♪ President down to reign ♪ ♪ Behold our God ♪ ♪ Seated on His throne ♪ ♪ Come let us adore Him ♪ ♪ Behold our King ♪ ♪ Nothing can compare ♪ ♪ Come let us adore Him ♪ ♪ You will reign forever ♪ ♪ Let your glory fill the earth ♪ - Back to chorus and then just vocals.

All right, let's try "Abide." Sorry, second time, we're just gonna go to verse three with a dial and then build on the third line. - Thank you, G. - Go one, two, three, four. ♪ Pass through death ♪ ♪ As I enter rest ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ Eternal life ♪ ♪ To be raised with Christ ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ You're the way, the truth and the life ♪ ♪ You're the will that never runs dry ♪ ♪ I'm the flesh and you are the blood ♪ ♪ Draw me close and teach me to abide ♪ ♪ Be my strength, my song in the night ♪ ♪ Be my own God ♪ - Sounds very good.

That's all we have? All right, let's go to the corner and let's pray together. (congregation applauding) ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ Eternal life ♪ ♪ To be raised with Christ ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ You're the way, the truth and the life ♪ ♪ You're the will that never runs dry ♪ ♪ I'm the flesh and you are the blood ♪ ♪ Draw me close and teach me to abide ♪ ♪ Be my strength, my song in the night ♪ (gentle piano music) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) (gentle piano music continues) - Good morning, church family.

Happy Lord's Day. We will now begin our service. (gentle piano music) ♪ Speak, O Lord ♪ ♪ As we come to you ♪ ♪ To receive the food ♪ ♪ Of your holy word ♪ ♪ Take your truth ♪ ♪ Plant it deep in us ♪ ♪ Shape and fashion us ♪ ♪ In your likeness ♪ ♪ That the light of Christ ♪ ♪ Might be seen today ♪ ♪ In our acts of love ♪ ♪ And our deeds of faith ♪ ♪ Speak, O Lord ♪ ♪ And fulfill in us ♪ ♪ All your purposes ♪ ♪ All your glory ♪ (gentle piano music continues) ♪ Teach us, Lord ♪ ♪ Full obedience ♪ ♪ Holy reverence ♪ ♪ True humility ♪ ♪ Test our thoughts ♪ ♪ And our attitudes ♪ ♪ In the radiance ♪ ♪ Of your purity ♪ ♪ Cause our faith to rise ♪ ♪ Cause our eyes to see ♪ ♪ Your majestic love ♪ ♪ Your authority ♪ ♪ Words of power ♪ ♪ That can never fail ♪ ♪ Let their truth prevail ♪ ♪ Over unbelief ♪ (gentle piano music continues) ♪ Speak, O Lord ♪ ♪ And renew our minds ♪ ♪ Help us grasp the heights ♪ ♪ Of your plans for us ♪ ♪ The truths unchanged ♪ ♪ From the dawn of time ♪ ♪ That will echo down ♪ ♪ Through eternity ♪ ♪ And by grace we'll stand ♪ ♪ On your promises ♪ ♪ And by faith we'll walk ♪ ♪ As you walk with us ♪ ♪ Speak, O Lord ♪ ♪ Till your church is built ♪ ♪ And the earth is filled ♪ ♪ With your glory ♪ ♪ And by grace we'll stand ♪ ♪ On your promises ♪ ♪ And by faith we'll walk ♪ ♪ As you walk with us ♪ ♪ Speak, O Lord ♪ ♪ Till your church is built ♪ ♪ And the earth is filled ♪ ♪ With your glory ♪ - All right, good morning.

Welcome to Bruin Community Church. We have some announcements from our family ministry. So Rachel's gonna come and give the announcements first. - All right. All right, so this is the last call to sign up for the Family Ministry Park Day, which is this upcoming Saturday from 2 to 4.30 p.m.

This event is actually now open for all of family ministry, whether you're a member or a non-member. The purpose of it is really just for there to be a casual event for people to be able to get to know one another, whether you're newer or you're older. You can sign up as either a participant or a spectator in the app, so please sign up today or via that QR code.

Sorry. Our second announcement is that we are announcing the opening day of submissions for our sixth annual service auctions. So if you are unaware, this is a fundraising effort our entire church membership body can participate in, whether you are submitting a service or you are bidding. The proceeds from this year's service auction will fully go to the Berean Mission Fund.

As in past years, church members have submitted a variety of talents, items, or fellowship opportunities, and then you would fill that out on the Google form. Please note that only active Berean members are eligible to participate, so be sure that you are a part of the Berean members' Facebook group because that's where all the services and items and auction details will go once it's live, as it all takes place online.

The deadline for these submissions will be April 19th, and after our church leaders review all the submissions, the auction itself will run from May 4th and then end on May 10th. We look forward to seeing the many talents and gifts God has blessed you with. Thank you. Our church needs to learn how to clap.

It's so awkward when you guys clap. All right. All right. All right. Next three announcements is concerning our Easter service that's coming up on April 20th. We're about, I guess, almost about four weeks, so maybe a little bit over four weeks away. If you look at--you should have gotten one of these when you were coming in.

So starting from April 14th to 16th, we have Passion Week devotions happening at 730. We do annually. We're just kind of walking through each day as he is headed toward the cross so that we can be prepared for the communion, Good Friday, that's coming up. And then on Thursday, we have a Passover meal that's starting at 630.

So if you've never participated in the Passover meal, I strongly encourage you to come because right before Jesus goes to the cross, he tells his disciples to do this in remembrance of me. And so he embedded the gospel in the culture of the Jewish ceremony. And so if you sit and really understand what's going on, for you, for your children, it's a great opportunity to kind of revisit when Jesus says to do this in remembrance of me.

And so if you've never participated, I strongly encourage you, and even if you did participate and you want to bring your children again to remind them and to instill that in them, Pastor Mark will be leading that at 630. There is a limited space, so if you want to participate, please sign up.

