Sermon Notes

Jesus is sitting in the living room of some of His closest friends, and one sister is at His feet while the other is stuck in the kitchen trying to get dinner on the table. In Luke 10:38-42, Brad Kirby walks through a short, familiar scene that turns out to be anything but simple. Martha isn't doing anything wrong. She is serving Jesus, and yet the very thing she is doing for Him has pulled her attention away from Him. If your life feels crowded with a hundred good things and you rarely feel fully present anywhere, this message speaks right to that. Come hear why Jesus says only one thing is necessary.

Key Takeaways

You can be in the room with Jesus and still be distracted. Martha welcomed Jesus into her home and got so busy doing things for Him that she stopped paying attention to Him.
Not everything that demands your attention deserves your priority. Jesus never denies the many things in Martha's kitchen, He puts them in order around the one thing that is necessary.
Hurry doesn't stay on the calendar. Martha's busyness turned into anxiety, then resentment, then control, until her frustration became "Lord, do you not care?"
The bump doesn't create what spills out. Jesus doesn't just want to reorder Martha's schedule, He wants to restore her heart.
Before Jesus sends us to feed others, we have to feast on Him. Mary chose the good portion, and the good portion is Jesus Himself.
Discussion Questions

When Jesus is near, what usually has your attention instead?
Which good things in your life right now have started pulling your eyes away from Jesus?
What weight might God be asking you to put down rather than learn to carry more efficiently?
What gets your first attention each morning, and how does that shape the rest of your day?
When you get "bumped" by stress, what tends to spill out of you, and what does that reveal about your heart?
What are you asking achievement, approval, entertainment, or productivity to give you that only Jesus can provide?

This Week's Challenge

Start each day this week with Jesus before you start with the noise, giving Him time in His Word and prayer before you pick up your phone.

Transcript

Something Always Happens at the Table

Here we are in week 3 of our Table Church series. As we look at the life and ministry of Jesus, we notice something interesting. He loves to share meals with people. Jesus comes to the table a lot, and when He does, something always happens.

Meals are never merely incidental details in the story. It is always about more than furniture and food. At the table, Jesus reveals grace, confronts self-righteousness, welcomes sinners, teaches disciples, and restores broken people. He is forming His church to accomplish the disciple-making mission. And that is exactly what is about to happen again at the table in Luke 10.

Same House, Same Jesus

Jesus enters a village, most likely Bethany, the home of some of His best friends on earth: Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. It looks like an ordinary evening in an ordinary home. Martha welcomes Him and starts cooking, preparing, serving. Mary sits at Jesus' feet. What looks like an ordinary meal is about to turn into a life-altering discipleship lesson about what matters most.

Keep one question underneath this whole scene. How do you respond to Jesus? Not what do you know about Him, or how much have you done for Him, but when Jesus is near, what has your attention? Martha and Mary are in the same house, with the same Jesus, given the same opportunity to be with Him, and they respond very differently.

The Issue Is Not Whether Jesus Is Present

Here is what makes this story uncomfortable. The issue is not whether Jesus is present. The issue is whether we are present with Jesus. You can welcome Jesus into your house and get so consumed with what you are doing for Him that you fail to pay attention to Him.

Martha is hospitable, responsible, generous. If something needs cooking, Martha is cooking. She is not doing something sinful. She is serving Jesus. Wonderful! Mary responds differently. Jesus is in the living room, Mary is at His feet listening, and Martha is in the kitchen making the chicken pot pie.

This is not a story about Martha being bad and Mary being good, or about introverts versus extroverts. This is about our hearts and our priorities.

Jesus Exposes What Is Pulling Us Apart

Luke identifies the problem in one sentence: "But Martha was distracted with much serving." That word matters, because Martha is not condemned for serving. Serving is good. Hospitality is good. Somebody has to make sure the food is ready and nobody notices the one room you shoved everything into five minutes before company arrived.

The problem is that even something good has begun to pull her away from someone better. Martha loves Jesus. She welcomed Him and is working for Him. Yet she is too busy to be with the Jesus she welcomed.

This happens to us way too often. We sit down to read the Bible, our phone buzzes, and twenty minutes later we have somehow watched a video of a dog riding a skateboard. Jesus can be right there, and our attention can be everywhere else.

Pulled in Different Directions

The word translated "distracted" carries the idea of being pulled away, drawn off, pulled in different directions. That is exactly what distraction feels like. A little piece of you is at work. A little is thinking about the kids. A little is worried about money. You are running from room to room of your life, trying to remember why you walked in there in the first place.

