Encounter Jesus : Rest Revealed

Pastor Burcham’s Sermon

Sunday, March 25, 2007

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

In 1983, Time magazine declared that stress was the epidemic of the 80's. If that was true back then, then what does that say about us today? In the two decades that follow, we have added cell phones, pagers, 24-hour news, and self-managed retirement funds. Shopping choices for us have exploded. What I mean by that is, a couple of weeks ago, I went to the grocery store just to buy some apples. That’s all I wanted was an apple. So I went to the grocery store thinking, “Well, do I want a Granny Smith or a Red Delicious?” It’s not that easy anymore. I went looking. There must have been a dozen different apples in front of me, one called a Grapple. That’s an apple that tastes like a grape. Why wouldn’t you just eat a grape? I stood there for 10 minutes trying to decide what apple I was going to buy. My point is even the simplest decision in our world today has become complex. We’re bombarded by information 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. If the epidemic of the 80's was stress, what does that say about us in 2007? Where would our level of stress be with all the demands that are put upon us?

And yet, then I read a story like the one about Mary and Martha and I realize that stress has been around for a very, very long time. Take one look at Martha. You see one stressed out lady, that is, until she encounters Jesus. When she encounters Jesus, she encounters rest and she gets some relief from the stress and the worries and the anxieties in her life.

Once again, this morning, I want you to encounter Jesus and I want you to encounter some rest in your life, the rest that He wants for you, the relief from all the pressures, all the demands and the anxiety, the stress maybe you’re feeling right now. When we encounter Jesus, we encounter reality, though, and Martha had to encounter the reality of her priorities. Let’s just take a snapshot of Martha if you will and do justice to her. I mean, this has to be the biggest dinner party she has ever thrown in her entire life, maybe not number-wise but certainly as far as the prestige of the guests that will be in her home. I mean, after all, how often does the Son of God come over for dinner? This isn’t just some great teacher and His disciples who are showing up. Certainly, He was that. People were calling Him the Messiah, possibly the long-awaited Christ. But Mary and Martha, we know from the Gospel of John, believed Jesus to be the Son of God. So how do you prepare dinner for the Son of God to come into your home? You have to believe her house was cleaned two, three, four times, one end upside, down the other. There was not a dust bunny to be found in this lady’s home. Plus all the preparations. The best and finest ingredients for the meal she could scrape together from her income. The best pottery was going to be out to make sure everything is well. And then the big day comes. Jesus and His disciples arrive. She does all the niceties, greets them at the door, makes sure somebody has a cup of water for them, their feet are washed. Everyone’s in place. Now she goes back into the kitchen. Pressure cooker time. Now I don’t cook, thankfully, but as I pass by the kitchen when there’s a big meal going on, the one thing I’ve observed is everything is ready all at once. Cooks, am I right? Everything is done all at once, the main dish, the side dishes, stuff that’s in the oven, it all comes together at one time. This is Martha. She’s in the kitchen. She wants everything to be perfect and everything is going to be done at the same time. She says to herself, “I wonder where Mary is, that sister of mine. She must be around here somewhere.”

At any rate, she has to get things done. She is moving so fast in the kitchen, NASCAR fans are outside the window watching. That’s how this lady is going. She’s just 90 miles a minute. And she says, “Mary’s going to be here.” Ten minutes later, no Mary. Fifteen minutes later, no Mary. Twenty minutes later, no Mary. Oh, now her mind is really reeling. Everything is going to be ruined. Nothing is going to be right. This is going to be burned. That’s not going to be cooked. The table’s not set. The silverware is not out. It starts going through her mind 90 miles an hour. Everything is going to be just a disaster, what she was hoping to be the best dinner party she’s ever given in her entire life. And finally the dam burst. She comes rushing into the next room. She’s no longer concerned about dinner, Folks. She’s no longer concerned about how clean the house is. She’s no longer concerned about her guests. All she’s concerned about is she’s doing all the work by herself and meanwhile, her sister is sitting on her duff in the other room. And so she proceeds to come in and tell Jesus, the Son of God, exactly what He needs to do. She looks at Him and says, “Will you tell her to get in the kitchen and help me? I have a lot of things going on out here.” She does not get the reaction from Jesus and Mary she was hoping for.

