Nevertheless, We Persist

Luke 18:1-8

I don’t think we can grasp what Jesus’s parables were like to hear in person. We treat them like they belong in a dry, dusty old book, but I feel like this one was a Renaissance Fair skit. 

Jesus begins, ‘In a “certain city” (dramatic pause so they could fill in which city they thought he must be thinking of) there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. 

In creeps a vaudevillian character in a long black cloak, with a twisty malevolent mustache. 
 
In” that city” there was a widow (out pops a sympathetic grandmother type) who kept coming to him and saying, (she turns to the audience and pipes up) “Grant me justice against my opponent.” 

For a while he refused; but nevertheless, she persisted! Finally, he said to himself, (the judge turns to the audience and remarks, finger on his chin), “Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, yet because this widow (pointing at her) keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming!" 

(Waves his magic justice fairy wand. End scene).
 
All that to say, there was a playfulness to Jesus’s storytelling.  And the scenarios and characters in his parables are often exaggerated to make a point.  And thankfully for us, the point is said right up front here. “He told them a story so they would pray always and not lose heart.” 
 
And friends, I feel like not losing heart is a good goal.  

I feel how easy it could be to lose heart. This week I heard someone quote a scientist who said, “The three biggest environmental issues facing us today are selfishness, apathy and greed. And scientists can’t do anything about those.”  That’s one thing that could make me lose heart, for example.  
 
And Jesus tells this story of this persistent widow, which is to say – this person without power or voice who refuses to stop asking the person with power, but no character, for justice against her opponent. We don’t know anything about this opponent or, what they have done, or whether her claim is stronger than her opponent’s, or what justice would even look like.  All we are told of is her persistence. And how her persistence ultimately persuaded the jerk holding all the power, who sees no authority above himself and cares about nobody, to rule in her favor. That’s how persistent she was!

And won’t God, Jesus asks, God – who is actually just, who actually love us, who is actually already moving everything toward wholeness and healing – won’t God be far more responsive when we cry out for wrongs to be made right? 
 
Justice means for wrongs to be made right. 

Unfortunately, try as we might, we can’t actually make wrongs right.  We can punish, and we can enact revenge, and we can correct imbalances, and we can change laws so things are better in the future. We can acknowledge how wrong things actually are. But we can’t make wrongs right.  Humans are affected by what we do and say to each other and stuck with the consequences of our actions.  And while of course, society needs order and rules, nothing can undo what has been done. 
 
I heard an interview this week with someone who was wrongly convicted at 20 years old, spent 17 years in prison, and was finally released.  He was given $50,000 for each year he was in prison, and the interviewer asked how that money had helped. He responded that it can’t make up for being kidnapped for 17 years, can’t give him back the college education he was ripped out of, or provide a career’s worth of job skills that he didn’t get to acquire.  He has filed a hefty civil suit against the detectives who investigated the case.  When asked what that money would mean, besides the practical implications, he answered, “It would be justice.”  
 
But no amount of money can give back the life that was taken from him. It can only win him public acknowledgement of just how wrong it all was, which seems like about the best we can hope for. Making Alex Jones pay nearly a billion dollars to a group of Sandy Hook parents doesn’t take back the horrifying damage his words have done and will continue to do. Even more to the point, it can’t bring them back.  
 
The gaping losses we experience, the hurt we cause and the hurt we absorb, the terrible disparity we operate within, everyday unfairnesses and the brutality of sheer evil, these are wrong. They are not as life should be. Can any human mechanism we can wield actually make what’s wrong right?  
 
So, this persistent widow is our model, then. We are to come again and again, crying out for wrongs to be made right. We are to persist in demanding this and not let up.  And actually, this is the way to not lose heart. Because we are joining our hearts with God’s heart that beats for justice, God’s reality that holds the promise of all wrongs being made right.  
 
Along with our good intentions, we are also filled with selfishness, apathy and greed, and generally human beings are unimaginative when it comes to hope. We don’t really believe wrongs can be made right. Maybe this is what Jesus means when he ends his story with one of those head-shaking, hypothetical questions lifted to the sky: But when the Son of Man comes back will he even find any faith on earth? 
 
