Read­ing Time: 2 minutes

Introduction

In this Sunday Gos­pel read­ing, Jesus con­tin­ues his teach­ings on the king­dom of God and the con­di­tion for inher­it­ing it; and on why some people work their way away from etern­al life. Last Sunday Gos­pel (cf. Luke 10:25–37) ended in verse 37. And this Sunday Gos­pel begins from verse 38 of the same chapter. In oth­er words, the story of Jesus in the home of Martha and Mary com­ple­ments the story of the Good Samar­it­an, which imme­di­ately pre­cedes it in the Gos­pel accord­ing to Luke. To be noted also is that both stor­ies are unique to Luke. Remem­ber, Jesus is still on his way to Jer­u­s­alem (cf. Luke 9:51), the cli­max of his mis­sion and where he will x‑ray the reli­gious form­al­ity and injustice of the Jew­ish people and the crooked­ness of reli­gious and civil author­it­ies. These were dis­trac­tions from that which mat­ters. Hence, the theme of this reflec­tion – Dis­tract­ing my dis­trac­tions. 

Avoiding distractions  

By dis­trac­tion, I do not mean someone, a thing or an enter­tain­ment that pro­vokes pleased interest and dis­tracts you from wor­ries and vex­a­tions. Instead, by dis­trac­tion is meant draw­ing your atten­tion away from what really mat­ters. It is obstacle to atten­tion. In the con­ver­sa­tion between Jesus and the law­yer as recor­ded in Luke 10:21–37, with the story of the man who fell in the hands of the hood­lums, Jesus taught the law­yer and all believ­ers, that the­or­et­ic­al and blind obed­i­ence to the law were ser­i­ous hindrances and dis­trac­tions to the pur­suit of etern­al life. Jesus’ vis­it to his friends’ house, offered him anoth­er oppor­tun­ity to reit­er­ate this mes­sage. The pur­suit of the king­dom of God should not be second to any­thing. But Martha did not under­stand this. She was too dis­trac­ted with worldly mat­ters to the extent she even wanted to quar­rel with her sis­ter Miri­am. The jour­ney towards etern­al life abhors dis­trac­tions. Dis­trac­tion could be intern­al or extern­al. Unfor­tu­nately, many people are so dis­trac­ted that they lose focus in life. Mis­place­ment of pri­or­ity and value is a ser­i­ous sign of dis­trac­tion. Many people fail in life because they are dis­trac­ted. Dis­trac­tion is pla­cing a keg in the wheel of success.

Conclusion

Dear friend, look around you. Observe everything hap­pen­ing around you. Sit back a moment and reflect on your life, your fam­ily, your town, your kindred, place of work, school, your office, gov­ern­ment houses, churches, your coun­try, and the world. What do you notice? What do you observe? Martha every­where. Dis­trac­tions all over. Cer­tainly, if you are like Martha, you can nev­er notice the dis­trac­tions around you and which are dis­tract­ing you too. Some­times some people com­plain and lament of so many things and that they are being dis­trac­ted. But the truth of the mat­ter is that they are the dis­trac­tions them­selves. They dis­tract both them­selves and oth­ers. How many lead­ers both civil and reli­gious are dis­trac­ted? That they do not and can­not lead well is due to their too many dis­trac­tions. The Nigeri­an gov­ern­ment both at the Fed­er­al, State, and Loc­al levels are typ­ic­al example of a dis­trac­ted, con­fused and vis­ion­less government.

FOR DETAILS, GET YOUR OWN COPIES OF THE BOOK “THE WORD OF LIFE:
SUNDAY REFLECTIONS” (vols. I‑II-III)!! The reflec­tion for the 16^th Sunday is found in The Word of Life, vol. III, pages 384–394. Happy reading!

For details on how to get it, con­tact the author on this link: https://m.me/uchennabiblia?fbclid=IwAR2yeg4a6sDGBp9QGkIvKj6FSADumMokN6lshdE0zuo-JHs6qOmlhA7jyHo
or email me at: postmaster@uchennabiblia.com
or simply send an SMS on 08116100926, and I will get back to you.

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