Luke 10:38-42
Did you know that when individuals are asked about stories from the Bible that they remember the best or are their favorites, this story of Mary and Martha is nearly always included?! The familiar tale of two sisters, one who is working her fingers to the bone while the other sister sits around doing nothing and gets praised for it. It’s not even just those from the Christian tradition who have this account as part of their consciousness. At a recent party where I was the designated kitchen help, one of the guests – an active member in her synagogue – insisted on doing all the dishes and explained that she was much more comfortable at a party being Martha. And she said she wasn’t talking about Martha Stewart!
Maybe the reason so many people remember this story is because it is an experience to which we all can relate. For one, having been a guest at a dinner party or given one ourself, we all know the work involved: the time, the preparation, the worry about getting things done, pleasing the guests, making sure there’s enough food, even having to take the weather into account. For another, we also know that this kind of hospitality is an art. Some of us have highly developed the skill, and the rest of us are fortunate we have the numbers of our favorite restaurants on speed dial.
But the other reason we probably can relate to this story so well is that many of us have felt exactly like Martha did: overworked and unappreciated, resentful that all our efforts were not supported by those closest to us. And when we complained and just asked for a little help, we were criticized and the other person’s choice was lifted up as the better part. This doesn’t happen just between siblings, either. How many of us have felt treated this way as a colleague, a co-worker, a friend, when we’ve asked for help or encouragement only to get a rebuttal in response? No wonder the Mary/Martha story is so often well remembered by Christians and others alike. It is a story that hits us where we live.
However, given its familiarity and the reality that when Jesus told stories he would usually tell them in ways people would not expect to hear – in this case those first hearers would not have expected a woman to be the one welcoming Jesus into her home, nor would they have expected Jesus to denigrate Martha for doing what was typically woman’s work while elevating another woman for listening to a rabbi’s words. Given that we now know the story almost too well, I’ve always wondered that if Jesus were to tell the story today he instead might say something like this:
“Now as they went on their way they came to a house of two brothers. One brother was busy with many things and occupied himself day and night. There was his job which took many hours to keep ahead of the pressure and the workload and then there were all the chores that needed to be done around the home. This brother was worried and anxious about many things and when his young daughter asked him: ‘Dad, could you please just take a break and play catch with me?’ the father rebuked her saying: ‘Can’t you see I already have too much to do? Go away and don’t bother me.’
But when the other brother who lived in that house and had no children of his own heard his niece’s plea, immediately they went outside. As twilight began to deepen the sky, the two threw the ball back and forth to each other. ‘See,’ said Jesus, ‘this brother has chosen the better part which will not be taken away from him.’”
Now I’m not trying to advocate baseball or softball as the new religion, and I know not all of you are sports’ fans. Still, there is something about the game of catch which anyone can play which gets at the heart of what Jesus meant in his original story: being present at the moment needed, paying attention to the times God’s presence can be felt and shared while not being distracted by other things.
In an essay he wrote a number of years ago, Roger Rosenblatt (who lives in NY, so you can guess which baseball team he favors) described a game of catch like this: “It’s hard to learn to play catch. In the beginning you use your arms to cradle the ball against your chest; then you use both hands, then one. Soon you’re shagging flies like Willie Mays and firing bullets across your body like Derek Jeter, not having to think about the act. Notice, they do not call it a game of throw, although throwing is half the equation. The name of the game puts the burden on the one who receives, but there is really no game to it. Nobody wins or lose. You drop the ball; you pick it up… A ball travels between two people, each seeking a moment of understanding from the other, across the yard, and the years. To play a game of catch is not like pitching to a batter. You do not throw to trick, confuse or evade; you want to be understood.”
Rosenblatt then went on to describe how the game of catch is a way to think about how we are in relationship with others. While he uses the parent-child relationship, I would add others such as the relationship between spouses or partners, the relationship between friends, fellow members of a congregation: “A game of catch is an essential gesture of parenthood too, I believe, when families are working well. Everyone tosses to be understood. The best part of the game is the silence… We do what we can as parents, one child at a time. We take what we get in our children, and they take what they get in us, making compromises and adjustments where we are able, making rules and explanations, but for the most part, letting things happen, come and go, back and forth. The trick is to recognize the moments when nothing needs to be said.” (Time 7/13/88)
When Jesus was scolding Martha for her busyness and praising Mary for her sitting still, it wasn’t because he was trying to polarize ‘doing’ vs. ‘being’, but because he was trying to point out the mystery of connectedness. Jesus wanted that connectedness for both of them, and he wanted it for himself. Those times of interaction between person to person, between person and God where either in the silence or in the act of back and forth, give and take, we come to a deepened awareness of the other person as well as the invisible bonds that tie us together, regardless of being related or not. Here as a congregation or in all the networks that make up our lives, hopefully you and I do what we can as members and friends, one person at a time We take what we get… making compromises and adjustments where we are able… letting things happen, come and go, back and forth. Our task is to recognize the moments when nothing needs to be said, and to savor that such moments are fleeting and far more often than not, serendipitous. May Jesus’ story of two sisters help us to pay closer attention, to notice what’s going on around us; and then to risk connection with one another and the divine – perhaps simply by playing a game of catch, being silent together or maybe even doing the dishes.
Amen.