"Learn From Me"

“Come unto me, all who labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

These are Jesus’ words in Sunday Gospel. “Learn from me,” he says. If I learn from Jesus, what is it I learn? As I look at Jesus I see one who loves without condition. Matthew, a hated tax collector, is beckoned to with the words, “Follow me,” inducted into the inner circle. The woman at the well, whose checkered life made her a near outcast in her village, is engaged by Jesus without regard to her many marriages and her current living relationship outside of marriage. The woman caught in adultery is offered forgiveness and guidance without even asking for it: “Go and sin no more.” The man who lay beside the pool thirty years, longing for healing, is given that healing without a word of reproach or condition. Peter’s betrayal of Jesus is brushed aside with the gift of a new responsibility to carry on Jesus’ work of feeding the sheep.

Paul calls himself the “chief of sinners.” And in Sunday's Epistle, he is puzzled by his behavior. Like Paul, I do not understand my own actions, my reasons for not following Jesus as I wish to. I find myself uncondemned by any but myself. Forgiven and loved even when I don’t forgive myself or love myself. How can I not long to be like Jesus when I am transformed by him? His yoke doesn’t require that I follow impossible rules or that I meet impossible standards. His burden is that I accept his love for me, allow that to burn away the last vestiges of self, and become one who accepts others rather than tolerates others. Who heals others with a touch or a word or a smile, who is genuinely concerned with the welfare of others, not because it’s my job or a part of a deal I’ve struck, but because his Spirit lives within. Who loves others when they are hard to love, perhaps all the more because they are hard to love.

Shall we be this kind of person because we’re afraid not to be? Shall we be this kind of person because it’s a good thing to do? No. We will take up this yoke because Jesus has encountered us in our great need and dealt with us generously and we just can’t help ourselves. Therein is rest for the soul.

Peace,

Jerry+