How to Understand GodHow to Understand GodDo you remember the old corporate seal for the RCA Company? You may have seen it on some of their records. It pictures an old phonograph player with a big horn from which the sound emanates. A dog sits in front of the horn listening intently, and below are the words, "His Master's Voice."Listening to the Master’s voice is what Jesus was emphasizing in the gospel lesson today during His visit to the home of Mary and Martha. Mary sat at Jesus feet listening to His Word while Martha was busy with much serving. Listen again to what Jesus said to Martha: "Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things, 42 but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her."
Mary set her heart on Jesus and His teaching. We also have Mary’s need and so we too with one heart set ourselves at Jesus feet to hear the Master teach us. For us that means spending time in God’s word. We share Mary’s need to hear the word of the Lord and for us that means taking time for bible study.
That’s one of the big things that’s on the schedule for those of us going to the NYG. Bible study. We’ve already done three bible studies in preparation for going and when we get there we’ll be going further in depth in God’s word. Like Mary in the story today, we will sit, all 25k of us, at Jesus feet and hear his words and His teachings from scripture.
When Martha confronted Jesus with Mary’s just sitting there listening to Him and not helping her with all the serving, the answer Jesus gave Martha is not what she expected. Martha wanted Jesus to send Mary to help her, but Jesus knew that Mary and Martha both needed more what Jesus was giving by His words than what Martha was preparing with all her running around the house and kitchen. We’ll come back to that in a minute.
But first, note that Jesus, when He does answer Martha, He does so with obvious love. When He repeated Martha’s name it’s like what a parent does when they’re gently correcting their own children. It’s significant that Peter remembered this detail of repeating Martha’s name because it reveals the love that Jesus shows His followers even when the need to correct them arises.
Now, Bible study is also one of the big things for us at Mt. Olive. This fall we’re again going to be starting up our full Sunday school program that’ll be between the two worship services and will include bible enrichment as well as grade school, adult, jr high and high school classes all doing one thing, focusing on the word of God. The bible e-study is also something we offer so that anytime you’re on e-mail you can take some time and sit at Jesus feet like Mary and hear the word of God.
You know that owning a Bible does a person no good unless they read it, study it, and meditate on it. There’re people who never read the Bibles they own. But instead they treat them like a good luck charm, they leave them sit out on a table or bookshelf to look at and hope it somehow sort of rubs off on them. Doing that is treating the bible with superstition. The Bible’s not meant for that, but it must be dug into and have time spent with it for it to produce the fruit that it can in a person’s life.
Owning a farm doesn't make a man a farmer. He’s a farmer only if he cultivates the land and harvests the crops it produces. So too with the bible. What it is that Mary was given at Jesus feet is still there for anyone who will take the time to sit and read scripture. Then, like the farmer who’s rewarded with crops in due season after planting and watering the soil, the one who studies the bible, will also receive the reward of growing in the grace of the Lord.
How sad it is that there are churches today that no longer seriously teach God's Word. Their buildings are full of activity of all kinds, yet the study of God's Word is often not one of them. They’ve gotten sidetracked. They’re like some libraries that were described in the Wall Street Journal a number of years ago.
According to the Journal, one New York library lends out cameras and hedge trimmers, lawn tillers, and a great variety of other tools. Some administrator viewed the library as a lending institution to support his favorite causes- such as green belts and neighborhood improvement, rather than what a library is primarily there for, which is a source of public education. The same thing has happened to many churches. The proclamation of the Good News of Jesus Christ and the study of God's Word is no longer central. Instead, these churches have been reduced to nice community centers.
That will never give anyone the good news that God wants the world to know. Which is, that God loves them. That message, as Jesus was trying to teach it to Mary and Martha today, only comes from taking time with scripture. You don't first have to have an understanding of God to study the Bible, but you do have to study the Bible to have an understanding of God and His love.
By the way, that’s the answer to our sermon title this morning about how to understand God. Understanding God can only come from studying the bible. That promise is for us like it was for Mary. What Mary had chosen, Jesus said, would / not / be / taken / away / from / her. When we do that, when we take the time to focus on Jesus and His word we too receive the reward of that same promise from Jesus. That God’s word will not be taken away from us.
We don’t want to be like those in that New York library and forget what our priority in bible study is. We approach bible study and realize that in that study time Christ Himself comes and meets us to first serve us. He serves us in bible study, we’re not serving Him. And that should also remind us that; we can’t do anything for Christ without first receiving from Christ.
Remember what He said in Matthew 20:28, the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.
Jesus came and served us through His death on the cross and His resurrection from the grave. He continues to serve us by giving us the promise of life everlasting with Him through the Holy Spirit because of what He has first done for us. And that promise He delivers to us by grace through faith alone.
When we forget that Jesus came to first serve us, we end up as Martha and not as Mary. In today's lesson well-meaning Martha permitted, her distraction and worry, to keep her from Jesus. We must place everything in our lives at the disposal of Jesus and His Word. We should allow nothing, not even our service to Him, to separate us from Him.
Let me close with a story a woman told about her husband coming home from bible study one day. She said, “One evening my husband plopped himself down in the chair beside me and told me about the series of questions he had answered in his Bible study for the day.
"Question one asked me to list the values most important to me," he said. "I put my personal relationship with Jesus Christ as number one and with you, my wife, as number two.
The second question asked me to list my free-time activities. I put watching television, house and yard projects, and planning my work."
When I got to question three, it asked me to compare what I had said was most important in my life to what I actually did with my time… and to draw my own conclusions."When he did that," she said, "he realized that the way he was spending his time didn’t add up with what he said was most important to him."
Maybe we could each try asking ourselves those questions sometime this week when we have a few minutes. What are my values? What is on my list of free-time activities? And what happens when I compare those things? Let those questions serve to remind us of how important it is to spend time in God's word and listening to Him. Remember we started out today talking about listening to the Master’s voice.
That’s what we do any time we spend time in scripture, we listen to our Master’s voice. Our Master’s voice gives us comfort and peace in the chaos and worry of this world. The voice of Jesus is the voice we hear in the bible. Let’s each take time this week and, in the scriptures, sit at Jesus feet as Mary did, and receive there from our Master what He wants to give us… New Life through His word.
In His name, Amen.