I have a confession to make. I don’t have a smart phone. My phone is dumb. It just makes calls. I even had the texting capability turned off. I know this is countercultural, and that it may make me old fashioned, but having a dumb phone is an act of simplicity in my already cluttered life. As it is, I feel the pressure to check my email several times an hour. It’s hard to focus on whatever I’m working on without seeing whether the market is up or down, what’s happening with the weather, what the news headlines are.
The technology scholar Linda Stone says that the disease of the Internet age is “continuous partial attention.” As a teacher, I see this in my students. They sit in class with their laptops open, perhaps taking diligent notes, perhaps checking Facebook or email, perhaps watching a Twins game. My ability to get them to focus is compromised at best. This is how many of us go through our days—multitasking, constantly connected, shifting from media screen to media screen. On a recent PBS show, professors at Stanford and MIT were lamenting that students today struggle to develop a coherent line of thought from one paragraph to the next; everything is broken up, fragmented, composed between text messages. Everyone seems distracted.
Today’s gospel reading of Martha and Mary speaks from a much simpler age about a recurring spiritual challenge. This text has long been prone to misreadings, so let me begin by cautioning against some of them. First, there is nothing in the text to suggest that Martha and Mary represent different personalities, spiritual types, or lifestyles. The story is about the decisions and postures of these two women in a particular moment, not for all time.
Second, there is nothing to suggest that the activities of service and learning or contemplation are in opposition or mutually exclusive. Jesus does not denigrate the serving of food or the offering of hospitality. He relied upon such hospitality to survive as he traveled from village to village. We should note how remarkable this story is for the holistic view of female discipleship that it presents. Martha is fulfilling the traditional cultural role of a woman by serving, but Mary is taking the traditionally male role of learner or student. Both are important.
Rather, Martha’s problem, and our problem too, is how we do those tasks: “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing.”It is the lack of focus, the inability to attend, the resentment, the worry and anxiety that keep her from being present to Jesus and her sister, that are the problem. This story is especially poignant because Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem, where he will be arrested, tried, tortured, and crucified. Mary recognizes how precious these final moments with him are. Jesus invites Martha to attend to “one thing”—communion with God. The “better part” is staying connected to God.
So is communion with God exclusive of getting things done? Should we reserve prayerful attentiveness for people of leisure without young children, perhaps monks or nuns who have nothing else to do but pray all day? Should we give up on it for ourselves in our busy age? According to this text and many others in scripture, the answer is no.
One of the great teachers in the Christian tradition on how to cultivate spiritual attentiveness in the midst of work is a 17th century Parisian monk named Brother Lawrence who did a lot more than sit around and pray. Brother Lawrence spent fifteen years working in the monastery kitchen and then moved to the shoe repair shop. He had many tasks, tasks that he often felt unprepared and incompetent for. But Brother Lawrence had a great insight: work can be just as much a prayerful exercise as sitting quietly in his cell. He taught that we must give ourselves totally to God, both in temporal and spiritual affairs. In so doing, he broke down the distinction between the two. Brother Lawrence said that our sanctification does not depend as much on changing our activities as it does on doing them for God rather than for ourselves. It is written about him, “He was content doing even the smallest chore if he could do it for the love of God.”
What does this look like? How can we cultivate prayerful attentiveness in our lives, doing our work for the love of God? First, it is a matter of perspective. We must see the world in light of God’s active presence and authority. We’re neither alone in the world nor ultimately in charge of it; God is. The universe does not depend upon our producing, managing, consuming, or accomplishing everything perfectly and on time. There is a greater power at work. We have to open our hands and let go of our claims to ultimate authority and responsibility.
Second, it is a matter of relationship. When we recognize, as Mary did, that our very existence depends upon our relationship with God, we see our labors and responsibilities differently. Martha let her work cut her off from Jesus and her sister. However, work can be a way of relating to God and others, of serving and loving. This means being willing to make mistakes because we are loved by a forgiving God. It means not trying to justify ourselves through our performance, but trusting God’s unconditional acceptance of us. It means slowing down and listening along the way.
Brother Lawrence talked about “practicing the presence of God.” “Practice” is a key word. He didn’t say “performing the presence of God.” Like practicing piano, or golf, or parenting, practicing the presence of God involves trial and error, learning as you go. It’s not about getting it right all the time.
Far too many times, I’ve been engrossed in multitasking, trying to clean the house, do the laundry, cook dinner, keep up with my emails, while also being home with my son, Luke. Sometimes, he’ll hold me accountable: Daddy, are you listening to me? Are you really listening? How easily we let ourselves be worried and distracted by our tasks and miss the most precious moments and relationships in our lives.
A study was done at Princeton Theological Seminary in which students were assigned the task of writing a sermon on the parable of the Good Samaritan, which we heard last week. They were sent across campus to get to work, and as they went, they passed by a man bent over and moaning in pain. Do you think they stopped? No, most didn’t. Only those who were not in a rush did so; most just hurried right past. Rather ironic, isn’t it? Needless to say, being worried and distracted keeps us from loving our neighbor.
Today, Jesus invites us to attend to the one thing that is most precious, our relationship with the living God. In that one thing, everything else finds its place, including loving other people in our lives and world. The tasks and worries will all go away one day, but that relationship will not be taken away.