It shows up in our faith too. We can spend hours with podcasts, sermons, and books about Jesus while spending very little unhurried time actually with Jesus. We can serve, lead, and organize, and become so busy doing things for Jesus that we barely have time to listen to Him. Eventually, you look around and there is not much of you left where you actually are.

A "Many Things" World

"Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things." That sounds familiar. I once read a bumper sticker that said, "God loves you, and everyone else has a wonderful plan for your life." Funny and painfully true. Everybody needs something, and everybody seems convinced there is an empty square on your calendar with their name already written in it.

Here is what makes distraction so confusing and dangerous: none of those things have to be bad. Distraction does not always show up looking sinful. Sometimes it looks like responsibility, productivity, ministry, or caring for the people you love. Martha is not distracted by sin. She is distracted by serving. That should get our attention.

Lay Aside Every Weight

Hebrews 12 tells us to "lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely," and to run looking to Jesus. Notice the distinction between every weight and sin. Not everything that hinders us is sinful. A weight may not be evil. It may simply have become too heavy, too consuming, too central.

Hebrews does not say, "Learn how to carry every weight more efficiently." It says, "Lay aside every weight." Sometimes the answer to distraction is not becoming better at juggling everything. Sometimes the answer is admitting something needs to be put down.

So maybe the better question is: "Is this helping me look to Jesus, or has it become a weight that keeps pulling my eyes away from Him?" Martha's hands are serving Him. But her eyes are somewhere else.

Jesus Is Right There

The One she loves is in her home. The One who spoke creation into existence is speaking, and she is too distracted to listen. The One who holds all things together is a few feet away while Martha feels like everything depends on her. The Bread of Life is in the room, and all she can see is the chicken pot pie.

That is what distraction does. It does not merely steal our time. It steals our attention. Martha welcomed Him, loved Him, and served Him. But Martha was distracted from Him.

Unite My Heart

I love David's prayer in Psalm 86:11: "Teach me your way, O Lord, that I may walk in your truth; unite my heart to fear your name." What a prayer for distracted people. A distracted life is usually just a symptom of a distracted heart. Our schedules get divided, then our attention, then our thoughts, and eventually our hearts can feel divided too.

David's life is not calm when he prays this. He is poor and needy, in the day of trouble, with ruthless men seeking his life. Yet he doesn't pray, "Lord, simplify my life." He prays something deeper.

David knows he cannot pull himself back together. So he asks God to gather his scattered attention, his competing desires, his fears and worries, and bring them under one governing desire: to know Him and fear His name.

Jesus Reorders What We Call Necessary

"Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary." Notice that Jesus does not tell Martha the many things don't exist. He doesn't say, "Nobody needs to eat. Let the house fall apart." The issue is that Martha has allowed the many things to become equally important, equally urgent, equally demanding.

That is a word we desperately need. Not everything that demands our attention deserves our priority. Some things are loud but not important. Some things feel urgent but not essential. Some things feel like they have to happen right now when in reality they can wait.

Spiritual Triage

Think about the emergency room. They do not treat people according to who arrived first or who is making the most noise. They practice triage. Somebody may be screaming about a broken finger while someone else sits quietly in the corner with symptoms of a heart attack. Triage means putting things in the right order.

Some of us need spiritual triage. Everything in our lives is screaming, "Me first!" The email, the deadline, the phone, the house, the kids, work, even ministry. If we are not careful, we will spend our lives responding to the loudest thing instead of choosing the most necessary thing. Jesus is not denying the many things. He is putting them in order.

Crowded Life vs. Centered Life

David said it in Psalm 27:4: "One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after." David had plenty of many things: leadership, enemies, family problems, danger. Yet above all of it was one governing desire, God's presence. That doesn't mean he only cared about one thing. It means there was one thing at the center that gave everything else its proper place.

Life is busy. There will always be many things. The question is whether there is one thing at the center that orders all the other things. A centered life can still be very full, with appointments, deadlines, kids, bills, and people who need you. The difference is that the many things are ordered around the one thing. Jesus!

Seek First

In Matthew 6, Jesus talks about the ordinary concerns of life: what to eat, drink, and wear. He doesn't dismiss them. "Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all." But He says, "Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness." He does not say seek only. He says seek first. That is priority.