We go by what we can see and do, not by what God does. 

We aim for retribution, but God delivers resurrection. 

We are limited by the confines of this life, barricaded in by death, and we lose sight of the reality that there is life beyond all confines and barriers, beyond what our limited imaginations can conceive of, pulsing always underneath it all. God’s justice is for now and for what is to be.  

God is not an unjust judge, and faith is not a means to an end. 

God is the source of all life, and the energy of love that pours into us and calls us back to what life is meant to be for all.  
 
But we don’t get to be the powerful one in the story. 

We’re the ones who come in our weakness like the persistent widow, the very weakness God took on and shared with us in Christ. 

By the world’s standards, God’s tools in our hands are unimpressive. They are things like forgiveness, listening, shared suffering, steady presence and hope-filled persistence. They are being, and seeing, and welcoming, instead of winning, or proving, or declaring.  
In fact, these tools of faith have no power in themselves at all. Instead they are gateways to eternity, portals to love and reconciliation, doorways to hope and promise. Because despite what we all fear, death is not the end.

The author of Hebrews calls faith, “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things unseen.” (Heb. 11:1). And the way to back to this assurance is to pray.  
 
Praying is not relentlessly begging a disinterested, selfish, and apathetic power-monger for acknowledgment of wrongs committed or retribution against an enemy.  Praying is turning our hearts to the Beloved, surrendering to the magnetic pull back to the source of all life, letting ourselves come in honesty and longing, again and again, to One in whom wrongs are made right.  
 
And when we do that, we will not lose heart. 

What we will begin to lose is our selfishness, our apathy and our greed. We will begin to see our lives shaped toward the justice we long for, the justice that is promised.   And we will begin to grow into a robust eschatological imagination that lives joyfully and ever more confidently into what is coming.  
 
And so, now we will do what Jesus told us to. We will be persistent and we will pray.
 
God, things are not ok.  
Life feel precarious and frightening.  
The earth feels fragile and on the brink of collapse. 
Progress toward equity slips, 
unity feels elusive, 
those on the margins bear the brunt, 
and those with wealth and power hold the reigns. 
 
Right now, war is raging, 
democracy seems wounded and flailing, 
lies are sold as truth and people we love believe them, 
vengeance masquerades as justice,
and hatred has become justified, 
and, God, if we’re honest,
we’re so weary of it, so exhausted and saddened by it all,
 that apathy beckons to us as sweet relief.  
It sometimes feels like not caring 
might be the only thing that saves us.
 
SUNG REFRAIN: 

But if it's not ok,
then it is not the end.
And this is not ok, so I know
this is not
this is not the end.
 
God, we are not ok.  
There is so much depression, 
so much anxiety, so much despondency, 
so much worry, so much fear.
and we want to fix it and can’t.
We forget that we all just went through the stuff of Hollywood blockbusters. 
We forget that the whole human family has been through a massive shared trauma. 
We forget that all of life as we know it was suddenly turned upside down 
and shaken up for nearly two years,
and it’s not even in the rearview mirror.
Effects linger, the impact reverberates, 
the shock hasn’t worn off.
We are scrambling to find a new normal, 
but don’t even know where to begin.
And we’re tired.  
God, everything takes energy that we don’t have.
 
SUNG REFRAIN: 

But if it's not ok,
then it is not the end.
And this is not ok, so I know
this is not
this is not the end.
 
God, we long for things to be ok,
but our senses are dulled
to the beauty, the interconnectedness,
the hope, 
the promise always lurking inside every interaction,
every silence, the laughter and tears, the hugs and hands touching,
the gentle gaze and friendly voice,
the shared quiet and sudden delight.
We’re generally numb to the thrilling potential for resurrection 
lingering around every corner.
 
Our hope is stunted; our faith is weak.
We aim for sustainable; you call us to life-giving.
We aim for tolerance; you call us to belonging.
We aim for stability, you call us to transformation.
We aim for parity, you call us to abundance.
We surrender our puny aspirations
and our paltry goals, Lord.  
We let them go.
 
SUNG REFRAIN: 

But if it's not ok,
then it is not the end.
And this is not ok, so I know
this is not
this is not the end.
 
