Sermons to the People 103.1–104.4

The words of our Lord Jesus Christ which have just been recited from the Gospel remind us that there is some one thing toward which we strive while we labor amid the multiplicity of this world. But we strive as those still on pilgrimage, not yet abiding; still on the way, not yet in the homeland; still desiring, not yet enjoying. Yet let us strive, and strive without sloth and without letup, so that one day we may be able to arrive.

Martha and Mary were two sisters, sisters not only in the flesh but also in religion; both clung to the Lord, both served the Lord in harmony when he was present in the flesh. Martha received him as strangers are usually received. But still, the handmaid received the Lord, the sick woman the Savior, the creature the Creator. She received him, she who was to be fed in the Spirit, to feed him in the flesh. For the Lord willed to take the form of a servant, and having taken the form of a servant, to be fed in it by servants, by his condescension, not by his condition. For this too was condescension, to offer himself to be fed. He had flesh in which he could indeed hunger and thirst; but do you not know that when he was hungry in the desert the angels ministered to him? So in his willing to be fed, he did a kindness to the one who fed him. What wonder, then, if he did a kindness to the widow through holy Elijah, whom he had earlier fed by the ministry of a raven? Had he run short of food when he sent him to the widow? Not at all. He had not run short of food when he sent him to the widow; but he was arranging to bless a godly widow through the service shown to his servant. So the Lord was received like a guest, he who “came to his own, and his own did not receive him; but as many as received him, he gave them power to become children of God,” adopting servants and making them brothers, redeeming captives and making them joint heirs. Yet let none of you perhaps say: “O blessed are those who were found worthy to receive Christ into their own house!” Do not grieve, do not grumble because you were born in times when you no longer see the Lord in the flesh: he has not taken this privilege away from you. “When you did it to one of the least of mine,” he says, “you did it to me.” Let these few words suffice for the time about the Lord being fed in the flesh but feeding in the spirit; let us come to the matter I proposed, about unity. Martha, arranging and preparing to feed the Lord, was busy with much serving; Mary her sister chose rather to be fed by the Lord. In a way she abandoned her sister, laboring over much serving, and sat herself at the Lord’s feet and at leisure listened to his word. Her most faithful ear had heard, “Be still, and see that I am the Lord.” The one was troubled, the other was feasting; the one was arranging many things, the other was gazing on one. Both offices are good; but which is better, what shall we say? We have someone to ask; let us listen patiently. Which is better we heard already when it was read; let us hear it again as I recall it. Martha appeals to her guest, lays before the judge a petition of godly complaint, that her sister has abandoned her and neglected to help her laboring so in serving. Mary does not answer, yet is present, and the Lord judges. Mary preferred, as one at leisure, to commit her cause to the judge, and would not labor at answering. For if she were preparing words to answer, she would relax her attention to listening. So the Lord answered, who did not labor in speaking, because he was the Word. What did he say, then? “Martha, Martha.” The repetition of the name is a sign of love, or perhaps of stirring attention: she was called twice so that she might listen more attentively. “Martha, Martha, listen: you are busy about many things, but one thing is needful”: that is, one thing is necessary. Not “one work” as if a single work, but “there is need,” it is expedient, it is necessary: this one thing Mary had chosen.

Think about the one thing, my brothers, and see whether, even in a multitude itself, anything delights except the one. See, by God’s favor, how many you are: who could bear you, unless you were of one mind? Where does this quiet among many come from? Grant the one, and it is a people; take away the one, and it is a crowd. For what is a crowd but a disturbed multitude? But hear the apostle: “But I beseech you, brothers.” He was speaking to a multitude; but he wanted to make all of them one. “But I beseech you, brothers, that you all say the same thing, and that there be no schisms among you; but that you be perfect in the same mind and in the same knowledge.” And in another place: “Of one soul, thinking the one thing, doing nothing out of rivalry or empty glory.” And the Lord to the Father of his own: “That they may be one, as we also are one.” And in the Acts of the Apostles: “The multitude of believers had one soul and one heart.” So “magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together.” For one thing is necessary, that one thing on high, the one where the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are one. See how unity is commended to us. Certainly our God is a Trinity. The Father is not the Son, the Son is not the Father, the Holy Spirit is neither Father nor Son, but the Spirit of both; and yet these three are not three gods, not three almighties, but one God almighty, the Trinity itself one God: because one thing is necessary. To this one thing nothing brings us except that, being many, we have one heart.

