Jesus is the king of paradox. 

A paradox is when two things that appear to be opposite of one another or actually both true.

For example, Jesus was both strong and meek at the same time. 

He was both humble and authoritative at the same time. 

He was both convicting and forgiving at the same time.

But one of the biggest paradoxes from Jesus‘s earthly ministry is the picture he painted of the difference between work and rest.

Jesus had an underlying message to everything he did, which was essentially this: love God and love people. 

And he didn’t make them out to be two steps of a process. 

In fact, he said that one is “like the other”. 

What he was saying was that loving God and loving people may feel like two different things, but they’re actually all part of one process happening in our hearts.

The tricky part that humans can mess up sometimes is that if loving people is important, then activity can start to feel like significance. 

The more good things we do, the better we feel.

We start to think that good works result in a closer relationship with God, therefore more work is better.

When you consider something to be a ministry, it can feel like you’re only as significant as the size or impact of your ministry.

But in Jesus’s ministry, he showed that the opposite is true… 

In God’s Kingdom, you can accomplish more by doing less.

For example, when Jesus went to Martha’s house in Luke chapter 10, we see a story of two sisters, Mary and Martha. Martha is slaving away preparing things for what must be done throughout the house as a result of having company over. 

She wasn’t doing anything wrong. In fact, the words used in the original language of the Bible for what Martha was doing is the same word used for “service” or “ministry”. It’s interesting to note that this is one of the first mentions of this word for ministry used in the New Testament.

But Mary, on the other hand, was doing quite the opposite. Scripture tells us that Mary was sitting at Jesus’s feet and listening. That’s it. 

She was essentially doing what we would call chilling.

When Martha complained to Jesus that Mary was being lazy and not helping with the service (the “ministry”), Jesus said an interesting and paradoxical thing. 

He said that while Martha was worried about many things, there was actually only one thing she needed, and that was Jesus. 

Mary had found that, and Jesus said that no one would take that from her.

But wait – to serve is to love, right? And yet Mary was doing less work – less ministry – and accomplishing more in Jesus’ eyes?

What does that mean for us today? 

The key to answering that question is found in Luke 10:40. It says that Martha was “distracted“ by “much service”. 

The Greek word used for “distracted” literally means to be drawn away from or dragged around. 

Martha was being pulled away from the thing that mattered most and being dragged around in order that she wouldn’t find her way back.

I find it interesting that God gave very simple visions to people in the Bible. 

He kept them very simple yet very specific. 

I think he does this so we won’t be distracted by all of the many other things that will come our way while pursuing the thing he’s put in front of us to do.

He told Abraham that he would be a father of many nations. He didn’t say how that would happen exactly, but Abraham knew that would come through his wife because that was God’s design. Other than that, Abraham essentially had no details regarding the plan.

Moses was told to free the Israelites from Egypt but he wasn’t told which route to take to the Promise Land. He was given a very short list of instructions. 

If you and I were to try to plan something similar, we would probably take days, weeks, months, or even years to plan such an endeavor. But God gives him a few lines of instructions and tells him to go.

Gideon was told he would overtake an extremely powerful enemy, but he wasn’t given a battle plan. In fact, when he raised an army, God stripped the army down to 1% of the people Gideon had prepared.

Noah was told to build an ark and he was told how big the ark would be but he wasn’t told when it would rain, how long he had to build it, how long he would be in the boat, or any of the other million details required to build something of that magnitude.

In story after story, God gives clear direction but he keeps his vision simple. 

I believe he does this so we don’t get drawn away from what matters most.

Think about Jesus…

As he’s getting ready to ascend into heaven after the most important event in human history, he has a captive audience of loyal disciples ready to embark on the most important adventure mankind has ever known. 

This would be the time to lay out the plan and cast the vision with lots of vivid detail including all of the various options and opportunities each of them would have to accomplish a very important mission that later became known as the Great Commission.

But what does Jesus say to them? He says for them to do one thing: Go and make disciples of all nations.

He could’ve laid out an intricate game plan. He could’ve talked about all of the many ways that they could go and make disciples. 

He could’ve given them options and caveats and nuance. 

But he didn’t. 

Instead, he gave them a simple command that could be fulfilled through any number of their own ideas and actions as long as they all pointed to what mattered most, which was to make disciples of all nations.

Here’s the point: your worst enemy is distraction. 

Whenever you try to do anything meaningful, whether it’s work you’re doing at your job, raising your kids, cultivating your marriage, or doing a specific work that God has given you, you’re going to face things that attempt to draw you away from making direct progress towards the vision.

What’s interesting is, even though Martha was the one distracted by “much service”, she was the one who opened her home to Jesus in the first place (see Luke chapter 10). 

She had been open and receptive to Jesus, yet she had so many other things that needed to be done. And she got distracted.

Jesus wasn’t saying to never clean the house and never prepare dinner. But he was saying that in those moments when there’s something attempting to draw us away from what matters most, we should stop and take a serious inventory of what’s most important.

This looks like trying to find ways to make money because you’re afraid that if you jump in to what God has put in front of you he won’t provide.

This might also look like neglecting your marriage because there are so many things to do when you have kids, a house, a job, sports, activities, social events and everything else that comes with adult life.

We get distracted by “much service.”

And remember, service isn’t a bad thing. 

The same word is used in the Bible for ministry. 

But I think it’s very interesting that the first time we see the word ministry in the New Testament, Jesus is saying to not get distracted by trying to do too much.

So what is most important to you?

What is the thing that if everything else had to go away it must remain no matter what in order for you to maintain a fulfilling life? 

It’s not to say you’ll only ever do that, but everything else in your life should only be done when it leads directly to that thing being accomplished or when it leaves plenty of room for that thing to be accomplished.

Because your impact is not limited by your ability. Your impact is limited by your distractions.