And I forgot what the charge is. There's a nominal fee for dinner that's happening at 630. And then on Friday night, we have Good Friday service. As you guys know, each Good Friday, we have all the three services, and sometimes even our outside guests come to that service. Our sister Susan, miraculously, were able to get more parking for us.

I don't know how she does it, but she found more parking, so we're going to have plenty of parking. But we do need help because this room can max fit 600. We're expecting about 800, 850 for that Friday. And so they're asking for parking help, for ushering help, and whatever else that they need.

So if you're willing to help that Friday, please let Justin know. And then obviously on Sunday morning, we have early rise service at 8 a.m. We will be having breakfast right after that. And then starting from the regular service, whether it's 8 o'clock, 9.30, and 11.30, there will be lunch provided.

And so our sister Laurel has volunteered to head that up, but they do need help. They need quite a few people to come on Saturday to prep and then Sunday to help serve. So if you're willing to help with that, if you can't do it on Friday, or you can do all of it, please let Justin know, and Justin will be able to guide you to that.

I think that's it. Yes, okay. So if you're willing, you can copy the QR code, or you can just contact Justin directly. All right, let me pray for our offering, and then we'll give you a minute to give. And then again, if you brought a physical offering, we have an offering box in the back that you can visit on your way out.

All right, let's pray. Gracious Father, we thank you so much for your continued grace and love and patience. No matter what it is that we have been wrestling with this week, I pray that you would help us to fix our eyes upon Christ, that he would be our refuge, that he would be our glory, he would be our joy, that our worship that we give you may be sincere in spirit and in truth.

Help us, Lord God, to break away from just regular habit, but to give you our very hearts, that even this giving would be a reflection, Lord God, of your grace in our lives. May it be given as an act of worship, and may it be handled in a manner, Lord God, that glorifies and honors you.

In Jesus' name we pray, amen. ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ Let us all rise and spend a few moments to greet the neighbors around us. ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ So, the way we chose her name, Elora means, "My God is my light." Phoebe means bright, radiant, and pure.

So, together the name means, "My God is my pure, radiant light." And so, her brother's name kind of has a similar mold as well. For us, two things that we'd appreciate prayers about would be, one, obviously, for her brother and herself to, you know, get to know the Lord at a young age.

Not just head knowledge, but have a personal, intimate relationship with him. And secondly, just for our family in general, and especially for my wife and I, just for wisdom, judgment, and discernment, to do what is right and just, you know, before his eyes. You know, obviously, in raising our children as well.

Earthly speaking, of course, they're our children, but we understand ultimately that we're just merely stewards of them and the lives that we've been entrusted with. So, we want to point them, you know, in the right way as much as possible to the best extent we can. Thank you. >> Hello, guys.

My name's Garrett. This is Rachel. We're the Kleizers. Been coming to Breein for about, what, eight years? And this is our beautiful daughter, Margot Rose. We named her that because we just really like the name Margot Rose. So, yeah, we just, for those of you that, like, come alongside us along this journey, it's been a while, just through some, you know, hardships and stuff, but this is just truly a blessing from God.

So, a prayer request, you know, like the brother before me, is just that she'll come to faith at an early age and she will live her life for the glory of God. All right, thank you. >> Morning, my name is David, and this is my wife, Fionn. This is our son, Nolan.

His older brother is also in nursery. His name is Evan. We also named Nolan because we just, we like the name. We listed a few names and came down to Nolan, and that's the one we like the best. If we could, if you all could pray for us, also saying that Nolan would also come to Saving Faith at an early age.

But also, we also wanted another boy, especially Fionn, because she wanted a friend for Evan. So, we were lucky enough to have another son. So, we also just pray that they would be able to grow up and have a strong bond as brothers. >> Hello, I'm Johnny. This is Joyce, and this is Janelle Eden Nguyen.

Not Janella, Janelle. So, Janelle means God is gracious, and Eden, like Garden of Eden. But honestly, we picked it because it started with a J. So, prayer request is pray for her and Jacob's salvation and wisdom for us as parents. Thank you. >> Hi, everyone. We are Andy and Emily.

This is our older one, Joshua. And this is our younger one, Caleb. We literally started in Genesis from Adam, and then we got to Joshua, and we decided this is what works. And our hope for them is that they would be the few that might see the promises of God, rather than being fearful, that they would come to the Lord, and to know the Lord, and to serve him all the days of their lives.

>> Hi, everyone. My name is Josiah. This is my wife, Esther. This is Hayden. We adopted her from Korea about a year ago. So, yeah, her name is Hayden Parker Leung. I think prayer is just that she would come to, you know, faith one day, and then I think for Esther and I it's been very apparent that we're going to need a lot more patience with this one than our other two.

So, you guys can pray for us. >> Hi. My name is Brian. This is Priscilla. This is my son, Hayden, and that's Mia Hana Choi. Before Hayden -- before -- when we were pregnant, before Hayden, we found out that he was a boy. We really liked the name Mia, because Priscilla really likes Fast and the Furious.

And there's only Letty and Mia as the two names that we could choose from. But Mia also means beloved, and her middle name, Hana, is in honor of Priscilla's family member who passed away, and Hana means grace and favor by God. So, our prayer request is that they both have a relationship with God, and that we -- me and Priscilla will be good shepherds towards that goal.

Thank you. >> Hi, everyone. My name is Joseph. This is my wife, Jessica, and this is our daughter, Eleanor, Charlotte Lee. And the name Eleanor means God is light, and that is our prayer for her, that God will be her light, that she will come to know him, and that she will be a light in this world.

Thank you. >> Hi. My name is Sam. This is my wife, Grace, and this is Obi. Full name is Tobias, which means God is good. We went with Obi because our older two are Abby and Eli, so we wanted to just keep the three-letter ending in an "I" name, so -- yeah, we didn't go with Toby.

