The Gospel for the Feast of the Memorial of Saints Martha, Mary and Lazarus is taken from Luke 10:38, 42 Jesus entered a village where a woman whose name was Martha welcomed him. She had a sister named Mary who sat beside the Lord at his feet, listening to him speak. Martha, burdened with much serving, came to him and said, lord, do you not care that my sister has left me by my to do the serving? Tell her to help me. The Lord said to her in reply, martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing.

Mary has chosen the better part. It will not be taken from her. Most of us have grown up in a religion that had lots of things that we were taught to do. Do this, do that, finish this, finish that. And what it leads to often is a misunderstanding that the real work that we have as a church, as a religion is to be in a disposition of radical openness to the essence of who Jesus is and thereby knowing who the Father is. We need to spend time pondering and wondering.

Yes, service is important. We need to serve the needs of a people around us. But if we’re only doing that, we haven’t touched the heart of what we’re here for, to be conduits of God’s grace and God’s healing power to those around us. Please reflect on the wisdom of these readings. At the end of the music, I will close with a prayer. Sam Sat Sat Sa foreign closing prayer Father, there’s so much that we all have to deal with every day.

And what I’m asking for is that each of us have the conviction deep in our hearts that there is something more than just the work that we have before us. There is this thing called transformation. And transformation can only happen when we are fully aware of the divinity of God offered to each of us. And we ask this in Jesus name, amen.