Don't Just Do Something, Sit There!

In today's evangelical Christian church, there seems to be a high emphasis on ministry, and rightly so. Everyone should be involved in some sort of service to help the local church.

Many have taken on a very "purpose-driven" mindset about ministry, even to the point where a single person may be involved in 5, 6 or even 10 different ministries or more. They always seem to be doing something at the church. They're at this practice, this gathering, this rehearsal or meeting, etc. There's nothing wrong with these things. In fact, they're all very honorable things.

However, what I've noticed is that oftentimes these ministries take up so much time actually doing something that many suffer when it comes to personal time reading and studying the Bible.

Notice that I said reading AND studying. There's a bit of a difference in the two. For instance, I can read my Bible in the morning for a few minutes before I head off to work/school, etc. But, study takes considerably more than just a few minutes. Studying takes time.

But, if we're constantly on the move, where do we find real and substantial time to study? The answer is, we usually don't. By the time we're finished from all of our daily, weekly or monthly duties, we're just too worn out to put real quality time into our studies.

So, instead, we wind up going to church and allowing our pastors to spoon feed all everything we know about the Bible. While pastors are put in place to teach us, if we only learn from him and never on our own, we will never go beyond his level of understanding. We will be subject to what he knows alone.

So, that brings me back to the title of this article. "Don't Just Do Something, Sit There!" You might have had to given that a second glance. Usually the saying is, "Don't just sit there, do something!" Well, some of the problems we face in our Christian walk is because we are always doing something, yet never just sitting and learning from God.

I want to share a story with you from the Bible concerning this issue I'm writing about today. Let's look at the Gospel of Luke, Chapter 10:

38 Now as they were traveling along, He entered a village; and a woman named Martha welcomed Him into her home. 39 She had a sister called Mary, who was seated at the Lord's feet, listening to His word. 40 But Martha was distracted with all her preparations and she came up to Him and said, "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the serving along? Then tell her to help me." 41 But the Lord answered and said to her, "Martha, Martha, you are worried and bothered about so many things; 42 but only one thing is necessary, for Mary has chosen the good part, which shall not be taken away from her."

Here we have Jesus entering into a village, and there He is met by Martha. Martha has a sister named Mary. Martha was so worried about preparing things for Jesus, so cumbered about with ministry (for she was seeking to minister to him), that she missed the most important thing for her to understand. Mary had chosen it, and He said it would not be taken away from her.

What was it that Mary had chosen? Mary chose to sit at the Lord's feet and listen to His word. She chose to be still and learn from Him. That was what was most important.

Dr. John MacArthur says this:

"Jesus was not speaking of the number of dishes to be served. The one thing necessary was exemplified by Mary, i.e., an attitude of worship and meditation, listening with an open mind and heart to Jesus' words."

In order for us to truly understand what it means to minister for Christ, we must first know Christ intimately, through personal worship, prayer and the reading and hearing of His word.

Are you taking real time to sit at the feet of Christ? Are you scheduling yourself enough time to really dig into His Word and know Him more intimately? Or, are you cumbered about with so many things like Martha?

I encourage all who read this to carefully consider your own schedule, and see if your study of His Word is lacking. Knowing God rightly is vitally important to being a faithful servant of Christ.
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