Martha's Meditation

I’m in the kitchen

It has been a normal sort-of day

Now drawing to a close

Highs and Lows

Things achieved and

Things left undone.

I can hear the sheep on the hillside

The smells of supper cooking

Greetings in doorways as workers come home

Then I hear Galilean accents

Familiar strangers

The sound of footsteps on the path

Jesus is here     -     unexpected

-          uninvited

-          what a surprise

-          with all his disciples!

Jesus is here     -     our honoured guest

-          our dearest friend

-          our wise teacher

-          our window into heaven.

There is so much to do

– bread to bake

-          meat to cook

-     shopping to collect          

There is so much to do

-     emails to respond to                 

-          presents to buy

-     lawns to mow   and what about the washing?

The busyness is like a tired cliché

I’m irritated by those who tell me to stop

I’ll stop when the work is done

I just need to write a list

Work as hard as I can

Keep going as long as I can

Then I will get to the end of my list.

But why do I have do all the work?

Someone could help me.

Someone should help me.

What about Mary?

                                    - she hasn’t helped me

                                    - she is sitting with the men

                                    - she is having a good time

                                    - I want to be where she is.

What about Mary?

                                    - Jesus is talking to her.

                                    - He smiles at her

                                    - He listens to her

                                    - Does he love her more than me?

Lord, don’t you care?

Don’t you care that my sister has left me

to do all the work by myself?

Tell her to come and help me!”

Years of pain and jealously flow out

Like hot tears on my face.

Insecurity and unworthiness

Bubble up unexpectedly.

Even to my ears

I hear childish self-pity.

Jesus is listening to me:

 “Martha, Martha!

You are worried and troubled over so many things,

Jesus is talking to me:

just one thing is needed.

Mary has chosen the right thing,

and it will not be taken away from her.

Jesus is smiling at me and

beckons me to sit next to him

Mary has chosen

And I can choose too

I sit down next to Jesus

And he puts his arm around me.

Jesus carries on talking to his friends

I am just enjoying being still with him.

As I sit there the clamour of my pain fades

The clatter of my self-pity disappears

The noise of my list of jobs grows silent

Lord help me to choose the right thing.

Julian of Norwich

I was at a meeting where Bishop John reminded us of this meditation by Julian of Norwich:

"In this vision he showed me a little thing, the size of a hazelnut, and it was round as a ball. I looked at it with the eye of my understanding and thought "What may this be?" And it was generally answered thus: "It is all that is made." I marvelled how it might last, for it seemed it might suddenly have sunk into nothing because of its littleness. And I was answered in my understanding: "It lasts and ever shall, because God loves it."

Meditiation on Mary

There were safer places;

more comfortable places;

palaces and wealthy places.

Yet you chose a daughter of the soil

who would have otherwise

lived a good and honest life;

grown and harvested crops,

cooked and washed and cared for others

and been forgotten,

to be your temporary home;

to be exalted for all time.

"My soul glorifies the Lord

and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,

for he has been mindful

of the humble state of his servant.

From now on all generations will call me blessed."

When does an ordinary life

become extraordinary?

A mundane day

become revolutionary?

A moment in time

change history?

When God enters in,

forgives sin,

allows us to

begin again.

When we repeat

those words of Mary:

"May it be to me

as you say." 

From today's I-Church Advent Calendar