Come to me you who are weary

Posted

Raise your hand if you’re tired. Raise your hand if you’re anxious. Raise your hand if you’re ready for a return to normalcy. Did anyone have their hand down? I, for one, am tired and certainly ready for some normalcy. Nonetheless, as I and other parents look ahead to another semester of home-learning for our children, normalcy still seems a way off.

“Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28)

Christ’s words graciously sound in refrain through my mind. His words are more than an invitation; they are a holy calling. A little less than a year ago, we reflected upon the theological practice of Sabbath through our All Saints Adult Christian Education series. We were reminded of God’s commandment to the Israelites to rest from their labors every 7th day, and to keep this sabbath day— this day of rest— holy. Their resting would follow God’s own practice of resting on the 7th day of creation.

But God’s commandment to the Israelites was not only about the sabbath day, but about a regular pattern and practice of holy rest. In addition to the 7th day sabbath rest God called for the Israelites to observe a Sabbatical Year and a Jubilee Year. Every 7th year was to be the Sabbatical Year, during which the fields were to be left fallow and debts released. This is part of the law of the covenant made clear in Leviticus (25:1-7). And Leviticus teaches us that a series of forty-nine years (7 times 7) was to be counted; and every fiftieth year declared a special year—a Jubilee Year— during which there was to be no agricultural work; all landed property was to revert to its original owner; and slaves were to be set free (Leviticus 25:8-54).

Through Sabbath, Sabbatical Year and Jubilee Year, God creates and then invites God’s people into a regular rhythm of Holy Rest. And lest we, as Christians, are tempted to dismiss this invitation because we are people of the new covenant, we need to remember the Gospels telling of Jesus’s regular pattern of holy rest, when he would remove himself from the crowd and go to the mountains to pray.

Even in “normal times,” our daily lives contain stresses big and small. And we live in a culture that feeds us the unrelenting myth of the Urgency of NOW! Certainly, in a time as trying as this (what I am calling Coronatide— like Eastertide or Christmastide… but a lot less fun!) we are all in need of the wisdom and grace offered to us in the commandment to Holy Rest.

The commandment to Holy Rest— Sabbath, Sabbatical, Jubilee— graciously invites us to create times and patters of rest, and to exercise patience and trust in God, replacing ourselves with God as the center of our lives. When we stop and rest, we remember that we are not the Creator of the Universe, the Ruler of Time, the Savior of ourselves, but we are invited into a deeper understanding of our dependence upon God’s provision and our interdependence on one another.

I wonder, how are you who are weary and heavy-laden observing God’s commandment to Sabbath rest? What that you’re doing is restorative to your tired soul? What are you doing that you need to do less of to make time for rest and restoration? Remember, that these times of rest are holy. And if you can’t give yourself permission to rest, remember that God commands you to do so! That should absolve you of any lingering guilt.

So, grab a book, or close your eyes and nap on the couch, or walk gently in the mountains or on the shore. Pray. Wrestle with your kid, or have a one-person dance party, or fill the house with the smell of home-baked love. Pray. But whatever you do, make time to rest your burdens and your weary self in the loving arms of Christ.

–Rev. Aimée Eyer-Delevett