You are God. 
You were here yesterday, you’re here today 
and you will be here tomorrow.
There is nothing that is, 
or has been, or will be
that is outside of, or apart from, your love.
We are not alone.
 
So we ask, Lord, give us your heart
that can’t be lost.
Deliver us from selfishness,
cleanse us from apathy, 
free us from greed,
and release us from fear. 
Restore us to love - root us and ground us 
deep and secure in the love that will not let us go,
will not let this world go, will never let go.
 
SUNG REFRAIN: 

But if it's not ok,
then it is not the end.
And this is not ok, so I know
this is not
this is not the end.
 
God, right here, in the midst of everything that is not ok, 
and everything that is ok too,
point our faces toward the further horizon,
point our lives toward the unimaginable, 
assure us of what can’t be seen, 
make us to know in our bones what surpasses knowledge: 
this “overwhelming, never-ending reckless” love of God 
made ours in Christ, that is saving the world. 
 
The Kingdom of God is breaking in upon the earth
and evil will not prevail.  
Only love remains.
You are already doing this. 

You are always doing this.
In you we all belong, 
to you we all belong.
Our weary souls and longing hearts belong in you, 
and the energy of your Spirit is what will move us. 
 
Help us, then, to trust in you. 
Help us, God, to rest in you. 
Help us, Jesus Christ, 
to persist, and not lose heart.

SUNG REFRAIN: 

But if it's not ok,
then it is not the end.
And this is not ok, so I know
this is not
this is not the end.

Amen.

(Sung refrain from Fool's Gold, by Sandra McCracken)

So, Sing

Psalm 98

Sing  a new song. 

Try it.

Something completely new.  

Something you’ve never sung before.

 You don’t know the words, you can barely hum the tune, but sing it anyway.

Try it on for size…no, just jump in and belt it out. 

Maybe you don’t sing with the confidence you would if it were the old song, the familiar song, the song that makes sense and feels easy.  Maybe you don’t feel so comfortable with the instruments, or worry that you’ll be singing alone.

Tell you what – how about if we sing with you?  

And not just us, the whole earth – the chaotic seas will sing too, and they can’t sound more in tune than you do – the floods will clap their messy hands; just make a joyful noise, really, any noise will do. 

But make it loud, ok?  

Because the hills are going to join in on this, and really, the world itself, and all those who live in it.  It will be a song like no other, so get ready to sing. Are you ready?

This song, it means something.  

This is one reason it is a new song and not the old songs.

It is not a song of proper religion.  It is not a song of patriotism, or a song of war.  It is not a lament for how terrible things are, or a song of social consciousness or commentary.  This song simply can’t be sung by ‘us and them’, or played on bandwagons or soap boxes, and it’s not a rally song, a commercial jingle, or background music in an elevator.   It’s not like the old songs in any way at all, so you need to let all those go if you’re really going to sing this song.

This is not a lullaby we’ll be singing, here, this song is more of a wake up and take notice type song.  It is a remember and never, ever, ever forget kind of song.  It is a song for all the times when you were treated unfairly, and not only you, but all of those who were treated unfairly, ever –even by you. 

It is a song for the times you were overlooked and undervalued, the times you were nothing but a number, or a diagnosis, or an accessory, or a liability.  

This is a song for the ravaged and destroyed creation; over the parched, burning and starving earth, it sings crashing seas and clapping floods and quenching rain. And where she’s drowning in sorrow it lifts the ground from waterlogged sludge, and drapes it gently over the line to dry in the tender breeze and warm sun. It’s that versatile and powerful a song.

This is a song for all the times when evil won, and those times were many and great - countless, or so we thought - it sings right in the face of those times, it thrusts it’s wide eyes and unquenchable joy right up under the nose of those times and opens its mouth and belts out with all gusto right into the shocked and startled face of evil, knocking it down on its bottom to stare up in stunned standstill at the wild and mighty sound of the song. 

