20 July, 2025, 16th Sunday, YR C: Genesis 18:1-10a; Colossians 1:24-28; Luke 10:38-42
The women in today’s Gospel have often been interpreted symbolically but let’s consider them as two sisters receiving a beloved guest.
Is there an element of camaraderie and joking in this dialogue? After all, isn’t this an intimate scene of friends enjoying each other’s company? And isn’t Martha’s remark about Mary’s inactivity more familiar than formal? And if Martha is serving, this is not a well-to-do household with servants or slaves to do the work. That probability is supported by Mary sitting at Jesus’ feet: he may be sitting on the only seat in the house, everyone else settling themselves on mats or cushions. And might Mary be sitting because she suffers some infirmity? Couldn’t that expose Martha’s “complaint” about her as an ongoing joke?
Note that Jesus never asks Martha to stop serving! She’s providing loving hospitality. Perhaps, Jesus’ reply inspired Martha to be more present to her guest and his place in the family than to the details of serving. Perhaps Mary then did what she could from where she sat.
Might the point of this vignette be the intimacy between all three of them? That Martha could speak so freely, that Mary could be so present to Jesus and that Jesus could bind them all together, doesn’t that describe a beautiful, mutual rapport and the positive role an outsider can play in a family?
We have no evidence of what Jesus had been telling Mary. Aren’t there significant conversations when the mutual “meeting,” the connection itself is more important than the words or the ideas exchanged? Don’t you and I treasure such experiences?
Let us recognize the communion between these three people, communion in the person of Jesus Christ.
And isn’t that why we are here this morning?