I apologize in advance if you came to church today hoping to
hear a Christmas message. It is
our habit here to go through the scriptures verse by verse, and today we come
to the end of the 10th chapter of Luke, which would seem to have
nothing to do with Christmas.
However, perhaps this message does relate to an aspect of the Christmas
season which is becoming more and more difficult to deal with. And that is the stress of the
season. More and more I find that
people are stressed out by Christmas.
There seems to be so much to do, and so much money that is required to
do all the things we think are important.
I know that in my case it seems that this Christmas season has been a very busy, very stressful time.
So as we consider the timing of this message, maybe instead
of being disappointed that we aren’t dealing with the traditional Christmas
story, perhaps we might consider that God has providentially in His timing
inserted this reminder about priorities for just such a time as this. Maybe you will find that there is a
message here for you to step back from all the craziness of this Christmas
season, and realign your priorities according to what Christ said should be important.
In these verses we read that Jesus has come to the house of
Martha and her sister Mary. Not
much is said about them in this particular passage, but this is the same
sisters of whom we read in John 11 that had a brother named Lazarus who Jesus
raised from the dead. And we know
from John’s account that Jesus particularly loved Martha, Mary and
Lazarus. He must have had a
special relationship with them.
Undoubtedly He ate with them and
stayed at their house on numerous occasions. They were His close friends.
Lazarus is not mentioned in this event, but his two sisters
are. And what is important to see
is that these women exhibit two distinctly different behaviors or
characteristics. On the one hand,
Martha is in the kitchen preparing dinner and working to get everything
ready. Mary, on the other hand is
described as “seated at the Lord’s
feet, listening to His word.” The
contrast is Martha is concerned about physical things, Mary is concerned about
spiritual things. Martha is
concerned about feeding the body, Mary is concerned about feeding her
soul. Martha is concerned about
temporal things, Mary is concerned about eternal things
But we need to be careful to look at this contrast with the
correct perspective. We could
easily go astray by reading into this comparison things that are not being
taught by the story. This is not a
diatribe against serving, for example.
If it were, then it would contradict the very teachings of Jesus Himself
who often taught that the lifestyle of a Christian would be characterized by a
servant’s attitude.
What the passage is trying to teach us is that Mary had
chosen the good part that would not be taken from her. And so we need to understand what that
good part is. Obviously, the text
indicates the good part was to sit at Jesus feet and hear His word. And Mary’s posture of sitting at His
feet indicates a submission and humility that is essential to the hearing of
the word. Merely hearing the word
and not being obedient to the word will profit nothing, but rather only serves
to add to one’s condemnation. So
Mary’s submission to the word has to be a vital reason for the benefit of her
hearing the word.
But what I want
to draw your attention to today is the answer of Jesus to Martha’s request that
He should tell Mary to get up and help her. Jesus answered, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and
bothered about so many things; but there is only one thing that is necessary.” See the important thing is not
just their response to Jesus coming,
but the order of their response to Jesus. Mary got the order right. Martha was active, she was working, she was serving, but her
priorities were wrong. That is why
we have been emphasizing in our Wednesday study of Ephesians that doctrine
comes before action. What you
believe will affect your behavior.
That before you can do the works of a Christian, you must first become a
Christian. You can do all the activities associated with Christianity and still
be lost and go to hell.
Rom. 10:17 says, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing
by the word of Christ.” Before we
can begin to live a Christian life, we must first be saved by Christ. And salvation is not by works, but by
faith. Faith comes through
hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
So we see that Mary had her priorities in the right order. She was hearing the word of God that
she might receive faith to become a child of God. That is the correct order. It’s not possible, nor is it
taught in the Bible that we should get our act together before coming to the
Lord. That we need to pull
ourselves up by the bootstraps so to speak. Rather, the Bible teaches us that we need to come to Christ
fully aware of our insufficiency, fully recognizant of our sin, and then in
repentance and faith be saved.
Then after having been saved, we receive the power to become sons of
God. That is a gift from God once
we have been born again. It’s not
possible to reverse the order. So
Mary has the order of her priorities right. She is focused on what is necessary, what is important.
Now what I would like to do is take this phrase found in vs.
42, “but only one thing is necessary,” and notice in it four things that I hope
will be instructive to us getting our priorities straight. The first word is the conjunction,
“but.” Some of the greatest truths
of the Bible are preceded by that little word “but.” It implies a contrast,
what is called a disjunctive conjunction. That is, a contrasting word, used to show the need for
consideration of the outcome between one behavior and the other.
It is a word that Christ uses to get Martha to consider the
difference between all her busy-ness, all her frenzied activity, and what was
really important. He says to her, “Martha, Martha,” and you can almost here the
gentle exasperation in His voice as He speaks to her, “you are worried and
bothered about so many things, but only one thing is necessary.”