Good are services to the poor, and above all the due services and godly attentions to God’s holy servants. For they are paid back, not given, as the apostle says: “If we have sown spiritual things among you, is it a great thing if we reap your material things?” They are good; we urge you to them, and in the Lord’s word we build you up: do not be slow to receive the saints. Sometimes people, not knowing it, by receiving those they did not know, have received angels. These things are good: yet what Mary chose is better. For the one involves busyness out of necessity; the other, sweetness out of love. A man wants to be ready when he serves, and sometimes he cannot: what is lacking is sought, what is at hand is prepared; the mind is stretched in many directions. For if Martha had been equal to those things, she would not have asked her sister’s help. They are many, they are varied, because they are fleshly, because they are temporal: though they are good, they are passing. But what does the Lord say to Martha? “Mary has chosen the better part.” Not you a bad one, but she a better. Hear why better: “which will not be taken from her.” From you the burden of necessity will be taken some day: the sweetness of truth is eternal. What she chose will not be taken from her. It is not taken away; rather it is increased. In this life it is increased, in the other life it will be perfected, it will never be taken away.

But you, Martha, if I may say so with your leave, blessed in your good service, you seek rest as the reward for this labor of yours. Now you are busy with much serving; you want to feed mortal bodies, even if of saints. When you come to that homeland, will you find a stranger to take in as a guest? Will you find someone hungry to break bread for? Someone thirsty to offer drink to? Someone sick to visit? Someone quarreling to reconcile? Someone dead to bury? None of these will be there. But what will be there? What Mary chose: there we shall be fed, not feed others. So what Mary chose here will be full and perfect there: from that rich table, from the word of the Lord, she was gathering crumbs. For do you want to know what will be there? The Lord himself says of his servants: “Amen I say to you, he will make them recline, and will pass by and serve them.” What is it to recline, but to be at leisure? What is it to recline, but to rest? What does “he will pass by and serve them” mean? First he passes, and so serves. But where? In that banquet on high, of which he says: “Amen I say to you, many will come from the east and the west, and will recline with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven.” There the Lord feeds, but first he passes over from here. For, so that you may know, Pascha is interpreted “passing over.” The Lord came, did divine things, suffered human things. Is he still spat upon? Is he still struck? Is he still crowned with thorns? Is he still scourged? Is he still crucified? Is he still wounded by the lance? He has passed over. Indeed the Gospel too speaks so when he kept the Passover with his disciples. What does the Gospel say? “When the hour had come for Jesus to pass from this world to the Father.” So he passed over, so as to feed us: let us follow, so as to be fed.

When the holy Gospel was read, we heard that the Lord was received as a guest by a godly woman, and she was called Martha. And while she was busy with the care of serving, her sister Mary was sitting at the Lord’s feet and listening to his word. The one labored, the other was at leisure; the one gave out, the other was being filled. Yet Martha, laboring much in that busyness and business of serving, appealed to the Lord and complained of her sister, that she was not helping her in her labor. But the Lord answered Martha for Mary; and he himself became her advocate who had been appealed to as judge. “Martha,” he says, “you are busy about many things, when one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken from her.” For we have heard both the appeal of the one appealing and the verdict of the judge; a verdict which answered the one appealing and defended the one taken in. For Mary was intent on the sweetness of the Lord’s word. Martha was intent on how to feed the Lord; Mary intent on how to be fed by the Lord. Martha was preparing a banquet for the Lord, at whose banquet Mary was already delighting. When, then, Mary was listening with delight to the sweetest word and was being fed with the most intent heart, and the Lord was appealed to by her sister, how do we think she feared that the Lord might say to her, “Get up and help your sister”? For she was held by a wonderful sweetness, which is certainly greater for the mind than for the belly. She was excused; she sat on more securely. But how was she excused? Let us attend, look closely, search out what we can, so that we too may be fed.