Our prayer request is for love, patience, and wisdom for us as parents, for all our kids, and that all our children would walk in the way of the Lord and come to know Jesus and serve him. >> I want to read from -- before we let them go, Psalm 127, it says, "Unless the Lord builds a house, they labor in vain.

Who built it? Unless the Lord guards the city, the watchman keeps awake in vain. It is vain for you to rise up early, to retire late, to eat the bread of painful labors, for he gives to his beloved even his sleep. Behold, children are a gift of the Lord.

The fruit of the womb is a reward. Like arrows in a hand of warriors, so are the children of one's youth. How blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them. They will not be ashamed when they speak with their enemies in the gate." Part of the reason why we present our children to you is, again, to think about our next generation.

That's something that the older I get, the more and more urgent that seems to be, that what is our church generation, what is our church culture going to look like once this generation passes? And so more and more we think about how, you know, you guys, and some of you guys are young parents, and some of you guys younger than that, like when you are the leaders of the next generation, what will it be?

And these children are going to inherit what we labor to build. And so, you know, the text here says that children are like arrows, like quivers, and a family that has full of them. And basically, quiver basically is all the arrows for the purpose of war. And so our natural thinking in our culture is to protect them.

So we have, if we're not careful, our church becomes a bunker mentality where we're trying to protect them from evil, but we're not necessarily preparing them to battle because that's exactly what they're going to do. We are increasingly living in a culture where they're hostile toward the faith of Jesus Christ.

And so if we train our children to be safe in bunkers, that's all they're going to know. And so the text that we're looking at, and part of the reason what we're doing is all the teachers, parents, the church, to prepare them not only to be protected from the evil, but to be able to fight against it.

When he says I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not be able to fight against it, is that they would be the next generation people who are going to stand up for the truth, the gospel, for what we believe. And so everything that we work for this generation will not end with us.

That it will be inherited by these young children, and that for many years to come, that they will continue to do the work. And so for that end, we're going to pray for the parents. We're going to pray for you, so all the teachers who are laboring on behalf, watching the children, that that would be the mindset of our church, that we prepare them, share the gospel with them, we teach them so that they may be ready against the hostile culture that we live in, and to glorify God.

So let me pray for us, and then we'll dismiss them. >> Heavenly Father, we thank you so much for allowing our young families, Lord God, to experience the joy of having children. Lord, we live in a culture where there's more and more hostility, Lord, toward having children, just generally, Lord God, and just attack on their mindset and what they are thinking.

Help us as parents, especially the parents who are here, as each one of them are praying, Lord God, that their children will come to faith. Help them to disciple them, to set an example for them, what it means to love you, what it means to live out their faith truly, and that their children would inherit the faith of the parents, Lord God, from an early age, that you would bless these homes, that these children, even from a young age, Lord God, would be able to discern truth, to be able to confess their sins, to be forgiven, and for many, many years to come, that they would be the defender of the gospel and the truth.

They would proclaim who you are wherever they go, whatever arena that you send them. So we pray for that purpose, that our church, not just these families, but our whole church, Lord God, would endeavor together, would commit together to raise up children, Lord God, who will be your warriors in your kingdom.

So we thank you, Lord God. We lift all these children, all these parents to you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. All right. Thank you. All right. If you can turn your Bibles to Luke chapter 10. I'll be reading from verse 38 to 42. Okay. Luke chapter 10, verse 38 to 42.

I'm reading out of the NASB. "Now as they were traveling along, he entered a village, and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. She had a sister called Mary who was seated at the Lord's feet, listening to his word. But Martha was distracted with all her preparations, and she came to him and said, 'Lord, do you not care?

My sister has left me to do all the serving alone. Then tell her to help me.' But the Lord answered and said to her, 'Martha, Martha, you are worried and bothered about so many things, but only one thing is necessary, for Mary has chosen the good part, which shall not be taken away.'" Father, we pray for your guidance.

We pray for the truth of your word to hit our hearts, to guide us, lead us, and encourage us. Help us to hear your voice and your voice alone. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. You know, typically when we survey the church, you know, the most common complaints that we hear in the church that I have, teeters back and forth depending on who we ask.

There's some of you who will say, you know, our church is a little bit too legalistic. You know, we had a dating seminar yesterday, and we gave, like, this is, you should take it seriously, you should prepare for marriage, you should seek counsel. And I know that there are some of you, just because I know, I hear it through the grapevine, our church is too legalistic.

We need to be more gracious. Why do we have to get involved with other people's lives? You know? And then there's some of you who are in this room and say, legalistic? You know, we're not strong enough. You know, we're allowing too much. We're too liberal in here. We're just allowing people just to do whatever, and we need stronger discipleship.

And depending on who we talk to, you're gonna have different opinions, and some very polarizing opinions. You know what's interesting is, years ago we were at Together for the Gospel, and I think I mentioned the wrong name. I said Albert Mohler in the first service, but I think he was, I'm pretty sure it was R.C.

Sproul. He basically outlined 2,000 years of church history, of the pendulum shifting back and forth from holiness movement to grace movement. And I forgot how many different eras that he mentioned, but there are maybe about 15 to 17 different swings that he kind of, you know, was telling us about.

This is what happened. And each stage, they see an issue, and then they would combat that issue, and they would swing, you know, to correct an error that they see, and then they would correct it all the way to the other side, and then that would cause a problem, and then they would swing the other end back and forth.

Just in the short time that I've been a Christian, the last 40 years, I've seen the pendulum shift probably about three or four times. I've mentioned many times, I became a Christian in 1983, and it was at the tail end of the Jesus movement. So all the people that was influential to me were saved in the '70s, and they were part of the Jesus movement.

And so if you don't know about the Jesus movement, is Calvary Chapel was at the center of this, and people came to faith, and so they got rid of the traditional worship. You had hippies who were coming into church with barefoot, you know, long hair, doing drugs, just coming up.

So a lot of the Calvary Chapel pastors were teenagers, or in their 20s, coming out from the Vietnam War, who got converted. And so that was part of the Jesus movement. So when I became a Christian, all I heard was Jesus loves us unconditionally, that, you know, Christians are not perfect, just forgiven.