There is a great need for modern man to consider the
contrast implied in this word “but”.
We are occupied with so many things. Some of them are seemingly good things. Our families have to eat, don’t
they? We need to support our
families, we must pay our bills. So we get up early and go to bed late, and we
work on weekends and we work overtime and we are so concerned with the business
of just staying ahead of the bill collector. But the Bible says in
Psalm 127:2, “It is vain for you to rise up early, To retire late, To
eat the bread of painful labors; For He gives to His beloved even in his
sleep.”
I’m not here to try to discourage you from doing an honest day’s
work, or to discourage you to provide for your children, but you need to ask
yourself, “Is this really what is important?” Is this all there is to life? Is more money really the answer? Because I think this passage commands us to consider our
priorities. Is making that extra
sale all that important? Will our
children really appreciate having that new technology that your money allows
them to buy as much as having a father or mother to spend more time with
them?
Jesus doesn’t necessarily rebuke Martha for doing what she
was doing. There are things that
must be done, there is work that must be done, but keeping it in perspective is
the more necessary part. The right
priorities produce the part that will not be taken away. That time you spend
with your children, that vacation that you take with your family, that time you
invest in the kingdom of God, that time you spend alone with God early in the
morning, that investment you make in the life of someone in need, those are the
type of things that are really necessary that will not be taken away. All the money in the world will never
compensate for that time you should have been focusing on the truly necessary
things. I’m afraid a lot of people will wake up in eternity and realize that
they spent their life worrying and fretting about things that weren’t all that
important in terms of eternity.
Jesus said in
Mark 8:36, “For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world,
and loses his own soul?” And I
might be so bold as to add, “or your children’s soul?” How many parents have spent the early
years of their children’s life chasing the almighty dollar, using the excuse it
was for the benefit of their children, and then one day found out that they
lost their children. What did it
profit you then?
But it’s not just over worked parents who may find
themselves lacking in this comparison.
Those that seek after pleasure may just as well be found wanting in the
end. Those that are willing to
spend all their energies chasing physical satisfaction found in hunting or
fishing or sports or music or fashion or bar hopping or lusts of the flesh or an
endless list of desires that appeal to our natural man, our physical
nature. There is no end to the
trivial pursuits of pleasure and self fulfillment that can occupy our time and
energy while the important things go wanting.
It’s especially true of young people who think that they
have plenty of time to serve the Lord, plenty of time in the future to get
serious about Christianity, and
yet they don’t realize how quickly time passes by, how much sand is left in the
hourglass of our life here on earth. Solomon was the wisest man to ever live
and he warned in Eccl. 12, “Remember also your Creator in the days of your
youth, before the evil days come and the years draw near when you will say, “I
have no delight in them”.
“Remember Him before the silver cord is broken and the
golden bowl is crushed, the pitcher by the well is shattered and the wheel at
the cistern is crushed; then the dust will return to the earth as it was, and
the spirit will return to God who gave it.” Some of you here today need to consider how many years you
have already wasted in trivial, ungodly pursuits of self satisfaction. And what have you got to show for all
those wasted years? Remember Him
before the silver cord is suddenly broken.
No matter how important seems the pursuit, no matter what
the urgency or attraction of temporal matters, this injunction to consider not
what is expedient but what is necessary should give us pause in our activities,
to consider our priorities.
There is a second word to consider is one of necessity. “But
only one thing is necessary.” And the second word is the word “necessary.” Only one thing is necessary. All around us, especially during this
Christmas season, but virtually any day of the year, many things are clamoring
for our attention. Things that are
appealing. Things that seem exciting. Things that may seem important, that may
seem worthwhile. Things that may
seem to have an urgency to them.
There is a never ending stream of things barraging our senses, begging
for our attention. Causing us to
lose sight of what is important, what is absolutely necessary.
Hebrews 12:1 likens our Christian walk as one who is in a
race. A runner in a race strips
away all the things that are not necessary, all the things that may hinder him.
Hebrews 12:1, “Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses
surrounding us, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily
entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,
fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy
set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the
right hand of the throne of God.”
I’ve said it many times before, and it is especially pertinent to this
discussion, that there are many things that are not bad or harmful in and of
themselves, that may not be sins, but they may very well be weights, things that
encumber you, that slow you down, that keep you from running the race that has
been set before you.
Paul said in 1Cor. 10:23, “All things are lawful, but not
all things are profitable. All things are lawful, but not all things
edify.” So often Satan trips us up
not by seducing us to outright sin, but by seducing us to secondary considerations. Things that aren’t essential, that aren’t
really necessary take priority in our life. But only one thing is necessary. Sitting at the feet of Jesus, listening to His word,
receiving it in humbleness and submission is the really important thing, it’s
the necessary thing.
But only one thing is necessary, and that is your
relationship to God. Your
salvation is the one thing that is important. All kinds of endeavors may seem important at the moment, but
only one thing is necessary; how
is your soul in relation to God.
