Reading Luke Together #32 – One Thing
As we saw on Monday, Jesus is unpacking and revealing what it looks like to Love God, and Love Your Neighbor. The neighbor? That generous, barrier-shattering Samaritan. Love for God? Jesus visits the home of Mary and Martha – and although he’s not named in Luke 10:38-42, their brother Lazarus, soon to die and be raised (John 11)! Gender roles get scrambled during this visit, as Martha does what all women did (and do?), serving in the kitchen. But Mary defies custom, joining the men sitting at the rabbi’s feet.
I’ve connected this in my mind lately with Psalm 27, which says “One thing have I asked of the Lord, that I may behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple.” Eugene Peterson, in his paraphrase The Message, offers us “I’ll study at his feet.” Was he thinking about Mary in Luke 10:38-42 where “one thing” looms large? Martha surely expected Jesus to shoo Mary away and into the kitchen. But gently he invites Martha into a fresh space of mercy and possibility: “You are anxious and troubled about many things; one thing is needful. Mary has chosen the good portion” (Luke 10:41-42). Mary was beholding the beauty of the Lord; she was inquiring in the temple that he was.
The Psalmist, and Martha, and all of us get “distracted by many troubles.” Could it be that really just one thing is needful? The earliest Greek manuscript of Luke 10 reads henos, “one thing.” But decades later, other manuscripts made what wasn’t a spelling error by the copyist, but something more intentional, and telling. Inserted now instead of henos we find oligoi, meaning “a few.” A few things are needful? We can’t ask the copyist, but I wonder if there was a community of Christians, devoted to prayer and Scripture, with meals to be cooked, rocks to be cleared from the garden, candles needing oil, sweeping to be done. I picture a pious wise guy not pulling his weight defending himself, when challenged, by pointing to Jesus’ words, “Hey, he said one thing is needful. I’m praying!” So the scribe copying out Luke for them was told to scratch out “one” and substitute “a few.” After all, there’s so much to do. Jesus wants us to get our work done, and to… and to… Fill in the blanks.
What could Jesus have meant, or the Psalmist? “One thing”? Every wise therapist or spiritual guide is right to diagnose the trouble we suffer: a divided self. Healthy thoughts, negative thoughts, worldly thoughts, cravings, dreams, parental voices, society’s messages: we get frayed, and it’s hard to focus, hard to be our true selves – if we can even discern that true self any longer. The primary goal of the spiritual life, God’s dream in giving us the Psalms and Luke, is that over time – and however imperfectly – we will develop a kind of inner simplicity, what Daniel Snyder (in his wonderful Praying in the Dark) calls “interior alignment,” maybe a sort of spiritual gyroscope that keeps us pointed toward our true north. “One thing is needful.” I’ve known people (and occasionally, by God’s grace, I am momentarily one of them) who manage a peaceful and even joyful orientation even in the thick of racket or crises or hurry or weariness.
The question is whether we can trust Scripture and the saints when they suggest to us that the secret to life isn’t “more,” accumulating experiences and things. In the spiritual life – heck, just in life – less is more. The only way to slow things down is to slow down. You are enough. You have enough. You are here, as in on earth in your life, for one thing, not many. How many songs, poems, novels, miniseries and movies dramatize the frustrations of not quite finding that one thing, but then the joys of finally finding the one thing? Dorothy comes home to Kansas. Ain’t no sunshine when she’s gone. Andy escapes Shawshank. Annie and Sam meet atop the Empire State Building.
Even these come up a little short of beholding the beauty of the Lord, soaring now where Christ has led on Easter morning, or being surprised by joy, the joy of mercy and hope. The pearl of great price for which you sell everything. Simply dropping your nets and following Jesus. Grab hold of that one thing, and never let it go – or realize that one thing has a firm grasp on you.