And so that was kind of like the mantra. And then the '80s hit, and they said, you know what? The church is getting a little bit too loose. We need to have more discipleship. So back in the '80s, if you became a Christian in the latter part of '80s, there was a strong holiness movement, discipleship movement.

So the campus ministries were heavily influenced by the navigator movement, started having emphasis on discipleship, that we need to be disciplined. This kind of free, cheap grace type of thing, we need to combat this, and the pendulum started to shift. And so if you became a Christian, or you experienced Christianity during the mid to late '80s, you know what I'm talking about.

There was a very strong emphasis on discipleship during that period. And after that, there was like, oh, you know what? This is too legalistic, and people are getting hurt from this. And so the seeker-friendly movement, charismatic movement started shifting and coming in, saying that we need to focus on grace.

They're so concerned about the younger generation leaving, and they were, I'm reading articles left and right about the exodus of the young generation. And then you hear stories about the seeker-friendly, market-driven churches who are going out and redefining what the church's service is. And so getting rid of all traditionalism, and just kind of breaking the church down into bare bones so that more and more people would be attracted to the church, and that was the seeker-friendly movement.

Well, tail end of the seeker-friendly movement, people began to notice that, you know what? There's no depth in here. The Bible's not being taught. And so the young, restless and reform movement came, and that was happening in the early 2000s. And so early 2000, the young, restless and reform movement, all of a sudden, the younger generation started to say, you know, I'm a Calvinist, and I believe in election.

I want to study the Bible. The church should practice church discipline. And I was a pastor during that time, and I was pretty amazed that just all of a sudden, there was this hunger for the Word of God. And the young, restless and reform, we want deep teaching. We want seriousness.

And then at the tail end of that, again, to noticing that maybe we've gone a little bit too far, and then the gospel-centered movement came in. That it's all about the gospel. It's not about moralism. It's about what we do. It's what he's done, and he had these cliches that had been thrown around.

And so maybe we're still kind of lingering in that part. And so just even in the short time that I've been a Christian, I've seen this pendulum shift back and forth to holiness, to grace, to holiness, to grace, to holiness, to grace. Well, how do we recognize that we're balanced?

Even in this church, if I ask a group of people, we may have different opinion. One very polarizing opinion, we're too gracious and we're too loose to, you know, we're not strong enough. All of this is an introduction to the text that we're at. Because the previous passage, remember, the lawyer asked Jesus, "How do you inherit eternal life?" And Jesus said, "Love the Lord your God "with all your soul, mind, and strength." And then he gives an example of the Good Samaritan.

It wasn't the priests, it wasn't the Levite, but the Good Samaritan that they thought was the worst of sinners. That God was gonna judge them first, even before the Romans. And then he uses them as an example, how that person was more obedient to Christ. That he was the one who was practicing the Shema better than the Levites and the priests.

And then he ends it by saying, "You go do the same." So stop talking about loving God. Stop talking about loving others. Go do the same. That's how it ends. And then we come to this text, very next passage, Martha is doing. Martha is serving. And you would think there would be commendation for Martha.

Instead it said, "Martha, Martha, "you are distracted about so many things, "and Mary has chosen what's best. "Calm down." If we saw these two texts separately, depending on, say, you may, if you think that we're a little bit too loose, you may have loved last week's passage. Like, we need to work.

We need to just stop talking about love, and we need to actually apply it. And then maybe some of you may gravitate toward this passage. There's too many Marthas in this church. You know, we need to be Marys. We need to sit at Jesus' feet and listen. Well, if we're not careful, and part of the reason why we try to study the whole counsel of God is because the same Bible that tells us if you love your father and mother more than me, you cannot be my disciple, the same Bible tells us that if you do not honor your father and mother, you cannot live long and prosperous.

God's blessing comes from honoring your father and mother. So which text is true? Obviously, both of them is. But when we're in the flesh, we naturally gravitate toward whatever fits into what we want to hear. And so we end up highlighting certain parts of the passage that fits our narrative, and then we kind of minimize the things that may not fit.

And it's not safe for us to simply highlight certain things that make sense to us, that the whole counsel of God needs to be understood in its totality, and not just bits and parts. So I'm saying all of this to introduce the text to you because there's a reason why Luke ends the previous passage by saying, "Go do it," and then in this passage he says, "Hey, you're worried about too many things," right?

We are very familiar with the story about Mary and Martha, right? Mary has chosen what is good. Some of your translations said what is best, and Martha, you're worried about too many things, right? Even before I say anything, if you've been a Christian for any period of time, you've probably heard multiple sermons about this, right?

This is for my own benefit, okay? I'm gonna ask you. I asked you the first generation, I'm gonna ask you. How many of you relate more with Martha? You're like the doer, right? Honestly, raise your hand high. I wanna see, this is, I'm gonna keep a record of this, okay?

Raise your hand if you're Martha, okay? Or you relate to Martha. How many of you relate to Mary? Okay, a few of you. And the rest of you are completely lost. You have no idea who you are, okay? Let me do it again, okay? You have to choose one.

You have to choose one, okay? If you wanna be an A student, you have to choose one, okay? Are you a Martha or are you a Mary? If you're more of a Martha, not completely a Martha, okay, raise your hand. Raise your hand, okay? But if you're more of a Mary, raise your hand.

More of a Mary. Okay, that's what I thought, okay? There's still some of you who are raising your hand, but predominantly, more people relate with Martha. Predominantly, you're right. And this is what we see, right? Because Marthas are celebrated. Some of you who said you're Mary, okay, and I'm not saying, 'cause I'm not talking about anybody specific, right, but how many of you are really Marys?

How many of you are really like, you know what? I just love being at Jesus' feet. You're not Mary just because you don't like to work. (audience laughing) That's not Mary. That might be Lazarus. That's not Mary, okay? (audience laughing) Okay. Mary is gravitating, okay, and we're gonna be talking about that a little bit, but I would say, not just in the church, just generally in society, I think more people will say I tend to be a Martha.

