One Thing Is Needful - Part 2

Jesus answered and said to Martha, “Martha, Martha, you are troubled about many things. But ONE thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.”   Luke 10:41-42

Friends, Jesus loves it when we come to Him, to draw from Him as much as we can. This is the very reason why Jesus was pleased with Mary. And it’s also why He defended Mary sitting at His feet listening instead of running around serving everyone. He said, “ONE THING IS NEEDED, AND MARY HAS CHOSEN THAT GOOD PART.”

The ONE thing that is needed is not to busy yourself in the serving of the Lord or being troubled about ministry responsibilities. No, the ONE thing that is needful is for you to sit at Jesus’ feet and keep your eyes, ears, and heart on Him (The Word). One sister saw Jesus in the natural, needing her ministry while the other sister saw Him as God in the flesh with a fullness to draw from.

Well, it’s obvious from what Jesus said which sister complimented Jesus and made Him feel like the God that He is. Mary. Martha on the other hand forgot that this God-Man multiplied loaves and fishes to feed a multitude of thousands. HE DIDN’T COME TO BE FED BUT TO FEED. Sometimes it’s really hard to sit down. It’s hard to stop our own efforts and rest solely on Jesus’ unmerited favor.

We’re sometimes like Martha in that our heart is in the right place but we’ve allowed ourselves to get busy and troubled about many things. Even things that are legitimate. Martha wanted to serve the Lord from her heart and ended up doing many things but missed out on the ONE thing that was needed. Believers who do that ONE thing that is needful are not worried about anything else.

On the other hand, believers who fail to do that ONE thing, end up being troubled about many things. Do you believe what Jesus said, that ONE thing is needful, to be at Jesus’ feet and receive from Him? Now, are we overdoing it when we just want to devote our time to sitting at the feet of Jesus through the Word of God? I truly do not think so.

We find later in John’s gospel, Mary took some very costly perfume and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped His feet with her hair to prepare Him for His burial (John 12:3-8). On resurrection morning, some women came with ointment to anoint Jesus’ body, but it was too late then. Now notice something here. They were doing the right thing, but at the wrong time. Jesus had already risen. But Mary did the right thing at the right time. This shows us that when you do the ONE thing that is needful, you will end up doing the right thing at the right time. And the awesome goodness of God is surely to follow you. Thank You Jesus.