Readings: Isaiah 32:16-20, Luke 10:38-42, (Ecclesiastes 3).

There is a time for everything under the heavens, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to tear and a time to mend, so what do we gain from all our toil? In the mystery of God, He has made all things beautiful in their own time. In a time of famine and a time of abundance, do we bless God in one and curse Him in another, or seek Him in all things? What can be gained in the mystery of a time of trial and a time of rest?

Each of us are free in that we can turn our eyes and hearts toward or away from Him – we can turn away from looking up to heaven burying them instead in our earthly cares. But Jesus does not edify Martha because she has done wrong but says her sister Mary has chosen what is better.

Let all that you do be done in love (1 Corinthians 16:14). Love binds us together in patience, in generosity, in gentleness, but we are free not to choose it, and how often we don’t! Our toil and our sufferings however are universal, though they take many forms we all grieve at some point in our lives, we can all suffer pain in mind, body and soul. So just as His love binds us in relationship with one another, in family and in our communities, so is solidarity born in our suffering together.

Some have said suffering is a punishment given for the fall of Adam and Eve, but in our fallenness God clothed us with love to cover our shame. Suffering was not a punishment; it holds us together as a universal in this fallen world. We see this at the cross where we are bound to Him and to each other by both His love and His suffering. In our fallenness, in our humanity, the purpose of suffering is unity.

How beautiful are the feet of Christ that walk upon the mountain – to sit at His feet is to rest in His presence and dwell with and alongside His love. In Him we find rest in all times, whether this is in times of toil, suffering or love. He encircles us in all things, and in all times, comforting us in our days of uncertainty – and this is not particular to our modern days, for the times past and present were and are always changing; in the days of war and peace, in the days of famine or feast, God is with us – but let us not fall asleep in this certainty and let others deal with what is beyond the walls of our own homes, but hear the call to recognise the humanity of Christ in the eyes of all people, that as one human family no one exists on this planet alone, that we are all connected in love and suffering, though far greater it is to be connected in love!

The healing presence of Jesus gives to us so that we may give what we have to others. And in our final judgement, the measure we use, will be measured to us. The healing presence of Christ is the hope and life of heaven we carry in our hearts – it is that we do not see as the world sees, we do not fix our gaze on outward appearance, but look for Him in otherness, to seek and find Him who binds us together, who repairs and restores us to the Kingdom of God. May we too in His rest be the spark that ignites the fire of the Holy Spirit in others. Let us trust the work to the Holy Spirit through us as His servants sowing good seed by every stream, for it is the fire of God that purifies, not the works of our hands in themselves, but He who works in us and through us.

Let our hearts be open, let our hearts be large, for God works within our understanding as well as within all mysteries, in our order and our disorder.

As St Paul writes we walk by faith and not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7), and though the cross seems like foolishness to those who are perishing, for us it is the power of God, (1 Corinthians 1:18), visible in us as His life, His wisdom, truth and love.

And life was created to thrive as a whole. Life has the highest value but is not a thing to pursue as an end because it is something that already is. It is the gift of God that each of us may eat and drink and find satisfaction in our work. As a human can conceive of itself and others, it follows that human consciousness gives an individual value in itself as well as a value derived from its connectedness to others. If every human life has value it follows that this derives a universal equality.

So for whoever the mountains may fall and the earth be removed, they are us, and we are they – let us weep as St Paul says with whoever weeps (Romans 12:15).

So how do we choose and do what is good? Good must then be all things that work together for each other. Therefore, the foundation of good is relationship. The principle of any action is then drawn from a perspective of this equality or sameness as one humankind. If we as a humankind are the end in ourselves, then we work for each other and belong each one to the other. There is no division between us, we are the self and the other.

As the common good or a collective survival is easily derived from nature you may think from what I’ve said so far that whatever does the greater good is therefore the highest good. I say not, because if each life is precious and of infinite value, then as Jesus points out in the parable of the lost sheep, the one and the ninety-nine are equal in value. Can anything be greater than infinity? We also have Esau who despised his birth right by exchanging it for a bowl of stew. Therefore, when we are choosing to do good, we must not look to externals, or feelings as a foundation for that choice.

French philosopher Michel Foucault talks about how visibility and evidence are linked, that our seeing has limits and that to see is always to think. How easy it is for us like Martha to be caught up in the busyness of the world about us, to think or see as a construct of our circumstances, of the rules we set, the obligations we feel we must meet.

It is like losing ourselves in a forest, of not being able to see the woods for the trees. God says to Isaiah in verse 19 ‘though hail flattens the forest and the city is levelled completely, how blessed you will be.’ Suffering changes our seeing, we recognise our humanity, our connectedness, our need of God.

How blessed are they who rest at the feet of Jesus, who give their time to God, to listen, to be in His presence, to be nourished by His word and filled with the true bread from heaven.

Mary in that time and in that place chose what was better, and it cannot be taken away from her, for His love feeds and waters the soul which will rest eternally with Him in heaven.

Amen.