good, and true. Trust that He is God alive in you. Sit yourself at the Master’s feet and rejoice that He has found you worthy and beloved to receive His proclamation, the Good News of His victory, of His Kingdom! Then, by all means, share that Good News in word and in deed, loving God with all you are by loving your neighbor as yourself. This flows naturally from time spent in His presence.

We live in a frantic and frankly crazed age, inundated by knowledge without wisdom, by demands for justice without mercy, without love. We are distracted, every moment of every day, bombarded by screens upon every conceivable surface, whipsawing between work and entertainment, between earning our money and frittering it away. The result is a haze of constant unreality, endless toil unmoored from purpose, busyness itself a sort of idol.

And so the greatest rebellion, the greatest cri de cœur for freedom amidst the madness of metamodernity, must begin in silence—in Sabbath—in a time devoid of doing, a time of timelessness, in which simply to be silent and to “know that I AM God.” It might seem inappropriate. It might feel uncomfortable, like we ought to be doing something productive, ought not to be wasting our limited time, when really we’re just terrified of what awaits us in the silence: namely, our soul.

Tell my sister to help me, Lord. Tell her to get up. “Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things. Only one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken from her.”

And there’s a place for you here by her side.

In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Pertinent Links

RDG Stout

Blog: https://rdgstout.blogspot.com/

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St Peter’s Lutheran

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Website: https://www.stpetersnymills.org/

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Nidaros Lutheran

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YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@nidaroschurch6026