Song of Solomon 2:8-13 + Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
The last portion of the gospel reading for today is, I would wager, the second most recognizable piece of scripture after John 3:16. As with most of the classics of the New Testament, it sounds best in the King James Version:
"Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."
It doesn’t lend itself to banners at the super bowl or a nascar race like John 3:16 does, or enormous billboards on the side of a highway like some other verses, but it has a gravity and a sense of comfort that has emblazoned it on our collective mind and that has linked it, inextricably, to our national identity.
I was raised as a summer vacation bible school only kid for most of my childhood (mainly to give my folks a break for a week), so was basically a heathen, but it is telling that I was around 10 years old before I could be convinced that this verse was from the Bible, and not part of the Emma Lazarus poem found on the pedestal of the statue of liberty (Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free- that one).
This wasn’t just a rookie mistake- in Matthew’s words of shared burdens, I think, we identify a sense of our selves, our country as a beacon of open armed welcome, of refuge for the homeless and rescue of the tempest-tost from teeming foreign shores, though we don’t seem to want to live into this so much as of late.
In one commentary* I read in preparing for this morning it was pointed out that this passage from Matthew was viewed by many as a rebuke of the 613 laws that observant Jews were required to follow in their daily lives, kept most publicly by the Pharisees of Jesus’ day. Some have proposed that Jesus was offering a simpler way of being faithful that did not involve complicated purity or dietary laws, and this makes sense when the passage is taken on its own, but when read in the context of the wider gospel, this explanation doesn’t hold up. It becomes clear that the life of faith that Jesus sets out for his disciples, for instance in the Sermon on the Mount, is more rigorous than the piety of the day, not less, and Jesus makes strenuous demands of his disciples in previous chapters, going to great length to impress upon them the rejection and persecution they should expect to face as a result of following him.
Christian life should not be viewed simply as doing good. If that were the case, we could join any of a number of public service organizations doing all kinds of good both in the local community and the wider world, feeding the hungry, eradicating polio or malaria- and often with much more calculable results. Doing good is certainly a part of a Christian life, but isn't all-we are called as followers of Christ not only to live a life of loving our neighbors as ourselves, but to live a life defined by a blinding sense of God’s love, a life lived as a way to give glory to that almighty love that created us and gave us our being, redeemed us, and supports us still.
This is much more complex than adhering to laws- it means changing our entire orientation, moving the center of our lives from our own interests to God’s.
Loving God means respecting the dignity of every human being, really, even in the little things (and believe me I have struggled mightily with this part, particularly since that construction started outside of our parking lot on Wyandotte St!).
Loving Gods means forgiving those who have hurt you, and accepting the forgiveness of those you have mistreated. Loving God means putting aside fear and embracing this life that has been given to us as a gift, and it doesn't happen just once, it is a lifetime of turning our faces toward God, breaking open our stone hearts again and again and again and allowing them to be replaced with hearts of flesh.
Is there a more passionate, a more palpable description of that love we share with God than in the Song of Solomon? There is some confusion among biblical scholars about why this book was included in our scriptural canon; it is beautiful but there is no mention of God in it, no mention of heaven or hell, and in many ways it looks more like a popular song from tavern life, circa 1000 years before the birth of our Christ, sung from one lover to another.
Ultimately, this is why many think it was included in the Bible- as a love letter in which God worships us, worships the perfection of our being created by God’s own hands, assuring us of our worth by our precious value to the one who created us.
And so- we are not being let off the hook today, we are not being offered an easier way to live a life of faith. Instead, we are being offered a purpose, a future, one that demands everything of us and summons our best parts.
We are being called in the gospel today to open ourselves up to God’s love, to help make all of God’s dreams for us come true.
We are being called to accept the yoke of our gentle and humble Lord, and in accepting it to embrace a worthy life that puts our souls at ease.
AMEN
*Lance Pape in Feasting on the Word, Year A Vol. 3
