Are you answering “how are you?” with “exhausted,” too? This week I was carrying bananas throughout the grocery store and with all seriousness, I called them potatoes.
I see in myself and American culture an obsession with finding the perfect balance of busy and rest (“self-care”). We want to gloat about our busyness to earn social accolades. We want to impress others by how well we are resting – to the point where I’ve heard people (me) bragging about how well they Sabbath (say a prayer for me). Our obsession with both busyness and rest are externally focused.
Here’s the thing: true, biblical rest isn’t just self-care. It’s not bath bombs, candles, massages, coloring books, yoga or meditation. While these things can be restful, I think we all know deep down as awesome as they are they but can’t provide true rest for our souls. Self-care can’t produce lasting peace because according to God’s Word, rest is an internal issue; as Christianese as this may sound and as much as I hate to say this, yes, it’s a “heart” issue.
Not too long ago, I was knee-deep in self-reliance and unable to rest (read: self-medicating with social media, chocolate chip cookies and Hulu) at the end of a long day when the Spirit reminded me of Mary and Martha’s story:
“Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house.
And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching.
But Martha was distracted with much serving.
And she went up to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.”
But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.”” (Luke 10:38-42, ESV, emphasis mine)
Although Martha was doing the acceptable thing by being hospitable and serving the many guests who accompanied Jesus, she missed Jesus. Mary, on the other hand, chose the good portion. Sitting at the feet of Jesus as any male disciple would at the feet of their rabbi (teacher), Mary was so enthralled by the long-awaited Messiah she chose the culturally “wrong” thing by neglecting preparations with her sister. Jesus could have left it with the external evidence of Martha’s problem, but He didn’t. He spoke to her heart. In speaking to her heart, He speaks to ours.
Jesus, seeing Martha’s heart, proves He saw and cared about her with a loving correction. Jesus affectionately flips the script on the urgency of her anxiety and essentially says, “Martha, Martha, no! Don’t miss it! The only need/must/necessary you truly have is me!” Straight up: anxiety is a liar. Anxiety lies about what matters most and tells us to be stirred up to serve temporary things. Whereas Jesus, our true “one thing,” is eternal, lasting, permanent. Mary missed Jesus, the one whom her service was for in the first place. In missing Jesus, her hospitality was done with a heart of anxiety, not love.
Since rest is a posture of the heart, how we do it matters. Martha did all of the right ministry things but with the wrong heart. Mary chose the culturally wrong things but with the right heart. Similarly, we can try and balance all the service and rest in the world, even Christian things like prayer and discipleship, but if we aren’t abiding in Christ, we won’t find the true, soul-deep rest we were created to experience.
This Christmas season it seems as timely as ever to take a note from Martha and Mary on service and rest, doesn’t it? We can make our holiday preparations with a heart of anxiety or love, with our eyes on the things for Jesus or on Jesus Himself. But we can’t do both. We can rush through these never-ending Christmas lists to get to practicing self-care (maybe self-medication)… or, we can wrap these gifts, mail these cards, bake these cookies and decorate these houses with hearts abiding in His love (and who knows, maybe we’ll have time to throw in a bath bomb, too). I’m choosing the latter. Who’s with me?