I would guess she was anticipating Mary to look sheepishly and apologize, Jesus to say something along the lines of, “Oh, I’m sorry. I was keeping her. We just got engaged in conversation.” And then for Mary to quietly get up and go to the kitchen and get just as busy as can be. Instead, she gets a gentle reproach from Jesus. Jesus says, “Martha, Martha.” By repeating her name, it’s a gentle reproach. “Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things. But only one thing is necessary.” Martha is stressed out. You see, Jesus’ words have more of a punch to them than maybe we quite get just reading it through one time. Okay, she’s worried. She’s upset. No, no, no, no, no. The words Jesus chose there have a little bit more punch than that. “You’re distracted. You’re being pulled away. You’re going off sideways here. You’re worried and upset about many things.” Jesus used the same words when he was teaching His disciples about worry and stress. It’s two chapters later in Luke and it’s also in Matthew. It says, “Then Jesus said to His disciples, ‘Therefore, I tell you do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear. Life is more than food and the body is more than clothes.’” Jesus is saying don’t worry. We’re not supposed to be consumed by anxiety. We’re not supposed to be consumed by stress and worry about the things in this world. “There are more important things than the dinner, Martha.” And then He really drops the bomb on her when He says, “Mary has chosen what is better and it will not be taken away from her.” “What? Mary has chosen what’s better? To sit on her duff while I’m working my butt off in the other room and it won’t be taken away from her?”

Jesus is saying when the Son of God comes over for dinner, you honor Him more with your attention than the meal you serve. When you’re in the presence of Jesus, you honor Him more by giving Him your full attention, sitting at His feet, and hearing what He has to say. Martha has her priorities mixed up. Now let’s understand. She’s going to be wanting every detail to be right about dinner. She wants to be a good hostess. She wants to make sure her guests are taken care of. All of that is fine and good and right. But in the process of that, she has focused in and drilled down so much on just the preparation, on just the dinner, on being the hostess she wants to be, in the process, her stress rate has just skyrocketed and the only thing she’s concerned about is making sure the dinner is right and she’s not really concerned about the fact that the Son of God is sitting in the next room.

You see, whenever we take our focus off of God and focus it on something in this world, that equals stress. Whenever God is not the number one thing in our life, whenever He’s not at the focal point of our life and we start focusing in on the things of this world, whether it’s dinner, whether it’s jobs, whether it’s clothes, whatever it is that has to do with this world instead of the next world, that always equals stress.

Martha had to come to the reality of the fact that her priorities were messed up. And Jesus says, “Martha, Martha.” I can’t tell you how many times I could swear I’ve heard Jesus say, “Ron, Ron. You are worried and upset about many things but only one thing is necessary.” Have you heard Him? Has He called out your name and just said, “Tom, Tom. You’re worried and upset about many things but only one thing is necessary.” In the world we live in, stress, anxiety, worry can consume us. I mean, we’re talking 1 st Century A.D. and Martha is stressed to the max. What does that say about us? What does that say about where our stress level is? We’re bombarded with information 24 hours a day. There are demands put on every age group in our society, unreasonable demands if you will.

Take for a moment and consider our young people and consider the amount of pressure that’s put on our young people. How much pressure is put on them to perform in school? Because we as parents say, “You have to get good grades because if you get good grades, your GPA is going to be higher and if your GPA is higher, then you’re going to get into college and if you get into college, you’re going to need scholarships to pay for college and you have to go to college so you can get the career you want so you can do what you want so you can make a living and you can take care of yourself, so it all comes down to what is that grade you got on that last test? How did you do on that last piece of homework? It comes down to the end of the semester, what’s that GPA saying? That means our young people are living from test to test, homework to homework assignment, quarter to quarter, semester to semester and it all comes down to a three-digit number. Did I get a 3.50? Did I get a 4.0? What is it I got? Students deal with it one of two ways. I’ve noticed they either push themselves into utter exhaustion or they give up without even trying. But they still feel the stress and the pressure and that says nothing of the social pressure of dealing with all of their friends and dealing with all of the decisions they have to make that, frankly, I didn’t have to make in Junior and Senior High and I’m guessing any of you at my age or older, didn’t have to make those kinds of decisions either. The stress level of our young people is unprecedented today.

