Sometimes, I struggle with all the structures and traditions of being “church.” I grew up with traditions, but I seem to have shed many of them - in a good way. Traditions are only traditions as long as they’re meaningful. Optimistically, I think that’s one of the reasons there are so many different churches. We each come to God our own way and some things are meaningful to some and not to others. If it’s not meaningful, if it’s not supporting God’s love and grace, encouraging and inspiring us to live it, then it’s just doing something that way because we’ve always done it that way. Or because someone told us to. That’s not meaningful.
Jesus ran into that. I think he was a good Jew who attended synagogue and learned the laws and traditions. But he brought something new to it, something that challenged the religious authorities when the laws and traditions weren’t reflecting the life giving love that God is all about.
Jesus offers a simple message of love and grace, of finding room in our hearts for God's love, and so many seem caught up in laws and traditions, more interested in judging their neighbour for how they behaved than loving them for who they are.
Really connecting with his human side, Jesus has a little bit of a rant, I think, in chapter 11 of Matthew’s gospel. People don't want to listen to his cousin John's message because he was too wild and different, but they don't want to listen to Jesus because he was too ordinary and hung around with sinners. They're like children who won't play each other’s games, but only their own. Some of the cities in which he and the disciples have done great things have virtually ignored them. If that had been a place like Sodom, Jesus says, the people would have seen their work and the city would have been saved.
Wow. Even a place like Sodom. That's pretty damning.
But that's the challenge Jesus puts out there. To follow Jesus is to take into your heart this message of love and grace and to really live it.
At first, those Jesus seems to be chastising in this story are those who don't hear the message. But then he points to the religious leaders, the keepers of the law, the scholars and teachers who use their knowledge and the letter of the law to resist the message that threatens their power. That's why the message is so readily heard by the powerless, the weak, the marginalized, the excluded - like children, Jesus says, they have no barrier to a love that welcomes and includes them, that cares for them and values them.
I think that's what Jesus means when he says this: “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 11:28-30). The weight of living up to the demands of society is heavy, the burden of following the letter of the law is exhausting. The hypocrisy of claiming the authority of the law and traditions but not living it an even greater burden.
But the "yoke" Jesus talks about binds your heart with God in living out this love he teaches. That is no heavy burden, but an enlightening of spirit. Learning to live that way is freeing and life-giving. It’s the heart of the law.
Hypocrisy is a lot of work. So is maintaining power over others, controlling them and judging all that they do. Jesus offers rest from that weight. Jesus offers the refreshing, enlivening, inspiring peace of God.
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