This is a song of justice that tears through the paper thin fragility of justice and liberty for all, that lifts up all the incidences – every single one – where injustice and oppression were really the rule, where lives didn’t matter as much as money, where people were forsaken for power – the song, you will hear it, has every one of their voices, loud and strong, vindicated and joyful, each forsaken child, every cheated worker, and every single starving, sick, disregarded or devalued human being that has ever been, all the silenced and ignored and unheeded voices will rise together in a sound so great that it shatters glass ceilings into a million pieces, reduces palaces to rubble and grinds diamonds to dust, they will sing out a sound so powerful it drowns out every bomb and bullet and lie and label, and quakes opens the prisons and graves and sets the captives free. 

So get ready, because this is some song.

 This is not just any song, it is the song of the earth for her king, her Creator; this is a song of all things made right.

But you know, this song, actually, is kind of a dangerous song. 

It is not a song for the faint of heart. 

We already discovered you don’t need to really know the words, or even the tune, you don’t have to have practiced or learned this song, in fact, there is really no way to do so, you just sing it. 

But you have to be willing to sing it.

Are you willing to sing it? 

Because if you hear this song you can’t ever go back.

You can’t pretend you didn’t hear it.  You can’t be the way you were before you sang it.  It changes you, but not just you; it changes everything. So if you’re comfortable with how things are, I mean, if you don’t really want to see things too terribly different, than you’d better not sing the song.

 Just to be safe. 

Because there are no secrets once this song has been sung. 

There is nothing hidden that doesn’t get revealed. 

And all the things that look strong, or sure, or important, they might seem kind of silly and stupid once you hear this song. 

So if you care a whole lot about those things, better not to sing it, at least not just yet.  Let them get tarnished first, broken in, disappointing, let the expectations get a little bit dashed and the frustration build a bit, because this song is for everyone and everything, except it is NOT a song for the satisfied. 

It is not a song for the secure and the worthy, for the strong and the powerful, and it certainly doesn’t make you right or tell you who’s wrong.

 It kind of makes a joke of all that, and if that is where you’re at, better to cover your ears and turn away for as long as you can stand it before it overpowers you, because you’re going to be really cut down to size and I can’t imagine that will be a very pleasant experience. 

But once you are, there is a place for you in this song too. 

Actually, it’s kind of the only way you can join in the song, is when you know that in singing it, you pass judgment on yourself, but you sing it anyway.

Because – and this is the most important part, maybe I forgot to say this – the song is not about you. 

It’s actually not really about any of us, or anything we know or have done or ever will do.  It’s about God.  It’s all about God. 

It’s about what God has done and what God will do. 

It’s about God who does things, and doesn’t just watch it all and keep to Godself. 

But God watches too, and doesn’t miss a thing, so there is nothing, nothing that doesn’t get made right in this song. 

It sounds like kind of a lot, and it is, actually.

It’s everything. 

Way more than you or I could ever bear.

Way more joy, and justice, than we would know what to do with in a thousand lifetimes. 

But we don’t really need to worry about it. 

We just need to pay attention.

 The chorus is coming.  And when you’re paying attention, you get to see that it has already started. Here and there it startles you, or makes you cry for no reason, or gives you a weird thrill of recognition and irrational hope.

 We’ve found ways to explain it away, the crazies, the anomalies, the exceptions, the sentimental or insane, but they’re not, really, they’re the song, peaking through the frayed seams, busting through a rip in the knee or a tear in a button-hole of the fabric of our so-called reality. 

The stranger stands and shouts a few notes before helping someone off the bus, the man on the overpass with the sign grips the change in his fist and hollers a bit of the melody into the passing traffic below, Chaplain Amy turns off the lights and walks past the doors of the sleeping or weeping children at Saint Joe’s, and she rings out a tone that echoes in the halls for a split second, the exhausted men and women fishing no longer strangers and their neighbors and dogs from the floodwaters and ferrying them to safety wring poignant harmony from the sweet sound of souls greeting and grasping each other in relief and welcome.

In fact, all over the world, if we just know how to listen, above us, beneath us, before us and afterwards too, we’ll hear that the song has begun; and the very earth itself is humming in anticipation.  Just lift your gaze to the red tipped treetops and breathe, or plunge your hand into some soil for a moment.  Close down the computer, shut off the phone, turn off the tv and lights and curl up at an open window as the day slips into night and crickets and katydids hold steady chorus beneath the city sounds.