And what about the rest of us? Those of you who are trying to scratch out a living. You’re still in the work force. What’s happened today? There’s no security anymore. It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been with a company. You could be there ten years, twenty years, thirty years. All it takes is a small dip in the market, profit goes down just a little bit and all of a sudden, we’re resizing, you’re out, sorry. No explanation. No real talking about it. It’s just one day you come to work and they escort you out the door and you’re gone.

Or maybe you’re trying to build a career. You want to take care of your family but in the process of taking care of your family, you’re never around for your family. And the times you are at home, you’re there bodily but you’re not there in mind because you’re thinking about work. The cell phone, the pager, the laptop, it’s only an arm length’s away because the pressure is on. You have to perform. If you’re going to move up, if you’re going to make more money, then you have to just keep pushing and pushing and pushing.

How about taking care of your family? What parent doesn’t want to be the Parent of the Year each and every year. We want to make sure our kids are wanting for nothing. We want to make sure every opportunity is out there for them. We want to make sure they are involved in all of the activities, sometimes activities they don’t want to be involved in. We drive across town. We drive across state lines to get them where they need to be. It’s constant. It never ends and pretty soon, we’re going to hit the wall and reality will strike. Stress will take its toll on each and every one of us.

A recent poll said that 70% or more of doctor visits can be traced back to stress, somehow related to stress. The National Sleep Institute did a survey and the respondents of that, 51% of them, said they had trouble sleeping because of stress in their life. Now first of all, I don’t know if anyone else was upset about the fact that we even have to have a National Sleep Institute. What does that say about our society? Stress is at an all-time high. And I don’t know about you but I hear Jesus saying, “Ron, Ron. You are worried and upset about many things but only one thing is necessary.”

The one thing that is necessary is God’s grace. It’s God’s undeserved love for us, for when we encounter God’s grace and His love, we also encounter God’s rest. We encounter God’s relief for us. Mary discovered that and she sat at the feet of Jesus. I’d like to believe Martha discovered that after she had a bout with reality of her priorities. I’d like for us to discover that, at least in part, this morning.

As I look at the story of Mary and Martha, there are three things I think we can pull out that God offers to us for us to find His rest, to stop and get off the wheel of the stress, anxiety, and pressure that’s on us. The first thing is to slow down. Isn’t it really what Jesus said to Martha? I can almost imagine Him saying, “Martha, listen. Dinner can be ten minutes late. It’s okay. And if it’s a little bit overdone, I won’t mind. Why don’t you sit down for a moment and let’s just have some one-on-one time, just you and me. Just slow down.”

Probably the greatest lesson I learned, I don’t know if I can really say I learned it, but it was really brought to the forefront of my mind when I was in Uganda in January is, man, do I live by my watch and by my schedule and, boy, do they not. They just don’t. You know, before we went, Steve Kohtz, our Director of Worship, put together this lovely schedule for our conference there. It listed the starting time, when we were going to have a break, when we were going to stop for lunch, when we come back from lunch, and we’d end at the end of the day. We could have saved a lot of effort and a considerable amount of paper because we didn’t follow it. I can’t think of one day that we started on time or one day we ended on time. The sessions I was leading, I remember distinctly it was the last day, and everyone had to leave by 3:30 or so I was told. And so it got to be noon and I said, “Well, let’s break for lunch but be back here at 1:00 because there’s a certain amount of material I’d really like to share with you before you have to leave at 3:30.” Okay. At 1:15, I was in the tent by myself. At 1:30, Steve Kohtz was talking to me in the tent and we were the only ones there. At 1:45, I mentioned to one of the leaders, “Do you think we should get going?” “Oh, yeah, I’ll get them together.” About 2:15, most of them were there. Some came straggling in even at 2:30. Now they weren’t being rude, okay? They weren’t being disrespectful. They don’t live by their watch. They don’t live by a schedule. Relationships are number one for them. And if somebody stopped and wanted to talk to them, I will stop and talk to you and spend as much time as necessary. If they wanted at the end of the night to sing another song, if they wanted to spend some more time in prayer, who cares whether we end on time. Let’s just keep on going. Their relationships with one another and their relationship with God were more important than anything else. Their life is lived much, much slower than our lives.

What can you eliminate in your schedule to slow down? Don’t try to convince me there’s nothing you can eliminate. You may not want to eliminate it. Okay, there are things I don’t want to eliminate but there are things I can eliminate. How can we learn to slow down and take life at a little bit slower pace? You know, remember life is a marathon, not a sprint. You can only sprint for so long and then you fall down. Slow down.

