Mary and Matha Book Study - Chapter 9

We are in the heart of synchro season and the beginning of summer baseball. I just don't know how those of you with more than 2 children can manage. Anyway, I am continuing to read and determined to finish this book. I only have two chapters left, but here is what I learned in chapter 9. I will do a second post for chapter 10

Chapter 9 - Martha's Teachable Heart

John 8:31-31
"If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples.
Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free"

It is interesting to see the kind of people Jesus choose as his followers - untrained, common men of the time. That is what most of us are. Weaver states that the disciples had the "potential for transformation". And I guess that is true for us also. This is what she says about transformation

"Unfortunately, though we all applaud the thought of transformation, most of us don't appreciate the process that gets us there. To be transformed means we have to change, and change too often hurts."(pg 138)

Martha reveals this transformation during her walk with Jesus to see a dead Lazarus.

"Jesus choose her open and teachable heart to reveal himself by saying 'I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies... Do you believe this?' Jesus asked Martha in John 11:25-26.

'Yes, Lord,' she replied, 'I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who was to come into the world'" (11:27)

...and this insightful proclamation came not from contemplative, sensitive Mary, but from organized, duty-bound - but teachable - Martha?" (Weaver page 143)

Weaver stresses that we must be teachable and to be teachable requires three things.

*being willing to listen (to God)
*acting on what we hear (sometimes the hard part for me)
*responding to discipline (as a result of not responding to the first two)

I like what weaver says on page 151

"My deepest fear has always been that I might wake up thirty years from now an realize I haven't changed...What a terrible thing that would be, But unless I have a teachable heart, such spiritual stagnation is my destiny...The purpose of Jesus' death on the cross wasn't to provide fire insurance or an all-expenses-paid trip to heaven. He died and rose again so we could be made new."

Dear Jesus-Thank you for loving me enough to not let me stay the same. Help me to hear your voice and respond to your living word. Thank you for your gentle and sometimes not so gentle nudgings to do the best thing instead of the easiest. You are so amazing. Amen.