And the reason why is because you have to get things done. If you want to get an A, you want to go to a good school, you want to get a good job. And so if you are a functioning, good citizen, member of the church, any society, in a family, and if you want to get praised, the Marthas are the one who gets praised.

Marthas are the one who climb the ladder. Marthas are the one who become leaders. And so our natural inclination, including myself, is Martha. So what Jesus says to Martha is something that we really need to pay attention to. There's three, I divide it into three Ds, just for the sake of memorizing.

Doing, distraction, and then disgruntled, right? That, basically this text described, Martha doing, distracted, and then disgruntled. First it introduces Martha to us that she welcomed Jesus into the home. Now, you have to understand that this Marian, Martha, is the brother of Lazarus, where John chapter 11, Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead, and they're in Bethany.

Bethany is about two miles away from Jerusalem. So we don't know exactly how many times he stops over at this house, but we know that this was a base, that before he enters into Jerusalem, because he knows that hostility waits for him in Jerusalem. He knows that the enemies, the people who want to crucify him and nullify him, are concentrated in Jerusalem.

So it seems like this home was a very prominent home that Jesus would visit. Before he enters into battle, he preps, and that's exactly what he does in John chapter 11, before he heads to Jerusalem, that he has his last public miracle in raising Lazarus from the dead, and then he goes into Jerusalem and cleanses the temple on Monday.

So this is a very prominent home, and you also have to understand that Jesus lived during a period of Asian-Americans. Okay, so I know we're not all Asian-American, but predominantly we're Asian-American. You have a leg up in understanding the Bible, and I remember when this was revealed to me in seminary.

I said, "Wow, this is awesome," because the Hebrew culture is generally an Asian culture, very hierarchical, honoring the leaders and the elders and family-oriented. And then you have the Greek culture, who is Western. So much of the Western world gets their culture, even the law system, philosophy, educational system comes from the Greeks.

So the Western world was influenced by the Greeks. So the early Jews were right in the middle. So the older school generation spoke Hebrew. The younger ones were speaking Greek. Predominantly, the spoken language at that time was Aramaic. Aramaic is, and this is oversimplification, but just so that we can remember, Aramaic is like Congolese or Chinglish.

It's a mixture of Hebrew and Greek. And so that was a language that the disciples typically spoke. If you wanted to engage the secular world, you'd have to speak Greek or Koine Greek, or if you wanted to engage the old generation or understand the Old Testament and stuff, you have to kind of have some Hebrew.

Now, I say all of this to kind of give you a cultural background of this time, that when Jesus came into town, that preparing for Jesus to come, again, this is not only of Asians. This is true in every culture, but in particular in an Asian culture. You can't just have an honored guest like Jesus coming into your home without preparation.

If you knew that the possible Messiah is coming to your home and using it as a base, everything in your schedule is gonna be cleared out. You have to get this ready. You have to cook the best food, right? You have to clean the house. You have to make sure that everything is prepared.

And so Martha is doing what any guest should have been doing. So the problem wasn't what she was doing. It was why she was doing this. She would have been prayed. We heard nothing. If Martha never said anything, Jesus came into town, and we just saw a picture of Martha preparing everything, and Mary just sitting there.

Our natural conclusion is, oh, Mary's lazy. She's so selfish, right? Martha's taking care of everything. We would have said that. Only because of the interaction between Jesus, we're looking at this and say, hey, this needs to be corrected. So it wasn't necessarily what she was doing, but it was why she was doing it and what she says.

So the second part of it, doing, to distract it, it says Mary was distracted in what she was doing. The word distracted is translated to be pulled away, to be anxious or preoccupied, or in some translations, dragged away. She was dragged away. She was worried and concerned. She was so concerned about all these other things that she was missing the core.

I think any Martha would understand this. You know the people who are the most guilty of this in the church are the church leaders, are the pastors, 'cause we're so busy taking care of the church and doing our job and preparing sermons. We're in front of the Bible all the time that we are so focused on feeding other people that we forget to feed ourselves.

I don't know how many times I go to a church and I preach during a retreat or something and the pastor's not in the room. He's so busy taking care of the food, making sure all the rides are taken care of, all the rooms, especially in a smaller church, and he doesn't get to hear any of the sermon 'cause he's always busy, he's always, and usually it's the pastor and oftentimes the wife.

And so at the end of the retreat, you sit down and they're exhausted and they're tired 'cause they poured themselves out, but they themselves did not receive. This is the typical scene of a Martha who is diligently serving, but they're distracted, they're anxious, they're dragged away. The Bible warns us over and over again where if we are laboring and serving with our own energy, we get burned out.

And I talked about this many times before, burnout basically means, it doesn't mean that you're overworked. We typically think if we work too hard, we're gonna get burned out. It's not the work that burns you out, it's the fuel that you work with that burns you out if you don't have enough.

There are people in this room who is preparing for the Rogner race. If you guys know what that is. Well, you run what? 10,000 miles or you just, I don't know why you're doing that. I don't understand you, but you guys are excited, right? And you're preparing. And you say, "Oh, how much are you running?" "I'm running 18 miles." Like, I'll get burned out running to my car from here.

But for whatever the reason, so it's not like, why did you volunteer? Nobody, what do you get out of that? Other than the sense of accomplishment. For whatever the reason, you find joy in running, which I don't get. So it's like, well, you don't get burned out? It's like, no, they do it.

They're thinking about tomorrow and the next day, right? It's not the amount of work that burns us out. It's why we're doing that. What we're doing it with. If we, the Bible constantly warns us that what God has called us to do is not something that we can do by our own strength.

Paul says in Philippians 2, 12 to 13, "So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, "not only in my presence, but much more in my absence, "work out your salvation with fear and trembling." Now, we all know that text, right? Now that God saved you and justified you, now work it out with fear and trembling.