The noise is building.

And we, here today, we sing the song. It’s what we do.  

It’s why in the world we come and do this thing called worship that accomplishes nothing at all, as any reasonable person familiar with the old songs could tell you.

We come here together to share song, to remember the truth, to recount the steadfast love of our Lord, the coming and sharing and dying and rising, backwards and upside down, breaking in and spilling out, never ending and always persisting salvation of our God-with-us.

We warm up our voices and pipe out a few notes in defiance of the deafening silence, in far-fetched musical mutiny to the grating discord of the world around us, and really, on its behalf, because like it or not, ready or not, the song is coming. 

So you might as well sing along.

Are you tired yet?

At that time Jesus said, ‘I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.

 ‘Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 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. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.’ 

Matthew 11:25-30

Every day here in Australia I wake up to a Facebook feed flooded with anger and fear and frustration and desperation. Sign this petition, call your congressperson, here’s fifteen vital things you should be paying attention to for the next four years!  And underneath of all of all these cries of Urgency! Vigilance! I hear deep sorrow, fear, and an unyielding fatigue. We thought when the contentious election season ended we could finally stop being on constant alert. But it turns out that was just the beginning, and there is no end in sight.  Americans are divided in many ways, but one thing we all have in common, is that we are weary.

Into this weariness come Jesus’ words, Come to me, Jesus says, and I will give you rest.

OK, Jesus, that sounds nice, but get real. It will have to wait. You must not be paying attention. This is clearly not the time to rest. If there were ever a time in our lives for vigilance, attention and non-stop effort, surely this is it.  How could we really contribute if we stopped and rested? What would it say about us if we turned away, if we weren't watching every moment, absorbing and feeling every blow? How would we measure our commitment if we didn’t pay 24/7 attention to it all?

In regular life, we're already a mess around the idea of rest. Those we esteem most in western cultures are the tireless, the unstoppable, the fighters that just keep pushing themselves, those that get it done. How are you? We ask each other. “Busy!” we always answer, cheerfully, proudly, exhausted. We might as well answer, “Distracted! Pulled in many directions. Unable to focus on or enjoy any one thing. Weary.”

But amp up the ante, put the whole work-weary, pressure-weary, election-weary nation under this new regime that is systematically dismantling much of what had seemed definitive and unshakeable about our country, and we’re in uncharted waters.  “Weary” doesn’t begin to describe people’s emotional state, but we tell ourselves we’re not allowed to be weary. That would be like giving up.

Rest is a nice idea, a someday luxury for a less urgent time. We’ll save rest for the sick and utterly depleted, for those fighting illness or recovering from surgery. Maybe when you absolutely can’t keep going, and you’re forced to stop and catch your breath, you can briefly rest until you can amp back up again.  Rest takes us out of the fight, and that can make us feel like we're abandoning others.

This passage of scripture comes in the middle of a long rant of Jesus’ about how the people are missing the gift right in front of them.  And it begins with the part where Jesus pauses in talking to the people, and raises his face to the heavens in a mid- argument prayer.  Like an exasperated mom, he blocks out their whining for a minute, heaves a dramatic sigh and intones, Oh, Thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because, clearly, you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants…

Infants get it, and we don’t.

Here’s the thing: Infants don’t exist on their own. They come attached to a parent. Completely dependent. Known, loved and cared for, learning who they are and experiencing the world through that secure attachment. 

And beyond that, infants don’t do a darn thing, really. They don’t contribute anything to the household economy or pitch in a single helpful thing to the community around them.  They don’t seem to feel at all driven to accomplish anything at all. And they hardly ever compare themselves to each other, or to their developmental milestones, to gauge where they are lacking or take pride in how quickly they are advancing. 

Babies are completely unconcerned about persuading others to think like them, or judging those who don’t, and infants rarely obsess about the future.

And they are only children of their parents; their identity is from the ones who gave them life. It would never occur to a baby to imagine you feel anything for them other than unconditional delight and devotion.  

To be an infant is to be vulnerably and simply you.  You, belonging.  You, beloved.

