PRIDE 4

Luke states very simply that while Martha opened her home, Mary “sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said.” Can you imagine what went through Martha’s mind? It was Martha’s home and she was kind enough to let her sister live there. After all, that is what sisters do, right? How could Mary be so inconsiderate of her guest and her SISTER by ignoring all that remained to be done? But Martha said nothing. If the job was going to be done, she would have to do it.

If you are a parent, if you have ever been an employer or supervisor, or if you have ever had responsibility for another human being, you know the pain Martha felt at that moment. You make decisions and take actions that you feel are in the best interest of all. Do you get cooperation? Are you thanked? Do you gain understanding? Too often those in your care are clueless. It hurts. They owe you better than that.

Pride’s trick is to take a need or a hurt and turn it into self-pity. It stores away the slight for a later time when it can be used as a club against the thankless person. It justifies the use of that club by reminding how hard you worked and how much you sacrificed. After all, you deserve better! Pride knows entitlement but nothing of grace and forgiveness.

Paul writes to the Philippians, “in humility consider others better than yourselves” (Phil 2:3). Martha seems the epitome of this verse. She didn’t say anything to Mary about not helping. She was doing her best to provide Jesus with a good meal. She was simply doing the humble, Christian thing by putting others needs ahead of her own. Luke tells us something unpleasant happened in the process. She became “distracted by all the preparations that had to be made.” Pride pulled a switch. What started as an effort to serve others became an effort to serve food. So much had to be done that the reason for doing it got lost.