But if you forget the second part, this is where you get into trouble. "For it is God who works in you, "both to will and to work for his good pleasure." He didn't just say work out your salvation with fear and trembling, he says to do that because God is working in you.

God is the one who's empowering you. In Colossians 1, 29, Paul says, "For this purpose also I labor, "striving according to his power, "which mightily works within me." So if you're a Martha and you're running around because you feel like sense of duty and you need to do this, you need to do that, but his power is not what's motivating you.

There's no work and renewal and refreshment that's happening in you, but you're just doing it because you're a good student. You learned how to climb up the social ladder, you're a good citizen, you're a good church member, and so you're used to getting A's as students, so now you're trying to get A's in the church.

And so you know how to work hard, you know how to fix things, you know what the problem is, but his work in you is not refreshing you. You know, in Acts chapter one, four, after the disciples fail, and then Jesus restores them back, "Do you love me more than these?" He said, "Then feed my sheep," and then Jesus is about to ascend, and then Jesus tells them, "Wait." In verse four, gathering them together, he commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for what the Father had promised, which he said, "You heard of from me." He said, "Wait." Don't go yet, you're not ready.

The disciples said, "Okay, we failed the first time, "we're not gonna do this again." He's like, "By your own strength, you're gonna fail. "You just wait." And then he says, in chapter one, verse eight, "When the Holy Spirit comes upon you, "you will receive power. "Then you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, "Judea, Samaria, to the remotest part of the world." He wasn't depending on them.

He's going to use them, but he said, "When the Holy Spirit comes upon you, "it's not your education, it's not your experience. "Since you failed before, now you're ready." He said, "No, in the flesh, you're gonna fail "10 times, 100 times." He said, "When the Holy Spirit comes upon you, "you will receive power." So the power is not in you.

The power is not in your education. The power is not in your experience. He said, "When the Holy Spirit comes upon you," and he doesn't say, "Try to be my witness." He says, "You will be my witness "when the Holy Spirit is upon you." That's why the Scripture is filled.

Walk in the Spirit, love in the Spirit. To be in the Spirit in everything, he said, to be filled with the Spirit, because it's the Spirit that's going to carry you along. In fact, in Mark chapter four, 18 to 19, when Jesus tells us about the different soil, the first one falls into the ground, the devil comes and snatches it away, it disappears.

The second one goes into rocky soil, it bears fruit a little bit because it has no foundation, it also dies. But the third soil, he says this, other than the one whose seed has sown among the thorns, these are the ones who had heard the word, but the worries of the world, deceitfulness of riches, and the desires of other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.

You notice here, he doesn't say they get caught in sin. He doesn't say they got caught in to heresy. The third soil just got distracted. They became anxious. And so he said that their anxiousness and their distraction that dragged them away from what is most important choked the word in their life, and then they die.

They don't bear fruit. So you have to understand how important this is, because with good meaning, with good intentions, our biggest fight oftentimes is distraction, distraction. We're so busy wanting to do great things for the kingdom of God, that in the midst of that, that we fall into the same trap as Martha.

Because we're busy, because we're working, because we're laboring, because we're sacrificing, but in the midst of that, what does it lead to? Because she was distracted, what does it say? She became disgruntled, because that's what it leads to. If you're working hard with the wrong motive, with the wrong fuel, eventually you become disgruntled, and that's exactly what Martha became.

In the midst of doing all that work, you would think if Jesus came into town, the Messiah is coming to your home. You would think the natural inclination is like, Jesus is coming into town, thank you for visiting my house. I get to serve my Messiah. Instead, because she was disgruntled, she's first disgruntled with Mary.

So she's doing all the work, and she's busy, and bitterness is starting to rise in her. I'm doing all the work, and she's looking over in the corner of her eye, and Mary's just sitting there. And so she's bitter at Mary, and this is what happens with a lot of people who serve hard in the church.

They're laboring, and then all of a sudden, their laboring turns into, why aren't they helping? Why aren't they doing that? And so all the good work that you do turns into being disgruntled and grumbling. And instead of serving to worship God, it becomes a source of contention, bitterness, anxiousness, and division in the church, because your hard work leads to grumbling, because you get burned out in the context of serving.

That's what has happened to Martha. But here's the kicker. Not only was she disgruntled with Mary, as soon as Jesus, the Messiah, comes into town, what does she say? Do you not care? Do you not care? Think about the context of this. Jesus forfeited glory. The king of kings and lord of lords forfeited his glory, was born in humiliation.

For 33 years, he walked as a servant, and now he's headed to the cross. He's about six to eight months to go to the cross to suffer for her, to take all her sins, past, present, and future, to take it upon himself, and this pain that he bore. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

And he was gonna do this for her. And then she says, don't you care? I mean, when you put it like that, it's like what she said, do you not care, it sounds ridiculous. I remember when my children were young, very young, we took 'em to Disneyland, okay, yes.

And we took 'em to Disneyland, right, against all our good sense. 'Cause our kids are young, they wanted to go, and at that time, we didn't have much money, so going to Disneyland was a big, big deal. So we sacrificed, and Esther loves Disneyland as much as I do, right?

So neither of us are fans, but we did it for our children. So we spent all day staying there. We're gonna be here, we spent a lot of money, so we're gonna milk it as long as possible. Waited until the fireworks, and pew, pew, pew, you know, all that was done.

We're coming home, and then we said, you know what, you guys want some jamba juice? Let's end this night with a treat. So we stop by Jamba Juice, and the kids are too young, so they can't drink the whole thing by themselves, so we got a big, big one, and then we split it into three cups.

This is before Isaiah's born. But we didn't split it perfectly, at least to them. So an argument broke out. This is on the way from Anaheim. We stopped by, got jamba juice, we put it in three cups, and all we are hearing in the backseat is, it's not fair!

