Well folks, here it is!! What we’ve all been waiting for!!! The application to the story. But I must admit…it was very hard to know what to write as there is just soooo much to learn from this story. So I decided to pick one thing from each section that really spoke to me.
So let’s do a quick recap before we keep going…
So first we saw what happened. We read the story. Then we looked at her good and bad qualities. And after looking at those, we dug a little deeper and found out what may of been some of her emotions.
So now for the application!!!! Let’s go through each section and see what we can learn from each one!
Bad qualities: I think something that is so easy for me to do, as it was for Martha to do, is to get distracted!! I get distracted from the goal. My goal is to honour and glorify my king, yet I get distracted and try to hour and glorify Mary instead of Jesus!!! Mary is my biggest distraction!! I want to please Mary! I want to make sure she is feeling comfortable and happy with me!!! I become so caught up with Mary instead of Christ! Oh may we all remember who it is in control, and who it is that we should have out eyes fixed on!!!
Good Qualities: I think one of the big things I learnt from her good qualities was her servants heart. I learnt a few things here. She let her servants heart take her focus of Christ. Oh it’s so easy for me to do this. I get so caught up serving others! I end up trying to impress others. Yet that’s not the goal. I need to glorify God in everything I do! Don’t let your gift move your focus, dear friend! Focus on glorifying God through your talent. Give him all the glory and honour. Colossians 3:17 But then I also admire her servants heart. She wasn’t afraid of taking on the big task of serving the most amazing person she’d ever met. Like seriously!!! I wouldn’t have let Jesus come to my home. I would’ve thought up a thousand excuses as to why he couldn’t come. But she didn’t. Not once is it mentioned that she put up a fuss about Jesus coming to stay. She willingly had him. May we all learn from this extremely hospitable lady!
Emotions: hmm…this was a hard one as each one of those feelings I’m very prone to. But I think probably what spoke to me the most was how she felt overwhelmed. This is a very real feeling. I often feel very overwhelmed. And funny enough, sometimes the very talent you are given overwhelms you. Like we see with Martha, she got very overwhelmed in her job of serving. Whether it be in my gifts, life, or work, I get very overwhelmed very easily. And I find that when I get overwhelmed, then I react the same way as Martha. Resentment, self pity, and loneliness quickly set in! But how do you avoid being overwhelmed? Well, partly that’s my fault. I let so much happen to me that it is very overwhelming just to hear what I’m doing each day. But I think the key to keeping yourself stay in check when you start feeling overwhelmed is staying your mind on Christ. Feeling overwhelmed is sometimes something that you can’t avoid. But there is a way to handle it. And that’s by keeping your eyes on Christ. He is the author of our life!!! We can trust in him all the time. He is very trustworthy. So next time you start feeling overwhelmed…look to Christ. He will take what seems like the biggest problem ever, and he will turn it into something good.
But that’s only a touch of what we can learn from Martha. It’s such a wonderful story with so many bits a pieces that’s it’s hard to compile into a few phrases. I also love good challenging questions. So here’s a few to chew on:
What in your life is similar to Martha, and how can you change it?
Where Are your eyes fixed and what is your goal?
Who are you glorifying right now with what you are doing?
