Mary & Martha

We started our Christmas series at FRC-Lima on Sunday, called www.TheGiftRevolution.com. It's a big series and it's a big vision that we have to change the world in 25 days, by committing random acts of kindness for strangers and having them pay it forward, and yesterday was the kick-off in Lima, Peru.

Yesterday reminded me a little bit of an Opening Night on Broadway. We arrived at the cinema at 7:00 AM, loaded with lots of extra stage decorations, including gift-wrapped boxes, Christmas trees, Christmas lights, brightly-colored stars and peace signs, among others, and we raced around for two hours to get everything set up, plus have a special time of prayer and Communion with our leaders, plus do a final music practice, plus check and re-check all of the audio and video, etc., etc., etc. The time flew by, almost too fast.

Frankly, there were moments when it got very hectic, as we raced against the clock to have everything ready before we opened the doors for the first service, and of course we were fighting against last-minute snafus and technical difficulties. I could feel frustration creeping into my bones as the time got short and the hour grew late.

At that same moment, all of a sudden I heard the names of two people being whispered into my soul: "Mary and Martha."

And then I got a nudge from the Holy Spirit: "Be like Mary, not like Martha."

You're probably familiar with the story of Mary and Martha in Luke 10:38-42. They were two sisters who were hosting Jesus at their home in Bethany one day. Martha spent all of her time involved in the preparations for Jesus' visit, while Mary sat at his feet and listened to everything that he said. Martha got mad, and told Jesus to tell Mary to lend a hand in the kitchen. Jesus told Martha that Mary had it right, and that Mary had chosen to do what was better.

I was more Martha than Mary yesterday.

It's very easy to get that way in ministry.

Everyone reading this blog post wants to excel in service and execution, but the risk that we run as ministers is that we fall into the trap of focusing solely on execution, and not at all on worship and adoration. That's the trap that we were falling into yesterday.

Obviously our adoration for Jesus Christ should lead us all to serve Him and to serve this world - that's a large part of what our Christmas series is all about - but we also must make sure that such service and execution is properly balanced, and should never be done at the expense of worship and adoration. It's easy to get distracted by total preparation and execution, and we have to guard against allowing our God-honoring priorities to get out of whack. We can never forget that, even as ministry leaders, we must never miss the opportunity to just sit at Jesus' feet and listen to his words for us.

Be more like Mary. Be less like Martha.