Sitting and Serving

Today I saw myself in Martha.

In Gospel of Luke 10, Martha was distracted with much serving.
Mary chose to sit at Jesus’ feet.

Two of my dear friends visited me today.

They are young, like my daughters.  

When my two dear friends came, my first instinct was to serve — to cook, to prepare, to make everything comfortable. I even took a day off to do it. I wanted them fed, safe, cared for.

But as we sat together, our conversation revealed something deeper.

We were not just serving one another — we were carrying burdens.

Worries. Heavy thoughts. Assumptions. Fears.
Some real. Some perhaps only shaped by our own thinking.

And like Martha in Gospel of John 11, when Jesus asked for the stone to be moved, she said, “It will stink.”

Some of what we talked about felt like that.
Stinky. Buried. Hidden too long.

But the tomb had to be opened.

Because what is hidden cannot be healed.

Jesus wept at the tomb.
He saw the grief. The weight. The finality they felt.

And yet — He called Lazarus out.

That is what I need.

To let the stone be rolled away.
To let the hidden thoughts come into the light.
To trust that even if it “stinks,” it is not the end.

Jesus, speak life into the places I have buried.
Call me out of fear, out of defeat, out of old thinking.

I do not want to just serve anxiously.
I want to sit with You.
I want to live.

I am not defeated.
You are still calling me out.