What then? Do we think Martha’s service was found fault with, whom the care of hospitality had occupied, who had received the Lord himself as a guest? How could she rightly be found fault with, who was rejoicing in so great a guest? If this is true, let people give up what they provide for the needy; let them choose for themselves the better part, which will not be taken from them; let them be at leisure for the word, gape for the sweetness of doctrine, be busy about saving knowledge; let them not care who is a stranger in the street, who lacks bread, who clothing, who needs visiting, who ransoming, who burying: let works of mercy cease; let all press on with knowledge alone. If it is the better part, why do not all do this, since we have the Lord himself as our patron in this cause? For we are not afraid in this matter of offending his justice, since we hold his verdict as our patron.

And yet it is not so; but as the Lord said, so it is. As you understand it, it is not so; but it is so as you ought to understand it. See, take note: “You are busy about many things, when one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the better part.” Not you a bad one, but she a better. But why better? Because you are about many things, she about one. One is set before many. For the one does not come from the many, but the many from the one. Many are the things that were made; one is he who made them. Heaven, earth, sea, and all that is in them, how many they are! Who could count them? Who could think of their multitude? Who made them? God made all things. See, very good. Very good are the things he made: how much better is he who made them? Let us consider, then, our busyness about many things. Service is necessary for those who will refresh bodies. Why this? Because people hunger, because they thirst. Mercy is necessary for the wretched. You break bread for the hungry, because you have found someone hungry: take away hunger, and for whom do you break bread? Take away exile, and to whom do you show hospitality? Take away nakedness, and for whom do you prepare clothing? Let there be no sickness: whom do you visit? Let there be no captivity: whom do you ransom? Let there be no quarrel: whom do you reconcile? Let there be no death: whom do you bury? In that world to come these evils will not exist; so neither will these services. Well, then, Martha, with regard to the Lord’s bodily (what shall I say?) need or will, was serving mortal flesh. But who was in the mortal flesh? “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”: see what Mary was listening to. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us”: see whom Martha was serving. So “Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken from her.” For she chose what will always remain; it will not be taken from her. She wanted to be busy about one thing. She already held: “But for me it is good to cling to God.” She was sitting at the feet of our head. The more humbly she sat, the more she received. For water flows together into the lowliness of the valley; it runs off the swellings of the hill. So the Lord did not find fault with the work, but distinguished the office. “You are busy about many things: but one thing is necessary.” Mary has already chosen this for herself. The labor of multiplicity passes away, and the love of unity remains. So what she chose will not be taken from her. But from you what you chose: certainly this follows, certainly this is understood: from you what you chose will be taken. But it will be taken for your good, so that what is better may be given. For labor will be taken from you, so that rest may be given. You are sailing; she is already in port.

You see, then, dearly beloved, and, as far as I judge, you already understand, in these two women, who were both pleasing to the Lord, both lovable, both disciples: you see, then, and you understand something great (those of you who understand; and you who do not understand ought to hear and know it): that in these two women two lives are figured, the present and the future, the laborious and the restful, the troubled and the blessed, the temporal and the eternal. There are two lives: think about them more fully yourselves. What this life holds (I do not say evil, not wicked, not criminal, not dissolute, not ungodly; but laborious and full of troubles, chastened by fears, anxious with temptations), this innocent life I mean, such as befitted Martha to have: look at this, then, as much as you can; and think about it, as I said, more fully than we speak. But the wicked life was absent from that house; it was neither with Martha nor with Mary; and if it was ever there, it fled when the Lord entered. So there remained in that house which had received the Lord, in two women, two lives, both innocent, both praiseworthy: one laborious, the other at leisure; neither criminal, neither idle. Both innocent, both, I say, praiseworthy; but one laborious, the other at leisure: neither criminal, which the laborious must beware of; neither idle, which the leisured must beware of. So those two lives were in that house, and the very fount of life. In Martha was the image of things present, in Mary of things to come. What Martha was doing, there we are; what Mary was doing, that we hope for. Let us do the one well, so as to have the other fully. For what do we have of it now? How much do we have? While we are here, how much is it that we have of it? For even now we do something of it: removed from business, with household cares put aside, you have come together, you stand, you listen. Insofar as you do this, you are like Mary. And you do more easily what Mary does than I who must give out. Yet if I say anything, it is Christ’s: that is why it feeds you, because it is Christ’s. For the bread is common, from which I too live with you. “But now we live, if you, brothers, stand firm in the Lord.” Not in us, but in the Lord. “For neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the growth.”