First Things First

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 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 from her."

Luke 10:40-42

I have often heard these verses used to teach that we must choose between being a Mary who sits at the feet of Jesus, and Martha who busies herself with preparing dinner for Him. Dare I say that we can be both Mary and Martha; that we can both worship Jesus and serve Him? Mary chose "the good part", to put worship of Christ first. I submit that Martha had her priorities messed up. She should have put the meal on the table after spending time with the Savior. The Lord pointed out to Martha that she was "worried and bothered about so many things." This tells me that Martha was stressed out over her service to the Lord -- maybe even doing too much -- and He didn't want that. He said "only one thing is necessary", and that one thing was spending time with Him. My guess is Martha would have found her service less stressful, if she had first spent time with the Lord.