Colossians 1:15-28; Luke 10:38-42
We just enjoyed a great week at Summer Celebration. It had a train theme, which was a lot of fun. In addition to music, crafts, and games, there was worship time. And worship time each day included a skit. The skit featured two characters. The first was a wise and caring train conductor who evinced a deep understanding of the Gospel and who led the children into a richer and fuller understanding of God and Jesus. That part was given to Mother Kathleen. The second character was a bumbling and somewhat dim-witted train engineer who didn’t have the foggiest idea of what Jesus is all about and who needed lots of help to understand it. That part was assigned to me. A parishioner I used to like told me I was perfect for it. Well, in one of the skits the bumbling engineer is afraid, so the wise conductor leads him in a guided meditation, telling him to close his eyes and go to his happy place, which for him was driving a train. And doing so helps him relax and feel less afraid.
The skit was ultimately about Jesus giving us hope, but the notion of a happy place has stayed with me throughout the week. That idea, of course, is very common: there are many references to “finding our happy place” in popular culture. That place could be a beloved beach house, a comfortable recliner, a cottage in the mountains, a favorite restaurant, Scott Stadium, any place. And it doesn’t necessarily have to be an actual place: it could be an imaginary location, a scene we dream up. I don’t know what your happy place is: I imagine there would be many different places represented here. But I’m guessing they would all have one thing in common: it’s a place where we are not worried and distracted. So maybe that would rule out Scott Stadium, but pretty much any place could be our happy place if it helps us to feel peaceful and calm.
Which is exactly how Martha does not feel in our Gospel today. She is worried and distracted by many things. There is a sense here that too much is going on, that Martha is having to deal with too many chores and obligations, leaving her very anxious and distracted. The Greek word used there, merimnas, literally means divided and distributed. Martha is scattered: her being is going in too many different directions. And I for one can relate to her situation: when I have to handle too many things at once, I can feel really scattered which makes me terribly anxious. And I don’t think I’m alone in that. To be alive, especially right now, can be difficult because we are dealing with so many challenges at once, as individuals, as families, as a parish, as a nation, as a world. It is all too easy to feel worried and distracted. In fact, I know pastorally that some people would say that “worried and distracted” is their default setting, the place they most often find themselves.
But in our Gospel, Mary is not worried and distracted. We could say that she has found her happy place in Jesus. And if we try to criticize her for not doing enough, like Martha does, that just amounts to our worried and distracted selves saying that she should feel worried and distracted as well. But she shouldn’t: none of us should. Jesus is right: Mary has chosen the better part, the better way. The issue here is not whether she or we should work and be busy: we will, all of us, inevitably work and be busy, because that’s the way life is. The great question is how we will work and be busy. And our happiness depends on how we answer that question.
And before I say anything else, let me remind you that Jesus did not come to make us religious: he came to make us happy, to show us the way that leads to life, love, and joy. And being worried and distracted does not make us happy: it usually makes us miserable. The good news is that the unshakable center of our being is the infinite and unconditional love of God which Jesus incarnates. When we are connected to that center then we are connected to what is truly our happy place and can thus much more easily experience and share love, joy, peace, and happiness — which is what God our Creator wants for us. When we are centered in God’s love, when we are centered in Christ, then no matter how busy we are, everything falls into place. As Paul says in Colossians today, in him all things hold together.
I know experientially how true this is. In my good moments, on my good days, when I am consciously living out of my Christ center, I can go from Summer Celebration skits to emails to the hospital to Bible study to meetings to cooking dinner to walking the dog to Face Timing with my children without feeling worried and distracted but instead feeling calm, present, and at peace. When that happens, I am happier and find it much easier to love. When I am out of touch with my Christ center, when I feel disconnected from God’s love, then everything feels overwhelming and I feel scattered and unhappy, and it’s much harder to love others or myself. And I share that because I don’t think I’m special or unique. This is just the human condition.
So – how do we live out of that center? How do we stay connected to that ultimate happy place, which is Christ within us? There is no cookie-cutter answer to that because we all have different personalities and deal with different circumstances. But the one thing we all have in common is the power of choice. We all have tremendous power to shape our lives because we all have the power to choose. We will stay centered in Christ if we choose to. Christ is always present, God’s love is always within us: we just need to choose things that keep us connected to Christ and God’s love: we can choose to take time for prayer, we can choose to go for a quiet walk, we can choose to come to worship, we can choose to do spiritual reading, we can choose to do anything that helps us stay grounded in God’s love. What works for me may not work for you, but it doesn’t have to. The best choices for us are the choices that keep us close to God, which means choices that make us less worried and distracted, choices that make us happier and more at peace. If you want to be centered in Christ and know the happiness which comes from that, think about the choices you are making. In the Gospel Jesus tells us that Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her. All of us can do the same.
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