Pentecost is the longest season in the church year. Pentecost means “ordinary time”—it’s the long period between Easter and Advent. I sometimes find it to be “more than ordinary time” primarily because each week brings a few more verses from the gospel lesson which—not all the time—but often times makes it difficult to engender enthusiasm for preaching.
At first blush, today’s gospel lesson is a good example. Mary and Martha—the two sisters—one who does all the work, the other who sits at Jesus’ feet. And Martha isn’t too happy about it. What are we supposed to get from this lesson? I began to think about issues of justice and fairness and goodness in the world—which may appear to be a stretch from Martha to this topic, but it is the long season of Pentecost, after all. So, how do we really understand God when these issues are ignored or not a part of our daily lives?
Many of us begin to wonder how we are to view ourselves and our place in the world—and how we view God and God’s role in our lives.