Zachary got too much. Faith got a little bit more than me. Jeremy has a little bit more than me. Why does he get more than me? So they started arguing. I'm driving, but I'm just dead tired, and we just emptied our bank account. We paid, what, $15 for churros.

You know, we're driving back home, and we're just tired. It's like, oh, you know, we're good parents, and we took good care of them. And the whole time, I was like, every ounce of energy I had to hold myself back, to grace and love and mercy. You know, it's like, are you kidding?

After the whole day of that, and you're gonna go to bed saying it's unfair? It's unfair because you didn't get enough jamba juice? (congregation laughing) I'm still frustrated. (congregation laughing) It was like 20 years ago. (congregation laughing) If you look at the context of what Martha is saying, how ridiculous that sounds, Martha is saying that before the cross.

We say that post-cross. We know exactly what he did. We have his words. We know exactly what he suffered. That God demonstrates his own love toward us, and that while we were yet sinners, he deliberately, willfully walked to the cross to take our sins, and then on this side, when we don't get what we want, when God doesn't answer our prayer, if life doesn't turn out exactly the way we want it, and say, do you not care?

Where are you? Now, when you see it in that context, you can see what the danger is with Martha. That she's working and laboring so hard, but it turns into grumbling and complaining to the very one who came to sacrifice everything for her. And if we're not careful, that's exactly what happens to us.

That the ones who are laboring and struggling and sacrificing the most, you will see them five, six, 10 years later, they're the most bitter toward the church. They're the most disgruntled. The ones who are serving and leaders, at one point, are sitting in a large mega church, just kind of disgruntled.

Because they were laboring, and they got burnt out, and their burnout turned into disgruntlement, and disgruntlement turned into complaining. And this is what Jesus was referring to. On the other hand, Mary is sitting there, just quietly. That's all, there's not a lot of explanation about what Mary was doing, she was just sitting.

This was not an ordinary position for a woman at this time. All it tells us, and Luke is just contrasting between Martha who was running around doing everything, and Mary was just planted, and all she was doing was just listening. She was just listening. In fact, all throughout Scripture, when God wants to use somebody, he isolates them.

You know, you and I live in a generation where isolation is something that we dread. I remember when Starbucks first came in, I couldn't understand, I think a lot of the Jubilee members may be able to relate, I just couldn't understand. Coffee's been around for over 200 years. They're gonna open up a coffee shop?

There's a coffee shop everywhere. And all of a sudden, it's just sort of blown up, and I realized it wasn't coffee that they're selling. They were selling koinonia, a place for people to gather. It wasn't like, oh, I drank this Starbucks coffee, and it was the best coffee ever, changed my life.

No, I mean, it's good, and it's just coffee. But they were selling koinonia, a place for people to gather. There was a generation of people where community was beginning to break down, and you don't know your neighbors, and you're working in your cubicles at home, and so you don't have anywhere to experience community, and so Starbucks became a place where people began to gather.

So it was hard for me to understand. When I was starting to work with the younger people in our church, and they would say, you know what? I get so distracted in the empty office, so I need to go to the coffee shop. I couldn't understand. The office is empty.

There's nobody there, there's no noise. I mean, if you wanna work, that's where you would go, right? No, they have to go where there's K-pop music happening in the background, and people are in line talking, other people sitting there, and even now, right? There's a culture where it's like, oh, I got so much to do, so I gotta go to the coffee shop, right, where there's all this noise and distraction happening.

But for whatever the reason, we live in a generation where being isolated and being by yourself is like to be avoided like a plague. If you look at Scripture constantly, God isolates his people to get their attention so that they would listen. Abraham was called from Ur of the Chaldeans in order to prepare him for what he had planned for the nation of Israel.

Moses was taken from the palace of the Pharaoh for 40 years in isolation, just spending time with the sheep in isolation. He physically meets God in the burning bush later on after the 40 years, but for 40 years, he lived in isolation. Israel wandered in the desert for 40 years.

And anybody who studied Israel history said, when was the highlight of Israel's history? It was the 40 years wandering in the desert where God was speaking to them. He was revealing himself to them to get up, to sit down. Elijah was isolated in Mount Horeb, and God began to minister to him and speak to him.

John the Baptist was taken out into the wilderness in order for him to do ministry. Jesus, to begin his ministry, was isolated for 40 years praying and fasting. Apostle Paul, after he converts, is taken out to Arabia for three years before he went out ever preaching anywhere. In fact, part of the biggest problem that we have in church is we have people, and some of you have told me this.

Some of you have attended church for 10, 20, 30 years, and you've never understood the scripture. It wasn't taught, or it just wasn't priority. And so now you're learning the scripture for the first time. Our churches are filled with people who are busy working, laboring, and sacrificing for other people, but they have no idea what they believe.

They don't know what the scripture says. They're not exactly sure what the church is. They're not exactly sure and explain what happened at the cross. But they're busy. They've been busy for so long. Because we celebrate Martha's in the church 'cause it gets done. The church gets claimed. Things get done.

The church is always in need, so the Marthas are always welcome. But the danger of that is when we're not paying attention to Christ, we can miss the whole point. That's exactly what it says in Mark 8:31-33. For the sake of time, I'm not gonna read the whole thing.

It says that Jesus was telling them that he's gonna go to Jerusalem, and then he's going to be killed by the priests and the scribes. And it says in verse 32, and he was stating the matter very plainly. And he says this. In the Gospel of Mark, he says this three separate times, and each time he says it, the disciples are, well, who's gonna sit on your left to the right?

Because they were so fixated and distracted and dragged away by their own vision of what they're gonna get out of this, but they didn't hear him. He told them he was gonna resurrect in the third day. But when he resurrected, they were not the ones there. They were listening, but they weren't paying attention.