The third word to be considered in this phrase is one of
prioritization. There is one thing that is necessary. There are not many things, there is but
one thing that is necessary. As we
have already said, many things may vie for your attention, but we need to focus
our priority and attention on the one thing that is essential. We cannot follow two masters.
Jesus taught in Matt. 6:24, “No one can serve two masters;
for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to
one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.” Listen, it’s not
just God and wealth. It’s God and
anything else. Jesus Christ must
be preeminent in our lives. He
cannot occupy the back seat, while we let another drive the car. God must be everything, or He is
nothing. The commandment states,
“You shall have no other god before Me.”
Nothing else must be as important.
But only one thing is necessary.
Remember the foremost commandment we looked at just last
week in the preceding passage, that we should love the Lord our God with all
our heart, all our soul, all our strength and all our mind. God will not allow Himself to be in
second place. We must love the
Lord with singleness of purpose, and singleness of mind.
That is why in our study of Ephesians the Apostle Paul
implores that we be unified in our doctrine. And that is why I endeavor to teach the core doctrines of
the gospel, so that we may be unified, that we may be one. That is why it is important to be found
sitting at the feet of Christ, listening to His word, so that we might be
unified in faith. As Ephesians
4:13 says, “until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge
of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs
to the fullness of Christ.”
There are a thousand voices calling out to Christians today
to come over here, to go there, listen to this new thing, read this new book
over here, listen to this new teaching by some television evangelist. But only one thing is necessary. Humble yourself and kneel at the feet
of Jesus and listen to His word.
Don’t be distracted by every wind of doctrine, don’t get distracted by
all the lights and sounds of entertainment driven modern Christianity, don’t be
deceived by false teachers who claim all sorts of miraculous powers and special
revelation. Only submission to the
word of God is necessary. That is
why this church puts such an emphasis on the verse by verse teaching of God’s
word. The teaching of the word of
God is not a negotiable thing in this church. It is an absolute necessity. The word of God must have
preeminence. Many of the activities we see going on in so many
churches today in the name of worship really need to examined in light of this
principle of what is necessary.
Not what is expedient, or what is relevant, or what is hip, nor
what the latest poll says people
want to see in a church, but only one thing is necessary, and that is sitting
at the feet of Jesus listening to His word.
One last principle that is implied in this phrase is the
immediateness and the present tense of this statement as suggested by the word
“is”. Not has been, or should be,
or might be one day. It is
necessary now. It is necessary to
be seated at the feet of Jesus today, not tomorrow, or some time in the
future. No matter how long you
have been a Christian, no matter how short of a time you have been a Christian,
no matter if you are not yet a Christian, there is an absolute necessity to
respond to Him today while it is still called today. Hebrews 3:7, “Therefore,
just as the Holy Spirit says, “TODAY IF YOU HEAR HIS VOICE,DO NOT HARDEN YOUR
HEART.
I am deeply troubled when I find self styled mature
Christians say that they no longer need to be as concerned about coming to
church every time the door is opened as they once were. I’m frightened for them when they think
that they have learned enough, that there really isn’t a need to learn
more. When I see that sort of
attitude I remember the verse that says, “when you think you stand, take heed
lest you fall.” King David thought
that he didn’t need to ride out into battle personally anymore and so he stayed
home and in so doing he fell into temptation and ruined his life and
testimony. Folks, there is a
humility and submissiveness that is necessary that can only be requited by
staying at the feet of Jesus on a moment by moment basis. We cannot afford to put off complete devotion
to the Lord to a more convenient time.
The is no time like the present.
There is no guarantee of tomorrow.
But only one thing is necessary.
Only one thing is necessary for the mature Christian; that
is to sit at the feet of Jesus.
Only one thing is necessary for the unsaved person; that is to come sit
at the feet of Jesus. Only one
thing is necessary for the backslidden person. And that is to come back and sit again at the feet of
Jesus. Only one thing is
necessary. As we go forward this
week into another frenzied week of endeavors and activities of every
conceivable kind, both good and bad, let us remember, no matter how alluring or
appealing the activity, no matter what, that there is only one thing that is
necessary. Let us keep that one
thing our priority above all else; to sit at the feet of Jesus, listening to
His word in humility and submissiveness.
Sitting at the feet of Jesus listening to His word is where
we find salvation. Sitting at the
feet of Jesus listening to His word is where we find lasting satisfaction. Sitting at the feet of Jesus is where
we find sustenance for our soul.
Sitting at the feet of Jesus is where we find strength for our day. Sitting at the feet of Jesus is where
we find joy and peace. Sitting at
the feet of Jesus is where we find forgiveness and reconciliation with
God. But only one thing is necessary,
and I pray that you will choose the good part, which shall not be taken away
from you. Let’s pray.
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