Deep Inside Your Armor

(a Steve Orr Bible reflection)

In a story I’ve considered writing, the three Bethany siblings are the children of well-off olive oil merchants. Lazarus is the prodigal son. Mary is the woman caught in adultery and the sinful woman who anoints the feet of Jesus. Both Lazarus and Mary, at some point in the story, are restored and saved by Jesus. 

But what about Martha?

In my story, Martha is the good one, the responsible one. Martha remains true to her family’s beliefs. She stays and keeps the home, nurses her parents in their old age. Martha watches her siblings waste their inheritance and their lives. After her parents’ deaths, Martha becomes the family matriarch.

That is the Martha we encounter in this week’s Luke passage. She’s the one who stayed, the one who held it all together, the one who was, as Jesus described her, “worried and distracted by many things.” 

It is not, and never was: Mary good, Martha bad. His words were not an indictment of Martha, nor of her desire to maintain order and decorum in her home. Jesus knows the depths of the people He encounters. When He spoke those words to Martha in real life, He knew she, like Mary, needed to be sitting in His presence. 

Martha needed Jesus just as much as her siblings—just not for the same reasons. Martha needed to hear those words from Jesus. They were for her. He was issuing her an invitation. 

It’s the same one He offers us: You can set down your heavy load of excessive worries and numerous distractions. You are safe with Jesus. You can take the risk of allowing Him to gently remove your armor. You can rest in Him. 

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BONUS MATERIAL 

Pause and listen to Twila Paris sing about the armor we wear: “The Warrior Is a Child” (with lyrics on the screen)