One Thing is Needful
What is a year? Is it not but vapor? For an insect, a year is a lifetime, or perhaps many lifetimes; but to a man, a year is as sand falling through his hand, quickly passing, and then gone. Indeed, as we grow older, the years move quickly against us.
Today is my twenty-sixth birthday, and while that may not make me “old”, I feel the wane of time all the same. Perhaps I am just an old soul, but I feel the weariness of this world more and more with each passing year. Sin has the tendency to do just that: it strains the soul, it burdens the mind, and quite simply, it makes us tired. This dreary world makes our weary hearts long for rest, for home - for Him.
What is a year? Is it not a test-run? Just as our years are made up of days, so too are our lives made up of years. If we throw away our days - and our years - will not our life suffer for it? The days go by slowly, but the years fly by; our life is but a little flame that is easily and quickly snuffed out, and then we are ushered upon the plains of eternity before “Him with whom we have to do” (Hebrews 4:13). Indeed, as C.T. Studd once penned, “Only one life, ‘twill soon be past, only what’s done for Christ will last”.
As I do with the approach of each birthday, I’ve been taking stock of the past year. If the last twelve months can be seen as a microcosm of my life, a test-run of sorts, did I run my race well? The answer is both yes and no. As it is with many of us, this past year has been a mixed bag; a series of bruises and blessings, a combination of dark valleys and high mountain tops. Over the last year, tears have been shed, both of joy and profound sorrow.
Last night, I took some time aside at the end of a busy week to simply walk and talk with the Lord. Over the years, I’ve found that I think and pray best while walking through the countryside, so that’s precisely what I did. It didn’t feel right to end the last day of my twenty-fifth year without simply thanking God for the countless blessings that He’s showered on me over the past twelve months. Even if I wanted to list everything that the Lord has done for me this year, I could not; for, “I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written” (John 21:25).
However, in remembering the past year, my mind was slowly being drawn to the year ahead. There are many exciting things lying before my feet in the upcoming year, for both myself and my wife, but there is a lot of change on the horizon as well. Suddenly, my thoughts began to drift not too all of the good that the Lord has done in the year behind, but to the things that must be done in the year ahead. In no time at all, my distracted mind began to compose a list of everything that required my attention in the coming days: bills to pay, emails that needed answering, and so on, endlessly as it were. It’s so easy to feel stretched thin, is it not?
And then, just as suddenly as my mind became distracted, a certain warmth began to bleed across my soul. Within moments, indeed in the moment between moments, a single truth took hold: “You are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is needful”.
The words felt like a warm embrace. I couldn’t at first recall where these words were from, but the speaker, the who, was unmistakable. As I was walking, it took me only a brief moment to pinpoint where exactly these words came from, and then I remembered:
“Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, ‘Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.’ But the Lord answered her, ‘Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is needful. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her’” (Luke 10:38-42).
There is a sense in which the past year of my life can be characterized by distraction. Not a distraction with bad things, exactly, but with lesser things. Not an all-consuming distraction with lesser things by any means, but not a whole-hearted devotion to the most important things either. In the midst of such profound blessings - my relationship with the King of kings, my beautiful wife, our family, and our church family - how easy it is to become fixated nonetheless on the fleeting things of this world: financial responsibilities, work stress, and the state of the world at large.
In our daily lives, there are many voices and vices vying for our attention. And yet, amidst the clamor of these many voices, the voice of the Lord cuts directly to the heart. When this passage in Luke 10 came to my mind last night, I was struck by how powerfully and immediately it set my heart at ease. The sound and fury of this world is no match for the still, small voice of the Lord; He created your heart, He doesn’t need to shout. He is the good shepherd, and His sheep “know His voice” (John 10). In asking the Lord for wisdom and guidance in the year ahead, He provided at once from His Word the very words I needed to hear most.
Indeed, “one thing is needful”. For, in this one thing, intimacy with Christ and obedience to His Word, all other things are bound. To make much of Him is to make much of all things. To love Him with every iota of my being is to also love my wife, and family, and church to the utmost. It is a profound mystery, but it also makes total sense - if we are willing to lose our lives for Him, we will surely find our lives in the process, for He is life itself.
My friend C.S. Lewis, who at this point is such a fixture of this blog that he might as well be a co-writer on it, remarked on this very mystery in this way: “Put first things first and we get second things thrown in: put second things first and we lose both first and second things.”
And so, while we may not know what lies ahead in the year to come, let us endeavor, all of us, to put first things first. In the midst of any anxieties and troubles that may come our way, let this banner be over our hearts: but one thing is needful, and He shall not be taken away from us, nor us from Him. Come what may, the Lord is God, and God He’ll stay.
