Skip to main content

Hearts to receive?

Our reading from Matthew (11:20-end) today begins with Jesus’ strong chastisement of what are called ‘the unrepentant cities’: Chorazin and Bethsaida as well as Capernaum. His words directly relate to the previous passages in which Jesus praises John the Baptist and expresses his frustration at the way the people speak about both him and John; verses 11. 18-19 ‘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.’

Jesus’ strong criticism of those who reject both him and John the Baptist is in stark contrast to the second half of our reading in which Jesus prays a prayer of thanksgiving to his Father. In it he praises his Father that his wisdom and truth is revealed to infants; and then Jesus makes a call to those who are weighed down with burdens, offering them an alternative way of life, a way which is gentle, easy and light.

‘Come unto me, ye that are heavy laden and I will give ye rest; for my yoke is easy and my burden is light’.

The movement in thought and emotion in this passage is a challenge to each one of us today. It is also an invitation. Jesus is clear that what he offers is received by those who are little; those who are small and humble of heart- willing to receive and to live in God’s alternative kingdom. We live, don’t we, tossed about by the day to day concerns and problems we encounter – and Jesus presents to us an attractive alternative, a life where our burdens are light, where we gain rest for our souls and where the yoke is easy.

How do we become part of such a kingdom? The link must be made back to how willing we are to receive from God – how willing we are to open our hearts to God’s loving word and to step away from the criticisms, condemnations and envy which make up the average human response to others.  Are we slow of understanding, always looking for fault, happy to condemn and reject? To those who have hearts to receive, Jesus welcomes them into a world of infinite goodness and mercy; to those who don’t, by their own action, they condemn themselves.





Comments

Post a Comment

Please be respectful when posting comments

Popular posts from this blog

Art and Imagination: the apocalyptic vision

Rev 12.7-12   Michael Defeats the Dragon   And war broke out in heaven ; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. The dragon and his angels fought back, but they were defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.  Then I heard a loud voice in heaven, proclaiming, ‘Now have come the salvation and the power    and the kingdom of our God    and the authority of his Messiah, for the accuser of our comrades has been thrown down,    who accuses them day and night before our God. But they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb    and by the word of their testimony, for they did not cling to life even in the face of death. Rejoice then, you heavens   ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Rugby

It has been just over three weeks now since we have arrived in Rugby and it feels like a world away from South London. If I was used to being in what is generally thought of and written about as a post-Christian secular world then Rugby looks and feels very different. There are a proliferation of churches across Rugby which are very active in working together for the good of the town. There seems to be a genuine Spirit of God's love working across Rugby in impressive ways that I'm not sure what century I am in! It is surprising to find a town that works so hard in regenerating and reinvigorating all that it is and it feels like an enormous privilege to be here.  Not that South London was any kind of spiritual desert! It was also a great privilege to work there and see how God can still be so central to people's lives in the 21st century. If the image we get from the newspapers and national media is that God is redundant in the modern age it seems that the reality is very ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Where was Jesus trying to take his disciples?

Addressed to the people of St Andrew's Church, Rugby: I would like to start with what will sound like a random question:  I wonder who we would be together if, for one reason or another, we were not able to worship in this building, in the centre of town? How, if at all, would our identity change? The Sabbath was and is something incredibly significant for Jewish communal self-identity; it marks them out as different. It gives them a weekly reminder that they live not for themselves, but for the God who made them. It is more than attending worship on Sunday – it is about a rhythm of life which resists the domination of work over rest and limits the human drive to create, make, accumulate, sell and work. Additionally it protects people from those with power over them to force them to work with no rest, for the whole household, livestock and alien must rest too. This is not a limited vision of rest, but a holistic vision of rest for the whole of created order. Let us...
Post a Comment
Read more