At the very most core –babies are still completely connected to God, and they take for granted that we all belong to each other.

They rest in their reality; they trust:

My needs will be met.  

I can sleep when I am tired. 

I can eat when I am hungry.  

I can cry when I am sad.

I can close my eyes without fear.  

I am held by someone stronger than me.

I belong to these people. They belong to me.

The world is filled with beauty, wonder and love.

Jesus doesn’t say, Come to me you who are weary and carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you extra energy and the strength to power through.  I will give you an edge, a do-over or a bump up.   I will promote your agenda or satisfy your desires.  Jesus isn’t offering a strategy to win, or to overcome our humanity and need, to fix the world how we think it should be fixed. 

Jesus is inviting us to tell the truth with our lives, to live how we were made to live – attached to our source of life. To come back to the reality that babies still exist in, to return to the natural order of things.

Rest is part of the cycle of creation itself, hibernation, germination, night, day, winter, spring.  It is initiated, and in fact, commanded, by the creator of all, who rests. 

The Old Testament often refers to the promise of salvation as “coming into the rest of God.”  In other words, rest is what it feels like to be saved from whatever keeps us captive, released from whatever consumes us, freed from whatever enslaves us, restored from whatever disconnects us from God, and relieved of whatever keeps us divided from each other.  Salvation is coming into the rest of God.

But, especially in the midst of what feels like such a national crisis, how do we do it?  

How do we actually put down what is weighing on our minds and pressing on our souls?  How could we ever allow ourselves to?

He answers the how question too.

“Take my yoke upon you and learn from me,” Jesus says. A yoke is a wooden crosspiece that is fastened over the necks of two animals and attached to the plow or cart that they are to pull.

“Take my yoke upon you.” This is a straight up trade. Jesus says, I will release you from your work and give you a different job altogether.  I will unhook you from all that you are dragging around, and connect you back up to me, and you will carry what I carry into the world instead.

What are you weary of?

What heavy burdens are you carrying around? 

To what are you captive?  

What feels most pressing, most urgent, most demanding?

These are what Jesus will ask you to lay down. 

That feels terrifying.  Because the very things we are often most weary of, are the things we also believe define us, or the things we think can’t happen without us.  We tell ourselves they are our identity, our purpose, our reason for being.  And who would we be, without these things?  How can we be expected to lay those down?

The yoke we are given by the world, the one we instinctively pick up starts in the very earliest lie, which says we are in this alone and God can’t be trusted.  It goes on to convince us that the goal of life is security and self-sufficiency at all costs. Those around us are competition, threat and obstacle; there is not enough to go around, so guard yours well. It says that the powerful matter and the weak don’t, that having more makes you better, and that all human worth is earned. It’s all up to you, so never slow down, never give up, never let go, never lose your place.

That’s the yoke we are accustomed to being strapped into, the cart we are most often pulling behind us.  Regardless of how we each specifically fill it – this message is the gyst of it for us all.  And this way of life demands constant vigilance and self-protection.

We can easily see this mentality shaping the current regime, but when it comes to doing justice, fighting for rights, standing up for one another, this mentality also often shapes our actions.  Life is a battle. It’s all up to us. The “other side” is the enemy. Those who dehumanize others are less than human.  No rest for the weary – you must stay constantly engaged. You are not doing enough. You are doing it wrong.

Anger sets people on fire. Rage motivates, and fuels, and makes people show up and do good things.  But it only works if you continually stoke the fuel of despair and outrage, and even then it burns out quickly and leaves ashes and exhaustion in its wake. And then the people who care, and want to make a difference, feel guilty for not maintaining that level of urgency and involvement, for letting everyone (themselves, God, and especially the vulnerable) down. 

This is one way to carry the heavy yoke.

But there is another yoke. There is another way.

Jesus’ way, the Kingdom of God, says we are already connected to God, like infants to a mother. And life begins in abundance and gift.  Our God comes into this life with us in weakness and impossibility, and stands with the poor, the stranger, the abandoned and the overlooked. That’s where God already is; that is where you will always find Jesus.  
And you are loved already, just as you are, and you are not meant to be “perfect,” you are meant to be the only you God ever made, in all your glorious difference, alongside all these others who are different from you, but also who are in it together with you as, sister, brother, friend.  There is enough to go around, and life is for sharing.  And no matter what it looks like at any given moment, it’s all heading toward connection and wholeness, because God is the one who decides the end, and in Christ, it’s already been decided.  Living in freedom, connected to God and each other – this is Jesus’ “yoke.” Bearing this is what Jesus is inviting us to join him in. 

