I spent part of the morning decorating the sanctuary for Christmas. I wasn’t terribly happy about it, to be honest. Not that it wasn’t fun. Those of us who gathered enjoyed the community and the work, and the fun. Except for maybe David Carter’s puns. Just kidding, David, they were hilarious. Sort of.
Anyway, it was a good time and I’m sorry so many people missed it. It was a pretty small crew. So, it wasn’t the company that I was grumpy about. Nor was it the work (even though I left early to pick up a kid - sorry about that gang). No my grumble has to do with the timing.
Maybe I’ve been married too long, but La Donna has driven into me this sense of order and Christmas decorations before Thanksgiving just seems wrong somehow. It had to be done, I realize, but it just seemed too early. We’ve had snow and cold and the stores have had the decorations up for a month or more now. So, what’s my problem? Dunno. Just doesn’t feel right. Something is out of sync. Even when you can’t explain it, you respond to it. It is as if your soul can feel it. "This just isn’t right," we think - maybe without words to describe it.
I’ve moved from early Christmas decorating, into something more powerful. That feeling that nothing you are doing seems to work. The relationships you thought you understood, now seem to be out of reach. The community you thought you were a part of now seems alien and foreign to you. The world in which we live seems to have taken a turn that we didn’t plan on or approve of or completely understand. We are told if we just work harder, just focus more, just pay attention then it will all make sense, or we can work ourselves back into a right relationship with all there is, or at least enough of all there is to feel comfortable again. So, we try. With all our own strength and knowledge, we try. It seems to work for a while, but not for long.
It is to this frustration that Jesus speaks in our Gospel passage for this weekend. It is this belief that we can fix our own disorder, we can make things right by doing more, by working harder that he so wants to change. It is his desire that we find our way to hope, that we live in sync.
Take a look at these familiar verses:
Matthew 11:28-30 "Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."
Contextually, Jesus was referring to the burdens placed on the people of God by those in leadership who expanded on the law. When God gave the law to Moses on Mt. Sinai it was a pretty simple thing. Ten Commandments carved onto two stone tablets - straightforward, clear and concise, just what we expect from laws! Right? Uh, no. Ever read the simplified tax code from the US Government?
God tried to keep things simple. There were laws about how to worship and laws about how to live in community - and what else do you need? Well, heaped on top of these ten laws were literally thousands of interpretations and applications that also must be followed in order to stay right. It became so onerous that no one could remember them all let alone obey them. So, every one lived out of sync with God’s law, at least according to those in charge. Most people wanted to be right, wanted to follow the law, but it was impossible. So, they lived with the burden of not being right, not being pure enough to worship, not having access to God, except through those in charge who guarded the gates religiously. (Sorry - I blame David)
Jesus came along and said "take my yoke." One of the concepts we struggle with in this passage is the fact that there is a yoke to take and that there is rest to receive. Which is it Jesus? Yoke or rest? A yoke implies work, and rest implies ... well ... NOT work. We like the rest thing, aren’t too sure about the yoke thing, to be honest. Even if it is easy and light.
Someone called this passage the Great Invitation. That makes four "Greats" that I can identify. There is the Great Commission - "Go and Make Disciples" (Matthew 28:19); the Great Commandment - "You shall love the Lord" (Matthew 22:37 et al); the Great Requirement "Do justice, love kindness, walk humbly with your God" (Micah 6:8); and now the Great Invitation - "Come to me" (Matthew 11:28).
But the real question is, to what are we invited? Is it work or is it rest? Labor and struggle, or vacation and getting away from it all? Is this about heaven or about earth? Yes. To all the precedes. Yes. And no. The invitation is to a relationship. "Take MY yoke," says Jesus, "and learn from me." He is inviting us into a partnership, to labor alongside him in the fields of the Lord. He wants us to take on his spirit, his heart. He asks of us to be "gentle and humble in heart" as we live and work in this world. It is not a task so much as a way of living, a way of being alive.
So, it IS a yoke. There IS a burden. But it a yoke that is easy and burden that is light. Does that mean that there is no effort here? That it is something we do without thinking, without straining? Not necessarily. "Easy" in this case really means "well-fitting." The yoke that Christ offers is a yoke that fits us, it is right for us. It doesn’t rub in the wrong places and make us sore. There is effort, there is struggle at times, but it is good effort, it is healthy struggle and we feel the better for it. The burden of walking in the way of Christ is light because it is right, it is good, it builds us up rather than takes us down.
Christ doesn’t offer us an effortless life, but one that means something. We don’t get a struggle free life, but one that accomplishes something, and makes a difference in the world. Those around us are better because we are there. We are better, happier, more whole. That is the promise.
Sounds good, but doesn’t sound like rest to me. Unless by rest he meant something other than what we first imagine. Unless he meant something like the antidote to restlessness. That what he was offering was not so much a sun drenched beach upon which to kick back and nap, but a sense of belonging and of purpose that allows us to know that we are right, we are in sync with our deepest selves and with our loved ones (which is always a bigger crowd than we acknowledge) and with him. The offer of rest is another way of describing salvation, which has less to do with the gates of heaven and more to with the fields we plow when we are yoked to Christ. Certainly there is a promise of eternity and an invitation into the presence of God, but that promise and that presence are what make the burden of living so light and what make the yoke of Christ so easy. We will find, says Jesus, rest for our souls. Our backs are into the labors of love, our shoulders are bent to the tasks of justice, our hands are busy with the works of kindness, but our souls are at rest.
Walking humbly with God is offering yourself to the yoke of Christ. As a church what better can we do than be about the business of walking hand in hand with the one who calls us? As a church what better can we do than invest ourselves and our resources in that which brings us into the presence of God? What better can we do than to commit ourselves to the maintenance of the body of Christ?
What better can we do than to prepare ourselves for the advent of the Lord, especially when it seems too early!
Shalom,
Derek
No comments:
Post a Comment