So how do we seek first? Start with Jesus before you start with the noise, in His Word and prayer before the phone and the news. Ask what is necessary, not just what is urgent. Put Jesus at the center of your decisions, because He doesn't just go at the top of the list, He orders the list. Learn to say no to good things. And check what is getting your best, because that often reveals what has quietly become first.

Jesus Addresses the Heart Beneath the Hurry

Jesus is concerned with more than what Martha is doing. He is concerned with what all that doing is producing in her. Busyness produces anxiety, anxiety breeds resentment, and resentment tries to take control.

Notice where Jesus goes. Martha talks about Mary. Jesus talks about Martha. Martha says, "My sister is the problem." Jesus says, "Your problem is on the inside." Jesus has an annoying knack for taking our outward frustrations and turning them inward to our hearts.

Martha essentially says, "Jesus, I have reviewed the situation, identified the problem, determined the solution, and I just need Your signature at the bottom." And the phrase that gets me is, "Lord, do you not care?" Her practical frustration has become a theological accusation.

Resentment Keeps Score

Hurry does not stay on the calendar. Distraction becomes anxiety, anxiety becomes irritation, then self-pity, resentment, and judgment. You start serving in ministry because you love Jesus, and eventually you are keeping score of who showed up and why you are apparently the only person in the entire church who knows how to stack a chair correctly.

Martha says Mary has left her "alone." She is surrounded by people, yet she feels abandoned. Anxiety is a tool of the enemy to make you feel alone even when you are not. And resentment has spreadsheets. Somehow the columns always prove we are carrying more than everybody else. We say, "No, really, I'm happy to help," while internally preparing an invoice. That is not grace.

The General Manager of Everything

Martha does not simply tell Jesus how she feels. She tells Jesus what He should do. "Tell her then to help me." That is control. Some of us are exhausted not because God has asked us to carry the whole world, but because we are trying to. We are trying to be the General Manager of Everything. The hours are awful, the benefits are nonexistent, and the position has already been filled. It's God's job, not ours!

Jesus loves Martha too much to let her anxiety run the house. So He calls her by name. "Martha, Martha." He does not embarrass her. It is as though He is grabbing His friend and saying, "Slow down. Look at Me. You are being pulled apart." That is grace.

What Spills Out

Imagine carrying a cup filled all the way to the top. As long as nobody bumps you, everything is good. But the moment somebody hits your elbow, whatever is inside spills out. And we blame the bump. "My kids are testing my patience." "The traffic made me lose it."

The bump did not create what spilled out. That was already in there. So ask: what is your hurry producing in you? More loving or more irritable? More gracious or more judgmental? What is inside me that keeps spilling out when I am bumped? Jesus does not only want to reorder Martha's schedule. He wants to restore Martha's heart.

Jesus Invites Us to Receive Before We Give

"Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her." What a beautiful phrase in a story about a meal. Martha is worried about physical food, and Mary chose a better meal. Martha is preparing a portion while Mary is receiving one. Martha is trying to feed Jesus while Jesus is feeding Mary.

In this we see the heart of Table Church. Before Jesus sends us to feed others, we must learn to feast on Him. Otherwise we will keep trying to serve food we have not eaten. We will pour from cups that have not been filled. We will tell people Jesus is enough while quietly trying to prove that we are enough.

Stop Feeding Your Soul Junk Food

The soul does not stop being hungry just because we stop feeding on Christ. It will look for nourishment somewhere: novelty, affirmation, entertainment, achievement, activity, escape. Spiritual junk food works like physical junk food. It can fill you without nourishing you. We can consume enormous amounts of content and still lack wisdom, or be entertained every waking hour and still live with a restless heart.

Jesus said, "I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger." The good portion is not just a more manageable schedule or better habits. The good portion is Jesus Himself. So what are we asking lesser things to give us that only Christ can provide? We ask achievement for worth and approval for security. Only Christ can nourish the soul.

Come Back to His Feet

Martha's problem was not that Jesus was absent. Jesus was right there. The problem was that everything else had become louder than His presence. Maybe that is your problem today. Jesus is not far away, but our minds are scattered, our hearts are divided, our priorities are crowded, and our souls are hungry.

And Jesus is still saying, "One thing is necessary." Him. So maybe the invitation today is very simple. Come back to His feet. Bring Him your distracted mind and your crowded heart. Bring Him the hunger you have been trying to satisfy with lesser things. There will always be many things. But only one thing is necessary.

A Table for the Distracted