Our life could be dictated by the things we avoid or fear, by the expectations put on us by others, by our bosses or bank accounts, or by the desperation and urgency of the current national crisis.  This is an option, and it’s a compelling one at the moment.

Or we could turn to God, who is Lord of heaven and earth, and find ourselves along for the ride in Christ’s work of loving and healing a weary world in all sorts of unexpected, impossible and subversive ways.  

God’s way is not our way. All true transformation, healing and newness comes through weakness, futility and impossibility.  

Lest we forget: we don’t have a triumph and might faith, we have a death and resurrection faith.  

It’s our job to remind each other of that.

I love that in the Jewish understanding of Sabbath, the day begins at sundown. That means that rather than rest being a reward for a job well done, or a last ditch attempt to recover from hard labor or relentless fighting, rest is where it all starts.

Rest is where your being and your belonging begin. 

In rest, we trust:

my needs will be met.  

I can sleep when I am tired. 

I can eat when I am hungry.  

I can cry when I am sad.

I can close my eyes without fear.  

I am held by someone stronger than me.

I belong to these people. They belong to me.

The world is filled with beauty and wonder and love.

And when you wake, all your work and efforts and living flows from this rest, this place of groundedness, peace, salvation. 

When things feel most urgent, most pressing, most despairing, this is not the time to panic, talk faster, run harder, strive further. On the contrary, this is the time to stop. 

To return to the natural order of things, to come back to the reality that babies still exist in, completely connected to our source; belonging to God and belonging to each other. 

To let what we do and say next flow from salvation’s rest. 

From abundance. 

From trust that God is doing something, always, and that we have a place in that.

Our calling comes from who God made us to be, and God will give us a sustained and consistent way to join in, a way that wont deplete us and burn us out, but will fill us with purpose and joy, even in the midst of sorrow.  A way that will connect us more deeply with one another and make lasting change. 

Anger and disappointment come from a longing for what we are made for to be experienced – to live and feel the deeply held values that we know in our bones to be true - such as respect, mutuality, kindness, safety, well-being, contribution, belonging, to be heard and seen, etc.  When we stop and sit with this longing, even naming it in specifics, and let God meet us in our grief and our desire for wholeness, then, instead of lashing out in frantic activity, our actions will be guided, focused, joyful, even.  They will be grounded in connection and cooperation, instead of hovering in isolation and haste.  We will participate with hope instead of desperation, because we are not looking for might and triumph, we are not trying to win, or beat our enemies. Instead, we are watching for resurrection out of death, we are finding our humanity alongside each other, and we are joining in God’s ongoing salvation that began before us and will continue after us. 
This yoke is easy and this burden is light.

Jesus says Come to me.  And we are invited to answer,

Yes. OK. I will come.  I will lay down my burdens and my pride; I will admit my weariness, and I will welcome your rest. I wont let rest become a last resort, a contingency plan, a life-saving measure. I will come now. I will begin here.

Yours is the way and work I choose.

What will be your ways to say Yes this week?  

A whole day with the phone off, reading and napping by the fire, or wandering unhurried through the woods? 

A three-minute pause each day in your car before heading into work?  

Something creative or crafty, something you enjoy that fills you?

When things are noisy, where is your silence?

Where is your music? Where is your joy?  

Who are the people you look at that remind you that you love, and are loved?  

Where do you go for support?  For reminding?  For relaxation? For respite? 

What will be your Yes this week?

Listen again. These words are for you:

“Are you tired? 

Worn out? 

Weighed down by heaviness? 

Come to me. 

Get away with me and you will recover your life. 

I will show you how to take a real rest. 

Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. 

Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. 

I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. 

Keep company with me and you will learn to live freely and lightly.”

 (Mt. 11:28-30 adapted from The Message)