Sunrise on the Sea of Galilee
There is a specific, fundamental dimension of our Christian faith that separates us from nearly all other major world religions. We see it clearly in our first reading this
morning from the Old Testament, and certainly in the Gospel for this weekend, as
well. Negatively speaking, we do not
believe that our faith is primarily a search for God or a quest to live as well
as possible on this earth in preparation for heaven. We are not, in fact, striving to make
progress in this life as we move towards God, who waits somewhere in heaven to meet us in
the end.
No, what we believe is precisely the opposite. What we believe instead, and what makes our religion
and our faith distinct, is that God comes to us.
God, who knows that we could never ultimately find Him and
make our way to Him by ourselves, instead comes to us in great mercy, with remarkable
gentleness and breathtaking humility. God reveals Himself, makes Himself
known. In our deepest need, our loneliest
moments and in those many experiences when we are never quite expecting
it, God comes near and seeks us out. He
finds us, and begins to guide us home.
In the first reading this weekend we listen to the words of
the prophet Zechariah. Zechariah is
writing to the people of Israel just after the Babylonian exile. Our reading takes place after one of the
darkest moments in their nation’s history.
They had flagged in their commitment to the covenant of God; they were
no longer faithful to the covenant relationship that God had made with
them. He had sent to them prophet after
prophet, urging them to return to fidelity and to faith. When they refused to listen He allowed them
to be carried off captive to the Land of Babylon.
They had lost everything.
The City of Jerusalem was in ruins and the Temple was destroyed. The Promised Land, where they had forged a
new life with God and had made a new beginning, had become nothing more than a
memory. They resided in Babylon for
years and many of them had died there.
Finally they are returning home and perhaps wondering how they will find
God or even if such a possibility exists for them. They had failed Him; perhaps they felt as if
God would now abandon them forever.
Suddenly the prophet Zechariah, at the outset of the
restoration of the city, announces:
Thus says the Lord:
Rejoice heartily, O daughter Zion, shout for joy, O Daughter Jerusalem! See, your king shall come to you; a just
savior is he, meek and riding on an ass, on a colt, the foal of an ass.
—Zechariah 9:9
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, in their writing of the
Gospels, will rightly see a direct connection here with the entrance of Jesus
Christ as the Messiah entering the City of Jerusalem just before His passion. God comes to us. In our darkest hour and our deepest need, He
comes to us. In great gentleness and
deep humility, He comes into our lives and creates a new beginning and a
restoration of hope.
Such is the case in the Gospel of St. Matthew this
morning. Jesus finds a people worn,
weary and heavily burdened. Who among us
could not identify with that! He sees a
people struggling to practice their faith and overwhelmed with the challenges
of life. He does not wait for them to figure everything out and make their way to
Him. No, He walks directly into their
lives—literally God stands in their midst—and beckons: Come to
me!
Come to me, all you
who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for
I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy and my burden light.
—Matthew 11: 28-30
God does not have the time for us to figure everything out
and make our way to Him. He comes
directly into our lives, with gentleness and humility, and creates a new
beginning for us. He joins Himself to us
with great love and teaches us how to walk with Him in this life and journey
with Him to eternal life.
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me . . . A yoke is a farm
instrument—in Jesus’ time it was made out of wood—which usually joined
together two oxen and allowed them to work in tandem as they plowed a field and
worked the land. Jesus is inviting us to
walk with Him, to learn from Him, to discover Him anew in our lives. He alone can give us rest, meaning and
purpose.
This is the great lesson we find in the lives of all the
saints. St. Peter and St. Paul, St. Augustine, St.
Teresa of Avila, and countless others; they all came to the end of themselves
and discovered that without Christ they could do nothing. Every one of the saints had to declare
spiritual bankruptcy before God and acknowledge that they were in desperate
need of a savior. They all took Christ
up on His offer, took the Savior seriously and joined themselves to Him. Will we?
Because we are all—every single one of us—called to be
saints. We are all called to holiness of
life and eternal bliss with Christ. And
no matter how far we may feel from Him or how weary we become with the challenges
and difficulties of daily life, there is always hope of that reality. No matter how lost we may feel at any time in
our lives, we can count on this: He will find us. He will come to us. He will invite us to be joined more
intimately to Himself.
Jesus Christ comes to us here, now. Whenever the Gospel is proclaimed, it is
Christ who speaks to us. Whenever we
gather together for the Eucharist, it is Christ who make Himself present in His
body and His blood. He comes to us this
morning, in great gentleness and breathtaking humility, in the humblest manner
under the auspices of bread and wine that will become our God, present: body
and blood, soul and divinity.
He comes to us today and invites us to Himself:
Come to me, all you
who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for
I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy and my burden light.
—Matthew 11: 28-30
