Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
“But to what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another, ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.’ “For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon’; the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.”
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 who 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.”
Amadeo was a deadbeat dad with a drinking problem, no job, and still living with his mom. He is the protagonist in Kristin Valdez Quade’s book The Five Wounds. It's a fictional story about a three-generation Mexican/American family living in small-town New Mexico. One day, Amadeo’s 15 year old daughter shows up on his doorstep, 8 months pregnant.
This was bad timing for Amadeo who's trying to get his life together, if even haphazardly. He joined the local catholic brotherhood and was about to play “Jesus” in the town’s passion parade. Amadeo marched the streets carrying the cross just like Jesus, with nails actually going through his hands, and thinking that act would atone for all his sins and put his life in order. The rest of the story is about Amadeo trying to be the man he so desperately wants to be for his daughter, his grandson, his mother, and himself.
There’s a part in the story where things might take a turn for the better. Amadeo’s stopped drinking and he’s even started his own business, repairing cracked windshields. After a few weeks of passing out flyers his daughter made, he got his first job: his mother’s boss, a big shot in the town. Amadeo thought this would be the moment that would change everything: if he could just fix the windshield of an expensive BMW, everyone would come to him for work, he’d have money to support his daughter and grandson, his mom would be so proud.
And then like a trainwreck you can’t help but read, the job and Amadeo unravel in spectacular fashion. Amadeo pours too much resin on the crack; it begins oozing all over the windshield and down the hood. He runs to grab paper towel and as he attempts to wipe it off, he breaks the windshield further and fills the cracks with debris from the paper. The windshield is ruined, resin is stuck to the hood of the car, and Amadeo is in full panic. He has no idea how to fix it, and instead of confessing to his mistake, he runs as fast as he can to the nearest bar that’s open at 10am and begins to drink, leaving his mother to once again face the consequences of his mistakes. In the midst of all this,
Quade writes, “in his mind, his crime balloons to fit his shame. He can never catch a break, can never dig himself out of his hole he was born into, even though he tries. He was supposed to be past the shame and failure and the mistakes that hardly seem to be his own and that unravel beyond his control.”
I won’t give the ending away because its a story you should read. Amadeo is a hard character to like. I constantly found myself thinking, “why can’t you just get yourself together and do what you know is good or right”. Then, while reading Romans 7, I was reminded, harshly, that I am just like Amadeo. “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate; I desire what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.”
Don’t we all have that inner struggle of wanting to do one thing, yet somehow doing the opposite. You want to be a better friend, spouse, parent, child, or neighbor. You don’t want to lose your temper, or down that drink, or take that pill, or go to that website. You want to stand up for justice, to speak out against racism, read your Bible or pray more. And yet, somehow, we do the very thing we didn’t want to do.
Not a night goes by where I don’t think to myself, tomorrow is the day; tomorrow I will be more patient when Clive screams in his carseat; tomorrow I’ll eat better and walk more; tomorrow I’ll call that friend; I’ll be a better husband, a better pastor, a better Christian and I’ll do the good I desperately want to do. And without fail, the next day I do the opposite of what I wanted.
It's exhausting, is it not? To try and fail, try and fail, piling on more guilt and shame atop of the already crushing load you're carrying. If that is you this morning, if you are tired, weary, struggling with your own disappointment, hear Jesus' invitation to you: “Come to me, all you that are weary and carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest”.
Jesus takes our sin, our heavy loads, all the guilt we shoulder, and bears them on the cross, putting to death what we could not. In exchange, Jesus says, “Take my yoke (my teaching, my forgiveness, my grace) and learn from me (I know you want to live differently, let me show you how. I’ll not only show you, but I’ll empower you to do the good you long to do. And when you mess up or you don’t get it right, don’t fear or despair, rather hear the invitation to come to me afresh, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your soul through me.
But wait!, you say, “doesn’t Paul say that it's not me that's the problem but sin that dwells within me?!”. Yes, but this is not Biblical precedent to say “its just how I am”. Paul also writes, “Nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh.” To be clear, one’s flesh is not the same as one’s body. There is enough bad theology out there that says our bodies are bad. No, our bodies are good and holy, created by God. Flesh, according to Paul, are the desires we have that go against the good we know, causing the inner struggle we are all too familiar with. Yet, only by the forgiveness and grace of God are we no longer enslaved to our flesh.
Perhaps some of you are wondering this morning, is this invitation for me? Maybe my burden isn’t heavy enough or I’ve not tried hard enough. Jesus gives no qualifiers on “weary” or “carrying heavy burdens”. He gives no further description, no criteria to be met. He doesn’t say you have to be this tired, your burden needs to weigh this much, or that you must carry your load for so long. Jesus simply says “you who are tired, weary, carrying a heavy load, come to me, all of you, no one is excluded from this invitation and no amount is too many.”
“How” you ask, “how can I come to Jesus?” First, if you are asking that question, I’m confident that the Holy Spirit is already at work in you. Secondly, in our cries for forgiveness, in our laments for help, in our coming to the table, we are responding to the invitation. But lastly, perhaps it’s not so much us “coming to Jesus” as it is Jesus coming to us.
As Soren Keirkegaard puts it, Jesus “does not merely stand and wait, he goes to seek the sinner as the shepherd sought the strayed sheep, as the woman sought the lost penny. He has walked infinitely farther than any shepherd and any woman. He walked the infinitely long way from being God to becoming a person, he walked all that way in order to seek us… so do not stand still and hesitate… even if it seems as if you could not succeed in taking one more step, could not keep on one moment longer without collapsing, Come. Yet, if there is someone so sorrowful that they cannot come, a sigh is enough; sighing for Jesus is to draw near.”
Hear and heed the invitation, whether you run, walk, crawl, or sigh: “Come to me, all of you, and I will give you rest.” Amen.
