Day Fifteen: Serving Like Martha

Martha is one of those biblical characters with a bad reputation. Since St. Augustine first distinguished between the Mary complex and the Martha complex in the early fourth century AD, Everyone wants to be like Mary, not Martha. Because Mary was the saint who chose the better thing, and Martha was the workaholic who couldn’t find time for Jesus in her schedule. She was the one that wanted to control everybody else.

And, of course, we aren’t supposed to imitate her. But what if you already are her? Seriously, we say there is hope for anyone to change, but I’ve always wondered about someone like Martha--- someone like me--- someone who is saved and serving God, but so focuses on doing things for God.

I’ve learned there are no such things as doing things for God. Either God is doing things through you or you are doing things for yourself. There is no middle ground between my agenda and God’s. It is either one or the other. In the first story of Mary and Martha, Martha was completely focused on her own agenda and did not recognize Jesus for who he was.

But Martha changed. Martha actually has two stories in the Bible about her. The first one is the one we know about Martha and Mary, and the work, etc., but the other one is the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead (John 11). I’m not sure why this story gets named after Lazarus; he’s sick in bed and then he’s in the tomb, so it’s not like he really does anything it in. Martha and Mary are the two siblings we see interacting with Jesus. It’s more like it should be titled Martha and Mary, part two.

When Jesus comes to the village, Martha runs out to meet Him and they have this amazing conversation--- a conversation that proves that between this and the other story Martha took the time to get to know who Jesus was. She says, “"I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who was to come into the world." She’s one of only two people in the Bible to say that; the other is Peter. And she agrees that Jesus has the power over life and death; something no one else in the Gospels understood. She knew who Jesus was. 

She went from someone who was only doing things for God in her own strength and in her own way to someone who had full confidence that Jesus could handle every situation, even this one with her brother in the tomb. That counts as a transformation.

I find that incredibly encouraging. Because no matter how many times God does things to teach me the contrary, I still try to do things in my own strength. And every time, God, in His infinite patience, shows me again, I’m not supposed to be handling it; He already has. But if God can overcome the Martha complex in Martha, He can do it in anyone.

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