I’ve spent the last week trying to balance rest and responsibility as I let a head cold run its course while keeping up with the relentless task of winter pruning in the vineyard.
The vines don’t care that you’re sick. They still need to be pruned in time for spring. Thankfully, Willy, Lina, and their crew are doing the lion’s share of the work, but I still feel the tug of the task. “Should I stop? Can I stop? Who’ll keep things ticking along in the vineyard if I don’t?”
The tension between resting and doing, being and producing feels pretty universal. Most of us are constantly managing competing inner voices: our ‘To Do’ list, our guilt if we slow down, our frustration when others don’t seem to carry their weight, and underneath it all those voices there is a quiet longing for something simpler and more whole.
There’s a short but loaded story in Luke’s Gospel that captures this tension with uncanny precision. Jesus visits the home of two sisters, Mary and Martha. Martha welcomes Jesus in and immediately sets to work preparing food, tending to the house, making everything just right. Meanwhile, Mary sits. She plants herself at Jesus’ feet and listens to him, in the way disciples sat at the feet of their Rabbis at that time.
Martha, understandably, gets annoyed. She says to Jesus, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”
It’s a scenario so familiar to us, isn’t it? It could be a description of any family kitchen, Staff Meeting, or Volunteer Committee.
While it feels familiar to us, it also reveals a deeper problem to us. Martha isn’t just complaining. She’s ‘triangulating.’ She doesn’t speak directly to Mary but, instead, speaks about Mary to Jesus, wanting him to take her side.
‘The Drama Triangle’, a psychological model about conflict, developed by psychiatrist, Stephen Karpman in the 1960’s, describes what Martha did.
Karpman argued that when conflict occurs, there are 3 players:
- The Victim: “Poor me, I’m doing everything!”
- The Persecutor: “They’re the problem. They are lazy, selfish, and wrong.”
- The Rescuer: “You fix this! Tell them what to do!”
In the story above, Martha cast herself as the Victim, Mary as the Persecutor, and Jesus as the Rescuer.
Many of us fall into this pattern, especially when we feel overwhelmed, unappreciated, or burnt out.
What’s remarkable is how Jesus responds to Martha’s behaviour! He refuses to enter the triangle she has created. He doesn’t scold Mary at all, and he doesn’t correct Martha harshly. Jesus simply says to Martha, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things. One thing is needed. Mary has chosen the better part, and it will not be taken from her.”
Jesus doesn’t criticise Martha for choosing to keep doing housework, while he visits her. After all, hospitality is a sacred thing. The issue is her distraction. It is her anxious, resentful heart. She’s not just cooking; she’s comparing. She’s not just serving; she’s stewing.
In contrast, Mary is fully present. She’s doing something radical for a woman of her time: sitting as a disciple, listening deeply to Jesus. She’s chosen presence over pressure. Focus over fuss.
This story is often interpreted as a warning against busyness, but in context, it’s more nuanced than that. Just before this passage, there is another well-known story, the parable of ‘The Good Samaritan.’ In that story, a man’s compassion is depicted, not through his quiet reflection, but through his bold, practical action. When Jesus finished telling the story he said , “Go and do likewise.”
The two stories, appearing one after the other, create a challenge and dilemma for us:
- Act boldly, like the Samaritan, but also stop and listen, like Mary.
- Serve like Martha, but don’t compare yourself to others and become resentful.
This isn’t about choosing between contemplation and action. It’s about knowing what the moment calls for. And more than that, it’s about recognising how we show up. Are we ‘centred’ and ‘in the moment’ or are we distracted and reactionary?
The 17th-century monk, Brother Lawrence, described his spiritual life as “Practising the presence of God.” He believed that peeling potatoes in the kitchen could be just as holy as kneeling in church, if done with love and attention. His was a gentle, counter-cultural wisdom, arguing God is not confined to sacred spaces or quiet hours. Rather, God is found in the middle of mess and motion, if we’re paying attention.
Another idea fits here. It is ‘Flow’, which is our state of being when we’re fully immersed in something meaningful. Artists know this state well. So do athletes, gardeners and musicians. It’s the reality when action and presence align. Time seems to dissolve. The state of ‘Flow’ is not passive. It’s an active and assertive engagement. You can experience ‘Flow’ while writing a letter or pruning a vine, making soup or singing a song.
I think Mary was in the state of ‘Flow’. She was grounded, attentive, absorbed. Martha could have been, too, if she hadn’t got trapped comparing herself to Mary and dealing with her frustration by ‘triangulating’. The problem wasn’t that Martha was serving. It was that she became disconnected from the task of serving by becoming resentful and turning her attention to that.
The two stories in the Gospel of Luke leave us with a challenge. Here are some questions for you:
- Where in your life are you distracted from what matters?
- Where are you ‘stewing’ instead of serving?
- Where are you hoping someone will play ‘Rescuer’ for you, when what is needed is you honestly and directly talking with the person you feel upset about yourself?
- Where might Jesus be saying to you, “Come back to the centre.
Come back to the one thing needed.”?
The good life isn’t about doing everything or doing nothing.
It’s about finding the rhythm of being and doing, listening and loving, serving and receiving.
It is about stepping out of unhelpful ‘triangles’, out of anxiety, and, intentionally stepping back into the presence of God, wherever we are, whatever we’re doing.
As Jesus said to Martha, “One thing is needed.”
That ‘one thing’ might just begin with our showing up, fully, quietly, gratefully, right where we are.
This is the gospel, and it’s good news.
Brian Spencer, Minister