This sermon was written and recorded for both Grace Episcopal and St Mark’s Episcopal. I am indebted to Debie Thomas of Journey with Jesus for the guidance that brought this sermon into being after the disruption in my life by a recent injury.
Mark 6:30-34, 53-56
After their first season of evangelism, the disciples came to Jesus a whirlwind of chatter and excitement. They had gone out as he had sent them, two by two, with nothing but the clothes on their backs and the power of the Gospel. They had proclaimed release to the captives and salvation to the poor. They had comforted grievers and challenged divisive systems. They had laid hands on the sick and the disabled and watched miracles take place. They had looked evil in the face and cast it out, freeing the possessed and embracing those who had been cast aside. Filled with zeal and the overwhelming energy of a job well-done, they surrounded him. There were so many seeking them that they were unable even to eat, their basic needs neglected in the demanding work of healing. This passage includes many healings, but the first is often overlooked. The apostles came to Jesus overflowing with words, with stories of their accomplishments in the mission field, with ideas about what the next step might be. They came to Jesus self-assured in their striving, seeking their next assignment. In response, Jesus answers “Rest a while.” This is a story of healing, of Jesus seeing the drain of ministry in the eyes of his harried friends, and showing them the path to renewal. The rest that Jesus offers them is not earned. It was not promised, when Jesus sent the apostles out two by two, that they would have opportunity to rest easy. This healing, this rest, is freely given, an act of compassion for God’s children. Jesus feels compassion for his weary young students, just as he feels it for the crowds who are like sheep without a shepherd. Both groups receive healing at his hands.
Our Lord looked upon the faces of his friends and saw weary overstimulated travelers in need of rest, too overcome with the importance of their work to feel the exhaustion in their bones. Come away, he told them. Come away to a place all by yourselves and rest a while. The newly reunited band of friends was called away to retreat, to rest and recuperate and return to their center together. Rather than send them back out again on the momentum of their first journey, Jesus called the apostles to slow down, to tend to their own needs and their own close relationships with one another. No one knew more than Jesus how important the Gospel work of the apostles was, and it was for this very reason he called them to rest.
Even our most noble Christian pursuits can be corrupted if we neglect the command to keep our rest holy. The pandemic has taught us that there are times when the most Christian act is to step back, to say no to activities and actions and missions that, in the long run, might do harm to our neighbors. This is not inaction, but a different action, an end within itself.
We feel in our own restlessness the same urgency of the disciples, always looking ahead and outward toward the next need or destination. After over a year of trauma and grief and confusion, we feel a near desperation to return to the old familiar ways, and an equally compelling desire to throw open our lives to the never-ending list of opportunities we may have missed this past year. We look around and see pews that are emptier than we remember, event calendars that feel somehow both packed and light. We look in the mirror and realize we might be a little older than we realized, our mortality a little closer after a year under threat. It is tempting to, like the apostles, tumble forward into the deluge of missions and activities and opportunities before us, without regard for the impact our journey has made on our hearts, minds, and bodies.
The same needs, fears, and injustices that existed in our world before the pandemic still exist as it continues, and in many cases are worse. Layered on top of them is the universal trauma and exhaustion of a constant threat and loss of connection. We as people called to be healers must find compassion for both the needs of others and the trauma in our own exhausted souls. Our rest is not earned by our work or taken in order to make us more productive. It is an entirely faithful act, in and of itself, to come away with Jesus and our closest Christian family, tending to the bodies and relationships that have carried us this far on our journey.
Jesus and his disciples once again boarded a boat, departing for another shore in order to take some time to rest, to eat, to check in. I imagine the atmosphere must have changed drastically once the boat was safely on the sea. Away from the crowds, away from the constant demands of life on the road, the newly returned apostles released a collective breath. Jesus made space for them to share the harder stories, the disappointments and trials of their evangelistic efforts, the moments where they had to dust off their feet and move on before being driven out. By taking Jesus up on his offer to come away, the apostles were able to take stock of the totality of their journey, to seek to console and be consoled by one another. Even this brief retreat moved them in the direction of deeper discipleship, and brought them face to face with another shore, another group of people in need.
Their great commission, to proclaim the kingdom of God through word and healing action, is accomplished in the resting and in the reaching out. The same opportunities and obligations present themselves to us in this season of transition. If we are to reach the far shore, to see the whole board, to meet the needs of the waiting crowds, we must heed our savior’s call to come away. We must see in ourselves what Christ sees in us, whole individuals worthy of love and deserving of rest and renewal. We are not the saviors in our story, just as the apostles were by definition sent out with the power of Jesus’s name, not their own. Come away together, and share the whole truth of your journey with one another. Remember who sent you, and who will receive you at your journey’s end. Rest a while in Jesus. This too is Gospel work.
Mother A Writes 