In “other” Words: Who is the Guest of Honor at Your Party?

“Jesus didn’t want Martha to be so caught up in kitchen ser­vice FOR him that she missed out on the joy of liv­ing room inti­macy WITH him.” Joanna Weaver
Hav­ing a Mary Spirit: Allow­ing God to Change Us from the Inside Out

You know some­one like Martha. Per­haps you are like her.

She’s the “host­ess with the mostest:” The most beau­ti­ful sil­ver, china and crys­tal, the ele­gantly let­tered place cards, the exquis­ite linens, the breath­tak­ingly gor­geous cen­ter­pieces, the gourmet food that tastes like noth­ing you’ve ever expe­ri­enced before.

When she plans a din­ner party, the prepa­ra­tions begin weeks or even months in advance. There is usu­ally a theme and, of course, color scheme. She spends what seems like an eter­nity set­ting the table, mak­ing sure every­thing is in pre­cisely the right spot before going back to the kitchen to assure that the food prepa­ra­tion is pro­gress­ing flawlessly.

When the party finally begins, the host­ess is per­fectly coiffed and smil­ing as she greets and wel­comes you. Every­one remarks about the lovely table and the deli­cious food, com­pli­ment­ing the host­ess on “pulling it off with­out a hitch” yet again!

That’s if they can find her … dur­ing much of the party she is vir­tu­ally invis­i­ble to you as she moves between the kitchen and ban­quet room refill­ing glasses, mak­ing sure the trays of hors d oeu­vres are full, tim­ing the serv­ing of each sub­se­quent course until the last plate has been cleared and every­one is enjoy­ing their after-dinner coffee.

There’s noth­ing wrong with being a won­der­ful host­ess, adept at plan­ning and exe­cut­ing an ele­gant party and mak­ing your guests feel wel­come and comfortable.

I’ve actu­ally only known a few women like the one described above in my life­time and on the rare occa­sions I have found myself at an elab­o­rate party, I have watched the host­esses, search­ing for clues to their true nature.

I recall one woman in par­tic­u­lar at whose table I enjoyed a lux­u­ri­ous gourmet meal. She swore that she loved to enter­tain. It was clearly some­thing she was very good at doing and her hus­band not only expected it of her, but was extremely com­pli­men­tary about her efforts through­out the evening. But in her eyes, I thought I saw a hint of sad­ness. Although she smiled gra­ciously through­out the evening, I was not fully con­vinced that she was actu­ally hav­ing the fun she pro­fessed. Her smile seemed just a bit forced as she moved among her guests and I would swear that she was relieved when peo­ple began say­ing good night and head­ing home.

I’ve known a lot of peo­ple who approached ser­vice to their church in much the same fash­ion. They claimed to love chair­ing a com­mit­tee, orga­niz­ing a fundraiser, lead­ing a Bible study or teach­ing Sun­day School. But they went about serv­ing in a work­man­like, unin­spired and joy­less man­ner, as though they were merely doing what was expected of them either by their pas­tor, their fel­low parish­ioners … or to con­form with their own self-image.

Enter­tain­ing should not become such a chore that we don’t enjoy our own party. Get­ting caught up in the details and stress­ing over the minu­tiae to the point that we are relieved when the fes­tiv­i­ties end assures that we miss out on the most impor­tant aspect of a party: The fel­low­ship and camaraderie.

The same is true of ser­vice. Psalm 100 tells us to “serve the Lord with glad­ness; Come before Him with joy­ful singing.” Implicit in that direc­tive is the com­mand to make sure that the work of serv­ing does not detract from our rela­tion­ship with the Divine Cre­ator or allow us to lost sight of why we offer our time and tal­ents. It is, of course, because we are called to serve, com­manded to do so.

It is also because, through mean­ing­ful ser­vice, we dis­cover a great deal about our­selves and draw closer to the Divine. There is inti­macy to be found in serv­ing, espe­cially when we serve glee­fully and with abandon.

That’s what Jesus wanted for Martha — joy, ful­fill­ment and inti­macy through ser­vice rather than duty and drudgery.

He wants us to plan the party, use the best linens, let­ter the place cards, cook up a feast . . . and then enjoy the occa­sion along with and in the midst of our guests. With him. He wants us to get to spend time con­vers­ing and get­ting to know him bet­ter to under­stand not only his Spirit, but his desires for us.

He wants to be the guest of honor not just at spe­cial events but at the party we throw every day … in our very lives. Every moment of every day.

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