But I believe Mary was. It doesn't tell us that, but in John chapter 12 verse three, after the resurrection of Lazarus, Mary, it says, took a pound of very costly perfume of pure nard, anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped his feet with her hair, and the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

At the minimum, we know that Mary loved Jesus. Martha was busy taking care of all these things. It's like, tell Mary to do, do you not care? This is not fair! Mary was there just sitting quietly, listening to Jesus. Then as he's headed toward the cross, she's the one who breaks the perfume, declaring her love, this very expensive perfume, and humbling herself, using her own hair, which would have been humiliating for a woman at that time, to wipe Jesus' feet, kissing him, adoring him.

It was really interesting because we saw that very scene in India. This woman who was so thankful, and she got on her feet, and she was kissing the feet. I forgot which one of our members experienced that, because that was their culture, is to show that we're so thankful.

So we know at the minimum, she loved Jesus. She loved Jesus. But even more than that, I think Judah's complaint is like, that money could have been used to feed the homeless, and ultimately, it wasn't even about the homeless. It's because he was handling the money, and he was kind of robbing the money back.

But this is how Jesus describes what she did. "Therefore," Jesus said, "let her alone, "so that she may keep it for the day of my burial." Now the word keep is to watch, to guard, or oftentimes, obey. It doesn't tell us that Mary fully understood. But what Jesus says hints to the fact that maybe Mary knew.

What was it that Mary was listening to? Probably what Jesus was saying to all the disciples, especially knowing that this is Bethany, that this is where they're setting up to get into Jerusalem, and we don't know how many times he visited there, but this was the center that they established to prepare to get into Jerusalem.

So my guess is that what he was talking about was what he was gonna do at the cross. She sat there, listening carefully, loved Jesus, and then was preparing for his death and burial. Everybody was so busy taking care of stuff and doing stuff, and what am I gonna get out of this?

And they're so enamored with the crowd that was coming on. But Mary was sitting there quietly, listening. Jesus says to her, Martha, Martha, you are worried about and bothered about so many things, but only one thing is necessary, for Mary has chosen the good part which shall not be taken away from her.

The word good, in some of your translation, is translated best, superlative. Oftentimes, the biggest problem in the church with good-intentioned people, working hard for the Lord, so distracted by what is good and neglecting what is best. Distracted by what is good, but neglecting what is best. And eventually, we get burned out.

Like I said, burnout is not because you worked hard, it's because you're working with energy that's not being replenished. Only one thing is necessary, and Mary has chosen what is best, and I'm not gonna take this away from her. I wanna conclude with this and hope it really sinks in.

God does not need us. He wants us. Let that sink in. God does not need us. He can do a better job without us. He can get his word out better without us. He can establish his church better without us. He doesn't need us. He wants us. Us. That whatever we do, he wants us, not the work.

That whatever we do, we do it as an act of worship. We do it as an act of adoration. We serve others because he served, compelled by the love of Christ. Because we love Jesus, I'm going to love these people. He doesn't need us. He wants us. Let's pray.

Amen. Heavenly Father, help us, Lord God, to learn what you are teaching through this text, through Martha, through Mary, that in the midst of so many things that we do, so many things that we're distracted by, so many things, Lord God, that constantly carry us away from what is best.

Help us to first learn to abide in you, to listen to you, to adore you, to love you, that we may proclaim you wherever you send. For your glory and your glory alone, in Jesus' name we pray, amen. Let's all stand up for the closing praise. (gentle piano music) ♪ For my waking breath ♪ ♪ For my waking breath ♪ ♪ For my daily breath ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ For the sun to rest ♪ ♪ For my sleep at night ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ You're the way, the truth, and the life ♪ ♪ You're the well that never runs dry ♪ ♪ I'm the branch and you are the vine ♪ ♪ Draw me close and teach me to abide ♪ (gentle piano music) ♪ Where the spirit ♪ ♪ Where the spirit ♪ ♪ Has unfollowed me ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ For the victor is ♪ ♪ Still the father ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ You're the way, the truth, and the life ♪ ♪ You're the well that never runs dry ♪ ♪ I'm the branch and you are the vine ♪ ♪ Draw me close and teach me to abide ♪ ♪ Be my strength, my song, and my life ♪ ♪ Be my all, my treasure, my prize ♪ ♪ I am yours forever, you're mine ♪ ♪ Draw me close and teach me to abide ♪ (gentle piano music) ♪ When I pass ♪ ♪ When I pass through death ♪ ♪ As I enter rest ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ For eternal life ♪ ♪ To be raised with Christ ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ I depend on you ♪ ♪ You're the way, the truth, and the life ♪ ♪ You're the well that never runs dry ♪ ♪ I'm the branch and you are the vine ♪ ♪ Draw me close and teach me to abide ♪ ♪ Be my strength, my song, and my life ♪ ♪ Be my all, my treasure, my prize ♪ ♪ I am yours forever, you're mine ♪ ♪ Draw me close and teach me to abide ♪ ♪ Be my strength, my song, and my life ♪ ♪ Be my all, my treasure, my prize ♪ ♪ I am yours forever, you're mine ♪ ♪ Draw me close and teach me to abide ♪ Let's pray.

John chapter 15, four and five. Abide in me and I in you, and as a branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in me, the vine. So neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

Lord, help us to heed your encouragement, your warning, your advice. That above all things, help us, Lord God, to give our full attention to you, to loving you, worshiping you, to listening to you, following you, that we may obey you. May Christ, Christ alone, receive the reward for his suffering.

In Jesus' name we pray, amen. ♪ The Lord sent his Son ♪ ♪ And called him Jesus ♪ ♪ He came to the earth ♪ ♪ The earth full of life ♪ ♪ To buy my father ♪ ♪ An empty grave is there too ♪ ♪ My Savior lives ♪ ♪ Because he lives ♪ ♪ I can face tomorrow ♪ ♪ Because he lives ♪ ♪ All fear is gone ♪ ♪ 'Cause I know ♪ ♪ He holds the future ♪ ♪ And life is worth the living ♪ ♪ Just because he lives ♪ ♪ So give glory to the praise of your mercy and grace ♪ ♪ And the praise of your glory ♪ ♪ 'Cause you are the God who saves ♪