The second thing I can see from Mary and Martha is we have to make time for Jesus. When we slow down, part of our new schedule is we spend each day just in His presence listening to what He has to say to us. Jesus, in the Book of Matthew, when He’s talking about worry and stress and all of that, He said these words, “Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well.” He’s talking about being worried about food and clothing and housing and all the rest. He says, “Seek first His kingdom, His righteousness.” First, seek out God and then everything else will fall into place for you.

There’s a really interesting story about a man who comes into our sanctuary Monday through Friday for about 15 minutes. He rides the MTA bus and I think the first time he came in here, he just wanted to use the restroom. The second time he came in, he said, “Do you mind if I sit in the sanctuary.” “Of course, I don’t care. Go ahead. Sit in the sanctuary.” Well, pretty soon we noticed every day he gets off the bus, he walks over, he comes in the sanctuary. He stays for about 15 minutes and then he leaves. I believe it was Pastor Meyer who struck up a conversation with him and what we discovered is he said, “Well, I came in here one day and I just needed to spend some time praying. But now I come in every day. I get off the bus and before I walk to work, I come in here and I spend 15 minutes praying and just listening to what God has to say.” He says, “You cannot believe the difference it’s made in my life. I don’t get upset at work like I used to. I don’t feel the stress I had before. My day takes on just a whole different attitude, atmosphere. Even the people around me have noticed.” He’s making time for Jesus, making time just to be in the presence of God, talking to Him and listening to what God has to say to Him.

How can you make time? Is it when you get up in the morning? Is it at lunch time? You don’t have to be here in the sanctuary. Is it at the kitchen table? Is it at your desk? Is it at your night stand before we go to bed at night? How do you make time for Him and just sit at His feet and hear what He has to say?

Along with that is the third thing. And the third thing is to share with God your burdens, your anxieties, things that are happening in your life. In one sense, isn’t that what Martha did? I mean, maybe inappropriately storming into the room, but wasn’t she sharing with Jesus what was going on? “I’m out here doing all this work by myself. I’m stressed to the max, Jesus. Why don’t you do something about it?” Well, Jesus didn’t give her the answer she wanted but He gave her the answer she needed.

Often times, that’s what’s going to happen with us. Jesus will not tell us what we want to hear but He’ll tell us what we need to hear. And it’s taking time to just share our burdens with Him, to sort of not try to carry the load ourselves. There are countless examples of scripture of God telling us to do that. There’s Jesus Himself, you probably know this passage, “Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest.” St. Paul when he writes to the church at Philippi, he tells them, “Do not be anxious about anything but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.” Even St. Peter in his first letter said this, “Cast all your anxiety on Him,” because He cares for you. We don’t have to carry the load alone. We don’t have to have all of these anxious thoughts and all of these worries. But when we come to God in prayer and we say, “God, you know, I know I’m not supposed to worry about this but I am worrying about this and I’m just stressed out about this.” You’d be amazed just by sharing that with Him, verbally expressing it in prayer, how much the weight is just lifted off of you.

Remember when Isaiah says, “God doesn’t grow weary.” He doesn’t grow tired. He’ll pick you up on the wings of an eagle and He’ll carry you through your day, through your week, through your month. Share your burdens, your cares, your concerns with Him because He cares for you. He cares about you and He cares about your life. You see, we have a God who is just as much concerned about our life in this world as securing a place for you in the next world. To be sure, Jesus is concerned about your eternity and spending that with Him but He’s also concerned about Monday morning and about Tuesday afternoon and about Thursday evening. He’s concerned about every aspect of our life and we have the privilege to come to Him and to share with Him our burdens, our concerns, and our worries and I guarantee you He will lift the load. He will walk with you on that.

This is the rest God wants for us and we need it. I need it. We live in a world that just keeps putting more and more demands upon us, that just keeps bombarding us from every angle, information overload, pressures, demands, stress everywhere. If it was the epidemic of the 80's, I don’t know what you would call it today. We need to encounter Jesus, encounter the reality of our priorities and maybe we need to shift them. But then encounter His grace. That’s where you find His rest. That’s where you find relief. That’s when you make time for Him and you slow down and you share your concerns with Him.

ncounter Jesus. Encounter His rest. Amen

Copyright 2007 Gloria Dei Lutheran Church